


Skulduggery Pleasant: Raising Cain

by GeckoLady



Category: Skulduggery Pleasant - Derek Landy
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:08:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 223
Words: 599,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25711132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GeckoLady/pseuds/GeckoLady
Summary: Valkyrie Cain, the adoptive daughter to the Dead Men, has had a life full of love and magic. But as she gets older, times become scarier and she finds herself fighting for her families lives more as war approaches. Very slow burn, very mature, OC girlfriend for Val.Includes all the Dead Men and a few ships for fun plus moreOriginally written on FF.net, but I know a lot of readers are here so I am branching out. It's going to take a while to get it all down, it's a long one!
Relationships: Ghastly Bespoke/Tanith Low, Saracen Rue/Dexter Vex, Skulduggery Pleasant/Solomon Wreath, Valkyrie Cain/Original Character(s)
Comments: 81
Kudos: 31





	1. Meeting the Gang

**Chapter 1**

* * *

**Stephanie is eight years old**

* * *

Stephanie ran into her Uncle Gordon’s arms for a hug.

“Oof,” he groaned. “You’re getting big Steph.”

“I’m just so awesome,” she said, backing up. “Need more space for it all.”

He laughed and led her into the house, waving Melissa off. Uncle Gordon looked after Stephanie every weekend and most days after school, and had done since he broke his arm a year ago and found he enjoyed the routine. It was a joke in their family now that Gordon was a second father, especially since her real father, Desmond, passed away when she was little. They got on extremely well, so much so that Melissa couldn’t deny her only child time with the man even though she was unsure of his books and some of his friends. She loved Gordon as a brother, so after a few weeks of begging, she allowed it, even letting her have a week with Gordon while she went on a holiday to Spain with her friends – and Stephanie was happy for her Mum. She deserved time away to be happy. She worked extremely hard. Gordon told her so.

“What are we doing this weekend?” She asked.

“Oh, I have a few ideas. But remember I also have to finish my book soon so I’ll have to work too,” he reminded her. That was okay, she had brought her homework and a book with her. For an eight-year-old, she was bright, smart and unusually quick to answer back though a lot of her humour was unappreciated by her family and teachers. It was probably also why she didn’t keep friends long, but with Gordon, she could embrace her full self and trade witty remarks without fear of being told off. He even let her _swear_ once.

They started the morning by taking a drive up to the supermarket and ran around the shop getting everything they wanted. That was followed by ice-cream and they returned to Gordon’s house to eat lunch and put away the food. Gordon liked to get work done in the afternoons so they had evenings to have fun again so she was sent to her room to do homework and read or play. She wasn’t allowed to leave the room.

“This house is so big,” he’d say when she asked. “You’ll get lost and I’ll never find you and your mum will have my head.”

So, she never left. It was an amazing room to be fair, and she even had a computer and all the new games and toys she could ever want, and Gordon’s friends would bring little things for her walls and all imaginable surfaces. The newest things, which she found as soon as she ran in, was sitting on her bed waiting for her. A tiny, tiny charm for her bracelet, made of some smooth stone, in the shape of a heart. She knew who this was from.

There were six of them, she was certain. She kept their things separate so she’ll know who got her what. She didn’t know their names though, so she gave them some herself.

This person always got her jewellery and pretty things, though usually not pink, and she called him Bear. It was rare to get something from him, but she always felt he really thought about what he got her.

Another person usually got her clothes, or shoes or bags or little purses or little toys. Everything always had animals on it and she adored it all. He was called Panda because of her favourite toy, the only gift she had taken home from Gordon’s.

Crow always got her silly things like sticks, rubber bugs and really random objects or books that she was confused by. He seemed a little strange, but it was always funny to her when she found his gifts.

Snakie got her pink everything, usually clothes, but they were always cool, like pink camo jackets, pink combat boots, a pink nerf gun with glittery bullets that exploded in gold when she shot them. Though they were pink, and she didn’t like to be a girly girl, she couldn’t help but embrace them with a big grin. She especially liked shooting Gordon with glitter bullets. He’d put the nerf gun up high on a shelf so she couldn’t get to it, but she knew she could get it down by standing on the chest of drawers below.

Weasel got her food more often than not, though he did occasionally send her tickets to an event of some type which she went to with Gordon.

Lastly was Wolf, whose gifts she would always take to Gordon to explain and show off. They were always exotic and fun, sometimes and instrument, sometimes a toy, sometimes jewellery, it seems random, but it was always different and intrigued her. Wolf had inspired her to learn dance, to her mother’s joy, and to find her singing talent. She hated singing in front of people because they would immediately want her to sing more and to other people. But she enjoyed it and liked to sing songs with her Mum.

Stephanie did her homework quickly with the stone heart charm in her little fist, and when it was stuffed back into its folder, she attached the charm to her bracelet and put it on. It was the perfect size and really pretty. Gordon said he’d get her a new bracelet one day, when she was older and bigger, and they’d put the charms on that one so she’d get to keep wearing the gifts.

She played with the doll’s house for a while, and the toys and tried to compete in a chess match against herself, turning the board for every go but she found herself being biased towards one colour when they started winning at the start and just gave up on the others and set them up for death, so she could win. Looking around the room of stuff, she wished she had someone to play with. So she played her favourite game – imagining she was on an adventure with her friends, with Crow, Bear, Panda, Wolf, Weasel and Snake.

She wasn’t sure why, but pretty soon into the game, she heard a noise outside the room. It had been a bang. She went quiet and listened carefully.

Nothing.

If it had been another day, she would have kept playing whatever game she had. But Stephanie and her imaginary friends had been playing ‘saviours’, where Stephanie would valiantly save all her friends from certain death, and now she was worried Gordon needed saving.

She opened the door very, very quietly.

“Gordon?” She whispered. Nothing. “Gordon?” She shouted. Nothing. “GOOORRRDOOOON!!!” She screamed. Nothing.

Things were serious then.

Stephanie bit her lip and left the room, something she had never done in the afternoons before. She knew where the office was, which was were Gordon was, a floor above her, so she snuck up the stairs and down the long hallway. She could see from a distance that his door was open slightly and there was light from the spring sun filtering through, and there was the murmur of voices too but she wasn’t sure if they were Gordon’s.

She snuck closer, stepping around the noisy floorboards until she was besides the door. She held her breath and looked into the crack.

She could see Gordon’s desk and there were three chairs in front of it, each of them filled though she couldn’t see who by. One of them was sat in front of Gordon so he couldn’t see her.

“How was your time in India?” Gordon asked suddenly. He was changing the topic, she could tell. “Find anything exciting? Any fun stories?”

The man snorted. “Nothing at all. I went for a month and I didn’t find a single mercenary matching their description. I just sort of wandered around.”

“You never were the best at finding people though,” another man with a velvety voice said. She’d heard that voice before but had never seen him. “You probably had drinks with them and didn’t realise.”

Gordon and the third man laughed. The first man looked at the second with a scowl and Stephanie got a look at his profile before he turned back to Gordon. He had dark blonde hair and a scruffy beard that wasn’t very long. “How is your book coming along? Am I going to be a hero?”

Gordon’s book was about her friends, Stephanie suddenly realised. Because these men _had_ to be her friends. She started to jig excitedly in place. She really, really wanted to meet them. Who would they be? What did they get her? What other stories did they have? What were their real names?

“It’s going well, thank you,” Gordon said. “And you hardly think I’m going to tell you that, do you?”

One of the men snorted. “You’d tell China.”

“Well, that’s here nor there,” Gordon claimed. “Did you get that information from her by the way? You never said.”

“Yes, I cracked that case a long while ago,” the velvet man said.

“We spoke about it this morning.”

“Really, the difference between a few hours and a few years is nothing.”

They laughed at the man and Stephanie giggled accidently. They went quiet and she held her breath. She was going to be caught. Oh no, where could she hide? Think, think…

Gordon opened his study door and Stephanie shut her eyes so she’d be more hidden. She heard his steps going up and down the hall, looking for her. “Stephanie, where are you? You’re not in trouble.”

Stephanie opened her eyes. She wasn’t in trouble? She wasn’t sure she believed him, but he couldn’t go back on it now he said it.

Gordon was further up the hall where it split into different halls going to other places. She carefully crawled out from behind the counter-thing she’d squeezed into a moment before and tiptoed into the study.

There, three men looked at her. She grinned and ran behind the desk and sat in Gordon’s big leather chair.

“Good day,” she told them and giggled.

They grinned back. One had his face covered with glasses, scarf and hat, another was the dark blonde man with the stubble, and the last was a man with a lot of scars. Stephanie was a little shocked at his appearance but next to the man covering his face she could only assume he was getting off lightly and gave him a bigger smile. Her Mum always said to be nice to people no matter what they looked like and she didn’t want to seem rude.

“You’re my friends,” she whispered. “The ones who keep bringing me things.”

The one with scars laughed deeply. “Yes, I suppose we are.”

“You’re little Stephanie,” the dark blonde one grinned.

“Of course,” she rolled her eyes. She turned to the covered man. “Why are you hidden?”

“I’m sorry?” He asked.

“Why are you hiding?”

“I’m not. I’m right here.”

“Your face,” she specified, giving him a look of attitude her mother wouldn’t like.

“Well, I have a hideous face,” he said.

“Oh. You’re the one who brings weird things, aren’t you? Why do you do that?” She questioned.

He tilted his head. “I do not. I bring things that will aid your development.”

She frowned at him. “Like plastic bugs?”

He hesitated. “Yes.”

She shook her head. “Who are you?” She asked the other two.

“My name is Ghastly,” the scared one said. “I’m a tailor.”

“I’m Dexter. I’m awesome.”

“So am I,” she grinned. “Do you bring all the different thing from everywhere?”

“I suppose so. Do you like them?” He asked.

“I love them! I have everything in my room, you should come see!”

Gordon came into the office then. “Stephanie!”

He looked mad.

“Oh, sorry Uncle Gordon,” she said, trying to look sorry. “I forgot you were going to get lost.”

The others tried to smother laughs.

“I didn’t know where you were. Why did you leave your room?” He asked more kindly.

She shrugged. “You walked right passed me so I came and met my friends. I was going to show Mr Dexter my room. I haven’t even told them my nicknames for them!”

“What’s my nickname?” Wolf – Dexter – asked quickly.

“Wolf,” she grinned excitedly.

Dexter grinned but Gordon shook his head. “Come on, back to your room.”

“What?” She asked, really upset. “But I only just got to meet them! I want to play a game. I want to know were all those things came from, I want Panda to teach me how he makes stuff! I don’t know what being a tailor is yet!”

“No,” Gordon said, picking her up. She was about to start squirming but didn’t want to have a tantrum in front of her friends. That was just embarrassing. “I told you to stay put.”

“I heard a bang. I thought you were alone and hurt. I wanted to help.”

“You don’t have to worry about me,” he said. “Now say goodbye.”

She looked at her three friends with big eyes and they filled with tears. When would she see them again? “I want a hug.”

She was let down and she hugged Crow first because he was nearest before hugging Panda, Ghastly, in a tight grip, and finally Wolf, who was actually Dexter. “Be good,” he told her, “and we can talk another day.”

She squeezed him tighter. “I’m not leaving.” He laughed and squeezed her tighter too and they started a squeezing competition. “I’ll squish you!” She shouted. “No Gordon! I have to squeeze his butt off!”

Wolf roared in laughter and Gordon finally pried her away. “I love you,” she said, and she was forced from the room trying to see them again.

Gordon shut the door softly and took her back to her room. He sat on her bed and she looked at him from the middle of the room for a moment before sitting beside him.

“Are you upset?” She whispered. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

He sighed. “It’s alright.” He looked at her with a smile, but she could see he _was_ upset. “I was just worried when I couldn’t find you.”

Stephanie gave him a hug. “I love you.”

“I love you too Steph.”


	2. Permanent resident

**Chapter 2**

* * *

**Stephanie is nine**

* * *

The death of her mother had rocked Stephanie greatly. At the start she could only think about how she was gone, about her hugs and kisses and what she was going to miss the most. Losing her dad hadn’t been this bad but she had been little then. She didn’t even remember him. Now she was older, and she understood. She’d never see her Mummy again.

How was she ever meant to go back to normal?

She hadn’t been scared, though, and she knew her Mum would be proud. First, Uncle Fergus had shown up and taken her to his house. She didn’t like it there but she was given a hot chocolate and the twins weren’t in sight and Beryl was very quiet so she didn’t care. Then she got picked up by her grandma and was told she’d stay with her for a while, which was nice but it was Grandma that explained that her Mum was gone forever and was in heaven. She just cried and missed her. She didn’t even know if Heaven was real! What if it wasn’t and her Mum had disappeared? What if she was somewhere else? It just didn’t make sense and all the questions made her feel like she was going crazy.

That Friday, six days since Melissa died in a car accident only a few hundred yards from the building that her husband had fallen from when it was still being built, resulting in his own death, Gordon came to Grandma’s house while she was asleep.

She crept to the top of the stairs, immediately happy to hear his voice from her bed.

“-with me,” Gordon was saying. “Melissa already arranged it that way.”

“Then where were you Gordon?” Her grandma said with more anger than Stephanie had heard before. “Honestly, you are a bad influence on that girl. What makes you think you deserve her? She needs stability, not _you_. You have to be the last person she should be visited by when she’s so upset, and I intend to not let you see her _again_.”

That was when Stephanie got scared.

She ran to her room and got her backpack and quickly filled it with all the things she had been given when family had visited, all brought from her house. Her Mum’s house. She didn’t have much and quickly grabbed her toy panda from Panda and bolted down the stairs.

“-we’ll see about that!” Her grandma shouted. She was in Gordon’s face and he was white with anger and his fists balled.

“It should be her _choice_ Veronica! At any rate, it’s in the Will! _I’m_ her godfather, _I’m_ her guardian and _I_ have full custody! If she wants to stay she can, but I won’t just leave her and not come back,” he growled out at her.

“How dare you–”

“I want to go with Gordon.”

The who adults jumped and looked at Stephanie. She was still in her little shorts and top, her hair probably all over the place. She walked to her Grandma and gave her a hug.

“I love you,” she said softly. “But I want to go with Gordon.”

Grandma started to cry but after a lot of hugging, she was finally pried away by her uncle and he took her to the car. They drove in silence.

She wasn’t scared anymore. In fact, she was a tiny, little bit excited that she might see her friends again. That would be fun, even if she was still upset and missing her mother. She smiled and drifted to sleep.

.*****.

“AAAAAAAAGGHHH!” Stephanie shouted, throwing a snowball over at Gordon. It hit his head just as he looked over his fort. “YYYYEEEEAAAHH! I am the victor!”

“Never!” And he got her on the shoulder.

Stephanie laughed and continued to scream and pelt him with snowballs. When they were finished trying to annulate each other, they went inside to get hot chocolate. Stephanie sat on the sofa in the living room, blowing the hot liquid. It would be Christmas in a few days and the big Christmas tree was almost hovering off the ground because of all the presents that were stacked underneath. Stephanie had bought Gordon and her six friends gifts which Gordon promised to take to them. She was also going to bake some biscuits which he said he’d get to them too. That was tomorrows job. The rest of it was for her.

Sometimes she felt bad that they always bought her things. But it wasn’t like she made them do it, so she didn’t think about it much.

“So, what are you hoping to get for Christmas?” Gordon asked her, sitting across from her.

“You know what I want,” she said, taking a sip finally. It almost scalded her tongue. “I want to see my friends.”

He sighed. “Why can’t you want fun things like TV’s and games and money?”

“I can have a TV?”

“No. But that’s what you’re meant to want,” he told her. “Not even a book?”

She shrugged. “That would be nice, but I’d really like to see them.”

He smiled at her. “You know I can’t let you do that. I’m sorry Steph. I just want to make you happy, you know.”

She smiled weakly. “I know. I love living with you. I just want to see them.”

“When you’re older, I promise. When you’re older we can all go on holiday, we can do anything you want. You’re just too young at the moment. You’ll get hurt.”

She nodded and tried to think of what to do to make him see her as stronger and older. She bit her lip. “How would I get hurt visiting someone?”

“Because of their jobs. They take down bad guys, and you’re too small. And don’t act like you wouldn’t get involved because we both know the first thing you’ll ask after you meet them is to go and work with them!”

Stephanie hesitated and decided it was best not to push. “Maybe I could do something now then, before I meet them? Like learning to fight. Then I’ll be really strong when I’m older.”

He grinned. “Now that’s a good idea.”

.*****.

It was summer again and almost Stephanie’s tenth birthday. In the nine months since Christmas, she had grown almost two inches and she’s been doing really well at learning to fight. She had been allowed to join a junior Muay Thai class Monday and Thursday and a boxing class Friday, and a morning kid’s fitness club Gordon would take her to near the school. There were mostly older kids there, but since she had started after a few months of fighting, she was good enough to keep up. On Tuesday and Wednesday evenings she swam, and it really helped her relax and wind off steam from school. She really didn’t like school.

The weekends were strictly for her and Gordon, and a little homework time, so Stephanie was looking forwards to tomorrow when they would get to go to a theme park, and the day after was her birthday. It was going to be a good birthday, especially since school had been so bad since she started. Year Five was not fun!

“Steph, are you ready?” Gordon called from the hall. “And have you seen my keys?”

“Here!” She grabbed Gordon’s key’s and they drove to the small gym where a load of kids were already standing around outside. She supposed it was still alright weather to do the class on the grass.

“I can’t wait until we start training inside again,” she moaned. “I like inside.”

He grinned at her. “You’ll be alright. Now go kick their arses! If I get back and you’re not in trouble I will be _deeply_ disappointed young lady!”

Stephanie laughed and ran to joined the group. It was a good lesson and she had progressed enough that their teacher, a young man called Cory, allowed her and one of the older kids – they were all boys except for her – to spar.

“I can’t spar her!” He said, thrusting his small training glove at her. “She’s a girl!”

Stephanie put her mouth guard in and crawled into the ring. They had gone inside for the sparing. Gordon entered the building and waved to her. She grinned and waved back.

“Mate, just spar her. Trust me, she’ll be fine,” Cory told him. “Now get in there.”

The boy, maybe twelve and not much bigger than her though she could see he had more muscles, got in but he didn’t look happy. “I’m not fighting you,” he said lowly to Stephanie.

She frowned. “Why not?”

“You’re a girl!”

Stephanie rolled her eyes and punched him in the nose.

The boys mum was not happy with her. She had broken her poor boys nose and he had been crying all the way to the hospital to get it fixed. Their trainer had kept her behind while they got it sorted and then high-fived Stephanie when he was gone and sent them on their way.

“I did it,” she claimed, sitting back in the car. “I did what you said. I win.”

“You did,” he grinned. “You have a mean punch.”

“I have,” she said seriously. “I want to meet my friends and go on adventures.”

His smile lessened but she felt he was not exactly upset. “So, what do you want for your birthday?”

She snored. “I want to see my friends still. Obviously.”

“When you’re older Steph. I promise. I’m going to tell them all about this though.”

She grinned. “Awesome.”

.*****.

Secondary School was not fun. She had thought Primary School had been bad. This was a lot worse. She hated Secondary school. Who did Mrs Miller think she was? Idiot. Bitch. Idiot bitch.

“Steph?” Gordon called up the stairs as she stomped away. “What happened?”

“Nothing,” she growled, stomping to her room. She hated school.

She dumped her bag by her bed and lay against the pillows. She’d had it redesigned for her eleventh birthday, choosing to get black display cases for all her gifts and lots of book space, a long desk, big bed and fluffy rug. The two big windows showcased the front garden beautifully and she got to see every time her friends came over. She never saw them themselves though. Not even from their cars. They were always blackened, and she couldn’t help but feel left out and upset that they didn’t want to see her. They still left her gifts, but a friend to talk to would be more appreciated.

“Steph?” Gordon asked quietly. “Can I come in?”

She shrugged, looking out the window. He sat at the end of her bed.

“What happened?” He asked.

“Nothing.”

“Please. I’m not that stupid. Tell me what’s up.”

She thought about it for a moment. “I hate Mrs Miller.”

“Why’s that?”

“She’s nasty.”

“How?”

“She said something nasty.”

“What did she say?”

“We got in an argument. I was making a drawing on my book, and I know that’s wrong, but she screamed at me in front of the whole class and then ripped my book apart.”

“What book?”

“My school one, the one I write in! She pulled out the page with pictures on it, even the one with things in the margins and put it all in the bin.”

“I feel that’s not everything,” he said, putting a hand on her knee.

She shook her head. “She got in my face and said ‘Do you think you’re smart? You’re going to grow up to be an idiot and never do anything in your life. Your parents will wish they never bothered having you, they’ll wish they never knew you at all. Do you want that?’ and then she made me stand in the corner, but I refused, and she told me to leave the room, and I did, but I heard her say under her breath, ‘No wonder she has no friends.’ Who does that? This isn’t a – a – a fucking _movie_!”

He kissed the top of her head and let her language slide. “Let me call the school.”

She nodded and waited until she thought he was far away from the room before she cried in her arms.

Later that night after a takeaway pizza and ice cream, Stephanie lay in bed with her eyes closed, trying hard to fall asleep.

Her door opened.

“She was so upset,” Gordon said softly from the door. Stephanie tried to be as asleep looking as possible. “I’m worried about her.”

“She doesn’t seem to get on with people her own age well,” Crow’s velvet voice said. She really wanted to get up now. “Perhaps you should reconsider our agreement.”

Gordon made a tutting sound. “I want Stephanie to have every opportunity in the world. Going on adventures is one of them but until she’s at least a little older she won’t be able to realise the hardship and pain that comes with that type of life. I want her to be certain, not hold her back. Just give her a little longer having fun.”

“I understand,” Crow said quietly.

Her door shut.


	3. It's a girl!

**Chapter 3**

* * *

**Stephanie has just turned twelve**

* * *

For her twelfth birthday, Stephanie wanted to see her friends and she was refused. So, she asked her friends, through Gordon, to see her. Gordon refused, and they had had an argument. It seemed so petty now, to have had such a silly argument when she now knew that he just wanted to make sure she had every chance to do everything and anything in the world, but it had hurt that she couldn’t at least see them over lunch or go on walks with them.

At Gordon’s funeral, she had wept her eyes out, the only one crying. She had overheard the rest of her family in the parlour of their home, Gordon and Stephanie’s home, chatting ideally about who got the fortune, who got the house, who got the kid. She had screamed at them and then had to sit in the car with them looking ashamed of themselves going to the burial site. They tried to comfort her, but the damage was done. Honestly, she was more upset about the argument they’d had weeks ago and apologised for, and of her relatives, than she was that she was at the funeral of the last person that cared solely for her being her.

The rest of her was numb. It had happened again. It was hard to not look at things with irony and with cynicism when this was the _third_ parents figure that had died.

She had seen her six friends in the corner, all in black suits and looks of genuine upset on their faces but hadn’t dared go up to them. Gordon hadn’t wanted that. She fiddled with the priceless emerald necklace Wolf, who was really Dexter, had sent her after she had won a dance competition a few months ago.

The wake was a little easier as the coffin was out of sight and it felt a little more final. She had been told by her Grandma, who had picked her up from the police station after Stephanie had called them to report Gordon being dead in his study and thus taken her in temporarily since she was a minor, that the funeral was being taken care of by Gordon’s friends. The ‘Reading of the Will’ was partway through the wake, though only a few of them were leaving.

Stephanie was led by her Grandma out of the wake after a wonderful meal at a fancy restaurant, Gordon’s favourite – she’d ordered his favourite, no one else had that she had seen – and into a small back room where a short man with massive pores all over his face stood with a hunch back and awkward smile. She looked at her Grandma over her shoulder and the woman shrank away a little.

She’s been very harsh and vocal about Gordon earlier. Stephanie, Ireland had found, was a much louder shouter than her. She didn’t want to see her again after today.

She sat it one of the chairs, purposefully not looking at the others in the room. The door was closed. She took a deep final breath. This was it. Then it was over, and she could go back to her life. She was a fighter. She could do this.

She looked at the man squarely, who avoided her steely gaze, and went for the least harmful participant, Beryl.

Times were rough for this little man.

“Can we start now?” Beryl quipped. “I want to get back home soon.”

“Yeah, we have things to do today,” Fergus frowned at him.

Stephanie glared at them and bit her tongue.

“Erm, yes, that is everyone after all. Firstly, allow me to offer my deepest condolences to you, his friends and family. I understand this is a–”

“Can we please skip this part?” Fergus asked. “I want to know who gets the boat? The house?”

“The royalties,” Beryl joined.

“The fortune.”

“Of – of course,” he said, adjusting his glasses and looking at his paper. “To my dear brother Fergus and your beautiful wife Beryl, though we have not always agreed or, indeed, enjoyed each other’s company, I have always respected your steadfast ability to ignore great details. I wish I could have seen the world through your eyes sometimes. To thank you for your company as children and through the years since, I leave you this. I hope you enjoy it as much as me.”

The man brought out a small box. They stared at it before slapping each other’s hands and Beryl snatched it up. She opened it and went deadly white.

“What is it? A pin number? A key? A bar of gold? Wife, show me!” Fergus worried.

“A broach,” she said faintly. “He gave us a broach.”

Fergus looked sick. “What else do we get? Come on man, there has to be more!”

The little man wet his lips and Stephanie glared more at her least loved uncle. “I’ll have to read on. ‘To my long standing friends, Ghastly Bespoke, Anton Shudder, Erskine Ravel, Saracen Rue and Dexter Vex, I have only advice. Remember that though you may all wish for different things, reality is a lot simpler than you first think. I found that in my, albeit short, life that all I thought I wanted to possess and worked hard to make happen was not what I truly needed, nor what gave me joy. I hope you achieve what took me so long to find and can find the brotherhood I feel you have begun to forget.”

Stephanie looked at them slowly, her eyes softening. She knew they had once been soldiers. War was not kind, or so she’d been told, and she had learned a lot about PTSD and other soldier things when she was at school once. She hoped they found what they needed too. They hung their heads in to mull over their late friend’s advice.

“And to my perfect niece, Stephanie Edgley. When I saw you in the hospital for the first time, I fell in love. I loved you and always have since the moment I saw your little feet in the air and you chewing your teeny tiny fingers. I am so, so sorry that you have had to lose both your parents and now myself. I never wanted this to happen. You wanted me to be there so badly, and I know I have made mistakes and I worry that I made a massive one it not allowing you to see our friends. I only wanted to do what I thought was best for you. I hope that I make up for it here. I know this is what you need in your soul. I think this is the path for you, and I am certain you will see it too. So I leave you, firstly, something to think about: Even some butterflies are poisonous. The world is so much darker than you think, but holds beauty you cannot even begin to imagine. So I hope you take to heart my warning to be tough, but never rough. To be quick but never dismissive. To be upfront but never horrid. To be blunt but never enjoy the pain. To fight harder, tougher, longer, stronger, smarter and with wit, more than anyone else in the universe, but never forget your heart and those you shelter in it. You are my daughter in soul. You have made me so proud already. And, with every expectation you will be the bluntest, sharpest, prettiest woman to rule the world, I leave you my fortune, my home, my villa, my boat, my car and every asset and net worth to my name, including all the royalties from my work to receive upon your eighteenth birthday. Don’t spent it all at once.”

Stephanie tried to memorise his words. She wanted to make him so proud. She nodded at the man to continue before her relative could make an argument.

“And finally, to my dearest friend Skulduggery Pleasant, some more advice, though I know there isn’t much more to give. Use your eyes. I know what you need and want, and it is all in front of you. Grasp it and never let go. Take it down kicking and screaming. And remember, my niece is a lot more hard-headed than you think. I leave you sole custody of her to raise as your own and to take on as many adventures as you can. She will be the Dead Men’s prodigy. The greatest force this world has seen. She’ll need her brothers-in-arms to make it through this world. She loves you all so much.”

The man lowered the paper and Stephanie stared at the man in shock. All of them were staring at her. The minutes dragged on. Fergus and Beryl launched out their seats and slammed the door behind them at some point. The will-reader left too and Stephanie could only stare at the wall.

“Well, that happened,” she said quietly, looking slowly at Crow who was standing in the corner. Crow. Skulduggery Pleasant. “Hi.”

Panda stood up slowly and stood behind Crow. He placed his scared hand on his shoulder. “Congratulations. It’s a girl.”

Wolf jumped her and pulled her into a hug. “I have a sister! I always wanted one. How did Gordon know?”

“Gordon’s pretty great like that,” she murmured. “I should probably – I don’t – I’m sorry.”

She felt the first tear fall down her cheek and had almost made it to the door when thin arms wrapped around her and pulled her into a wide, cold chest. She tried not to sob.

“I’m so sorry for your loss,” he whispered to her.

She hugged him back and finally, after a week of numbness, the sobbing came.

He carried her to the car and set her in bed after she had passed out, exhausted.


	4. First day on the job

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 4**

Stephanie woke up in the morning to an empty room but the sound of a lot of activity. She groaned, remembering exactly what a blubbering mess she had been the day before, but then she remembered that this was her house and her friends were here and they owed her a lot of hugs, especially now they were her brothers. How dare they be her brothers for – she checked her phone – twelve hours and she only got a hug from anyone but Skulduggery!

She stomped from the room and found them scattered in the hallway with various pieces of furniture and objects.

“Unacceptable!” She shouted at them. They all went silent and looked at her nervously. “How dare you!”

Dexter stepped forwards and put his hands up when she glared. “Stephanie, we thought you wouldn’t mind if we did some changes. We thought you would like it if you didn’t have to move home, you see, and we were moving out things–”

“Unacceptable! You did all this, made _plans,_ and I haven’t even gotten any hugs. It’s not fair!”

She stepped forwards and clutched Dexter in a hug as tight as she could. “I love you!” She shouted into his chest.

He started laughing and hugged her back. “I love you too.”

She moved onto the others, getting better hugs as she went down the maturity scale, leaving her finally with Snake. “I got you a present,” he declared and looked around. His grin was replaced with a frown. “I lost it.”

Stephanie laughed and left to get herself breakfast since all they were doing was moving boxes into the bedrooms next to hers. When her stomach was full, she went back up to find the place clear of almost everything and the big man was carving names into some of the doors expertly. They were really nice – Erskine, Saracen, Ghastly, Anton. “Whose Anton?”

“Me,” he grunted.

She grinned. “I like that name.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ve always called you Bear.”

“Why?”

She shrugged. “I gave you all nicknames. They’re fun, and I was little when I did it.”

He nodded and got back to his work so she left him and used the bathroom at the end of the hall – there was one on either end, luckily, and the rooms were large enough that they were not actually that close to each other. She’d have to really shout to get someone’s attention if they were at the other end of the hall. When she was ready, she went downstairs to the living room to find her friends sitting in there looking quite at home. It made her smile. They looked like a family.

Her smile faded.

She felt a little excluded with them looking so happy and close. They knew each other from every angle. She couldn’t compete with that type of friendship, couldn’t dominate that type of love. Where would she fit now Gordon wasn’t here to help her?

“Steph!” Dexter said, spotting her first. “What are you doing standing around? Come sit.”

There were no seats so Stephanie dragged the bean bag into the middle of the room and sat in the centre. Gordon said she if she was unsure, get right in the middle. She was probably misunderstanding but she was doing it, right?

“What are we doing today?” She asked them.

“Well,” Skulduggery, Crow, said, “I think a talk is necessary before we do anything.”

Ghastly, Panda, nodded. “Your uncle wanted to wait but this is different.”

Crow nodded. “Usually I would try to respect Gordon’s decisions even when he is not around but in this case our hands are simply being forced. Stephanie, do you believe in magic?”

And that was how she learned about magic. About skeletons and mages and fire and Elementals and Adepts and that her uncle had tried to keep her from such incredible things.

“Why didn’t Gordon want me to know about this?” She asked, feeling a little resentful.

“Your Uncle wanted you to understand the repercussions of making life decisions before you had to make one. I know that it may seem like he held you back from this, but he really just wanted to make you happy.”

Stephanie mulled it over in her mind. She supposed that was possible. It sounded like something he’d said once, so…

“Okay. So what are we doing today?” She asked again.

“Well, there is one more thing we need to tell you,” Panda said, scratching the back of his scared head. “Your uncle…”

“He was murdered,” Stephanie said. The others were incredibly quiet and looked almost guilty. “Yeah… I sort of got the impression when you started talking about that Serpine man, and how angry you are, and how much you all hate him, and how he keeps killing people. It was suspiciously stressed upon. I mean, it feels like you sort of wanted me to work it out. But Gordon told me you guys take down bad guys all the time. So you’re going to track him down, aren’t you?”

There was a long silence. “Fuck, this is going to be fun,” Wolf laughed, standing and pulling Stephanie into his arms. “Come along little brothers, we have a case to solve!”

Stephanie laughed and banged her head against the top of the door frame and laughed even more, falling over Wolf’s shoulder and just sort of hung there laughing. They were followed out to the cars. Panda’s van was there and so was Crow’s beautiful Bentley.

“So,” Wolf said when they were standing in front of their options. “Do you want to go with Skulduggery and visit China for information or do you want to go with Ghastly and help him make you some awesome new protective clothes?”

Stephanie pretended to think about it. “Crow. But I want to help afterwards.”

“That’s my girl,” and she was let down to get in the car. Wolf opened the door and pulled down the front seat for her. “In you get.”

Stephanie looked at the car. She looked at Wolf. “No.”

He hesitated. “Why?”

“I call shotgun.”

He grinned and she almost grinned back. “But I want shotgun.”

“I called it first,” she informed him. “Now get in.”

He sighed but did get in and Stephanie allowed herself to grin. It was a silly victory, but it was so fun to boss Wolf around.

Crow joined them and the three drove into the city to a residential area to park. Stephanie wasn’t worried about the car as she was too busy laughing with Wolf as he showed her his purple electricity magic.

“Aww, come on Crow,” she said, looking over her shoulder. He looked grumpy. “It’s not all that bad.”

He shook his head. “I promised Gordon I’d raise you into a respectable young woman with good prospects and without bias. Dexter is ruining that.”

“Are you saying Wolf is going to ruin me?”

“Yeah, don’t be so mean to my Cub!” Wolf defended her, putting an arm around her shoulder.

“I will not be ruined by anything. I am quite happy here. I’ve wanted to get to know you all since I was a little kid and go on adventures and solve cases and have fun. I’m doing that. Isn’t that exactly what Gordon would have wanted?”

He sighed. “Of course,” Crow admitted. “But not like this.”

Stephanie didn’t have an answer to that. She just asked Wolf if he could electrocute her if he used his magic with his other hand if he was holding her. He laughed but she felt like electricity would flow through him to her – it wasn’t _that_ bad of a question.

Crow went ahead of them into the dingy old building and the two made a ruckus laughing and joking about falling through the stairs. “You two need to quieten down,” Crow told them. “China won’t be happy if you don’t stop.”

“Whose China?” Stephanie asked.

“China is a lady I often go to for information. She is the most beautiful lady in the world and people fall in love with her on sight. She abuses that love and makes them bring her things for her collection. She owns a library, you see.”

“Oh. She doesn’t sound the nicest.”

“She isn’t,” Wolf said, more serious than she’d seen that day. “China isn’t to ever be trusted, but she is a good ally, and very useful for getting information. People talk to her you see. And one more thing before we go in,” he said as they stood in front of a man with a bow tie. “Do not tell anyone your name. If you do they can control you, remember?”

She nodded. “Never.”

“That’s my Cub.”

They went silently through the aisles of the library in search of the beautiful lady. Stephanie had been worried she wouldn’t know it was her but as soon as the woman was in front of her she could do nothing but stare entranced by her. She wanted to fall to her knees, kiss her feet, do anything and everything for her.

“China,” Crow said, “stop it.”

The wonderful creature laughed, making Stephanie think of little crystal bells blowing in the breeze, and the feeling of absolute devotion lessened to a minor obsession. “I’m sorry, I forget what effect I can have on new people, especially the young. Allow me to introduce myself: I am China Sorrows. And you are?”

Stephanie almost told her but Wolf squeezed her shoulder, where his arm still lay, and she shut her mouth again.

Wolf rolled his eye. “She’s too smart to fall for that.”

China grinned, and Stephanie felt she was being mocked. It certainly let her shake off a little more of the overpowering emotions she was feeling.

“Don’t you have anything for me today Dexter? Not even a hug?” China asked.

“Naa, this is my only girl now.”

“I see I’ve been replaced then, and I don’t even get to hear her speak. So, tell me, why are you visiting me today?”

Crow took over. “We have reason to believe Gordon was murdered.”

“By who?”

He was silent.

“Oh, no,” China said with a gentle laugh. “Not Serpine again? Skulduggery, you think Serpine is guilty of every crime you stumble across.”

“That’s because he usually is.”

“Well I still can’t help you. I have heard nothing but nonsense rumours that don’t even deserve to be called rumours,” she said with a smirk. “I imagine it would make you laugh.”

“What is it then?” Stephanie asked, getting annoyed at the back and forth.

China laughed. “The word is that Serpine has begun believing in fairy tales. In the Sceptre of the Ancients.”

Crow was silent for a moment. “Has he found it?”

“Skulduggery, dear, the Sceptre is a legend and nothing more. There is nothing to find no matter how much he searches.”

“If he’s looking it has some value.”

“That doesn’t mean it exists though, only that he has become more insane.”

“He doesn’t sound like a stupid man,” Stephanie said quietly. “If he thinks it’s real, there has to be a reason, and you said he was looking right? So, he has an idea of where it was. Does that mean he killed Gordon for it? Did Gordon have it?”

The adults looked at each other. “I think you found a lead,” Skulduggery said after a moment of consideration.

They left quickly, trotting down the stairs and out to the car. Crow called the others and put it on speaker, letting Stephanie hold the phone up for him while he drove to Panda’s tailor shop.

“What did you find?” Panda asked when he picked up.

“He’s searching for the Sceptre,” Crow said.

“How did you figure that out?” Weasel, who was really Saracen Rue, asked confusedly. “I never would have thought up that.”

“I didn’t need you to,” Crow said. “My partner in crime did.”

There was a short silence. “Why does she get to be _your_ apprentice? _I_ want a prodigy too.”

Stephanie grinned and tried not to start giggling as all six men started bickering over her. Eventually it was too much, and she started laughing uproariously at them, making them stop. She could feel them get embarrassed and probably defensive, but it just made her laugh more.

“Oh, please, stop!” She choked out between her laughs. “I’m gonna pee.”

“No! Ghastly, she’s yours,” Crow said in a panic.

She snorted. “I’m not really.”

“She’s mine.”

“You never said about what I thought.”

“Ah, yes. Stephanie realised that Gordon must have had it in his possession at some point, or else had information on where it must be. That’s why Serpine killed him,” Crow said, working it through. “Remember the legends. There can only be one owner of the Sceptre. If Gordon found it after centuries of it being lost, then he was the owner. Upon his death, the Sceptre became free for the taking again, making Serpine able to take the Sceptre with no problems.”

“That means it must be in the mansion,” Stephanie said. “There’s so many trap doors and spaces in the walls, and he never let me in the basement or loft or most of the third floor, or the fourth at all. It could be anywhere in there.”

Crow nodded. “Exactly.” He pulled the car to park on a dodgy looking street. Crow told them they were coming to the shop and they hung up, Stephanie letting Wolf out the back at which point his protective arm returned to her shoulders. It was fun having a big brother.

The shop was grey and a little run down, like the rest of the area, but when they entered it was bight, open and nice looking, if a little like a bachelor pad that had clashed badly with silk, chiffon, tweed and every imaginable button, thread, colour and material. It somehow was still masculine, made better by the muscles on Panda as he run a black as night material through his sewing machine with tender care. She couldn’t help but grin.

“Where in the mansion?” Snake, really Erskine, asked when they had locked the door. They were sprawled around the room, leaving Stephanie the only person standing. They had even taken the table space. She sat, instead, on the arm of the sofa next to Anton.

“Under the mansion is a cave system,” Crow admitted. “Gordon said when he was looking for his home that it was the only place with a magic history – he only wanted one steeped in as much magic as possible – that had only a negative history attached to its magic. Of course, he loved the scandal and bought it, and said once that it had a cave system beneath it. He found a journal from the owner a year later and was raving that he got in and there’re magic creatures. I agree he could have decided to hide the Sceptre anywhere, perhaps to trick someone into going into the caves, but it doesn’t seem his style.”

“If Gordon loved magic as much as you say, and he has a magical cave system with magic security, why wouldn’t he hide it there? It sort of makes sense he’d decide that.”

“Precisely. The Sceptre is free for taking so long as you can get into the caves, so long as you can get passed the monsters and whatever other traps have been set up, if you can get out afterwards. It can be done, but can he do it before us?”

“Nope,” Stephanie said. “We have the house, we can get it today.”

“How do we get in?” Bear asked.

“We need a key. I doubt Gordon would have left that around the house,” Crow said, rubbing his bone jaw.

“So the key is to find the key,” Snake said, smirking. “Any ideas.”

They were silent thinking it through.

Crow cleared his non-throat. “Gordon said what I searched for was right in front of me.”

“Oh fuck,” Stephanie said, sagging. She got looks of shock and scandal, and a few winks. “Fergus and Beryl have the key.”


	5. One step forward, two steps back

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 5**

Bear, Weasel and Snake went to the mansion while Crow, Wolf and Stephanie waited for Panda to finish the protective clothes for her. She had already switched her thick jacket for a vest and her trousers for the protective ones. Panda had already started the shoes, which were curing while he worked on the coat. He had allowed Stephanie to help him make it, and she had picked out a deep blue lining and black matt buttons, as well as how many pockets she'd have which was greatly influenced by Wolf as he told her all the pockets he found himself needing when in combat and wishing he had packed this object or that. She had four pockets on the inside and as many on the outside – one on the inside was specifically for money and Panda had decided to make a little pocket on the inside of her trousers for Crow to put some folded cash in so if she needed it in an emergency so she'd never have to worry.

She had smiled at them all, thankful for them looking out for her and also for helping her get into all the adventures she wanted. She'd be the most prepared adventurer ever at this rate.

When she slipped the coat on and looked in the mirror she couldn't help but admire herself. It felt like she'd been wearing it for months, tight where she needed it to be and loose where she would be moving, like her elbows. It was beautiful.

"Panda, this is incredible," she said. "I love it."

"It's alright. I put it on Skulduggery's tab."

She laughed and jumped into her boots. They were just as incredible. "Have you heard from the others?"

"No," Crow said, sounding annoyed. "I've tried calling them too."

Panda looked up from where he was clearing up scraps. "You know what that probably means, don't you?"

"Serpine is there."

They set off immediately – the others had taken the van, so Panda and Wolf sat in the back of Crows Bentley – and raced to the mansion. The metal gates were still open, and Stephanie didn't see any vehicles other than Gordon's old one and the van, but the door had been ripped off its hinges.

There were no sounds from inside.

Crow put a finger to his teeth and they quietly followed him into the house, sticking to the walls and sliding through the bottom floor without incident. They also failed to find any signs of entry to the cave system. Finally, they moved to the bottom of the stairs and Panda used his elemental magic to check if there was anyone there. They didn't wanted to accidently alert anyone to their presence. He held up eight fingers to the left and the pointed to the right and indicated six. They had to split up.

Wolf and Stephanie went to the right to find the six. They went quietly, tiptoeing towards to people. Stephanie couldn't stop her heart from pounding so loudly. But with Wolf, she wasn't exactly scared. Or rather, she wasn't scared for herself. She felt nervous for the others that weren't with her, worried they'd be hurt.

Wolf seemed to have homed in on them with a sixth sense Stephanie had every intention of developing and there were gentle voices coming from within the room he'd taken her to. She didn't recognise any voices behind the thick doors.

Wolf pressed himself against the other side of the door and got a gun out from she didn't know were. Stephanie looked at him. He held up three fingers…

Two…

One…

She reached out and burst into the room, Wolf backing her up with the gun over her head. She darted forwards and tackled a man to the floor with no particular thought to what she was doing and it somehow worked. She managed to punch him once in the nose, and he grunted in pain, but gripped her arms far too tight and lifted her off him, into the air and got up just to slam her onto the table. She was dazed and it took her a moment to realise she'd been dropped in favour of Wolf who was covered in a purple mist and straining not to scream.

Stephanie's eyes widened. They were in the presence of Serpine himself.

She tried not to get distracted and tried to get through the other guards – Wolf had already taken out two and Serpine was distracted by Wolf. But on second look, she realised they weren't men. They were nasty, papery looking creatures. She ran at the closest, feeling his body cave in when she pushed into it but then its balled up hands came crashing into her back and she choked as the air rushed from her lungs. She stumbled, holding onto its papery skin, and when she finally fell she accidently ripped its skin. Unfortunately, whilst she learnt how to kill it, she also learnt it was made of toxic, disgusting gas that hit her in the face just when she started sucking in lungsful of air.

Her eyes watered awfully and she coughed so much she thought she might throw up. When the other paper thing finally got to her from around the table, she was able to wrap her arms around it and claw open its back before it had time to do more damage.

She finally turned back to Wolf, who was still screaming in pain and clenching his eyes shut, and the two men hurting him. She didn't know what to do about Serpine. The other man, however, she could deal with even as he consulted his master on what weapon to use to hurt her brother more as the mist continued to torture him. She felt rage pass through her like nothing else. She got her breathing stable and slowly picked up the long dagger, or perhaps short sword, or whatever it was, and got a firm grip. Serpine was looking at Wolf with glee, not quite able to see her but any closer and she was a goner. The other man had his back to her but only for a moment. She licked her lips.

Wolf opened his eyes and stared at her. She glanced at him.

The man started to turn.

She launched forwards and swung her arm far above her head and brought it down before the man knew what she was holding.

The blade went almost fully into his flesh and he looked down at it with something between horror and shock.

She pulled it on and he fell to the floor.

Serpine started to laugh and she looked at him. Wolf had fallen to the floor and wasn't moving and panic flashed through her as she hoped he wasn't dead. Serpine started to clap with his two weird hands – one was normal, albeit very vain-y, whilst the other looked skinned but didn't bleed. That hand she understood. It had been modified, somehow, to have a second magic that's sole purpose, and ability, was to torture others.

Her heart jumped when he took a step towards her. She had her knife and held it in front of her with both hands.

"Stand where you are!" She shouted at the War Lord.

He laughed in her face but stayed still. "Oh no, a little girly has a little knife! Whatever shall I do?" He grinned at her and she finally understood what Gordon meant when he had talked about evil smiles. "You know, your friend Skulduggery Pleasant had a knife just like that once. He tried to kill me with it. Did he tell you? About how he wouldn't stop getting in my way and I was forced to kill his wife and child? It wouldn't be so bad if he wasn't using you. You know that he'll drop you the moment something better comes along, right? He's a very selfish man."

There was a bang from somewhere and the whole house shook. She heard footsteps banging towards them and she gave him a watery grin. "You won't get away. They're going to kill you and then this will be over. You shouldn't have killed my Uncle."

He chuckled. "You're right. Because I don't know where the Sceptre is. But I bet I know who does."

He used his red hand again and Stephanie was covered in that purple mist, screaming, before she could do anything with the knife. It clattered to the ground. The door was thrown open and she didn't know who it was but he looked harassed.

She groaned suddenly as the pain got too much and her head hit the ground. She passed out.


	6. Escape attempt

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 6**

Stephanie woke in a small, dark room in the freezing cold sometime later. Resting on the floor in an extremely uncomfortable position, she tried to see if anyone was with her. She couldn't hear anyone and she honestly couldn't tell the difference between eyes open and closed.

She struggled to sit up as her hands were behind her back but managed it just as the door to the cell, and she was sure it was a cell, opened with a bang against the wall.

The sudden light after so much dark was almost blinding and she didn't see who dragged her up and out before she was halfway down the hall. It was the same man that had run in the room right before she'd passed out. Her thoughts went to Wolf, to her other friends. She hoped they were okay.

"Where are we?" She asked the man.

He snorted. "Do you really think I'm going to tell you that?"

"It's not like I'm going anywhere," she pointed out. "Also, that cut of yours looks infected." He reached out and yanked her hair sharply and she yelped out in pain. "Fuck you!"

He growled at her and pushed her up the steps. Stephanie stayed quiet and tried to think of what she could do. Until she knew if her friends were here there was no point leaving. Then again, if they were all here she would need to escape to get back up. She tried not to panic and followed the man despite the growing anxiety clawing at her stomach.

They entered a large room with at least twenty of the paper men and a few real men she didn't know lined up against the walls. No females of any type except herself. In the middle of the room stood Serpine. Stephanie was brought a few metres in front of the man and forced to her knees.

"Ah, I've been waiting for you to awake," Serpine said. "I think you might just know what I want."

Stephanie refused to say anything and glared at the small scar above his eyebrow. She hoped Skulduggery had given it to him.

"I have a little bargain for you. I know Pleasant and his Dead Men have decided to take you under their wing and make you their newest member. Usually, I'd dismiss anything they thought, but then I met you," he said, stepping forward slowly, looking her over. "You are young and weak now, but you show a lot of potential. You killed one of my men. Did you know that? Oh yes, he died quickly from his wound. I expect you would make a great apprentice and under my mentorship, you can help me take over this world and crush those that don't believe in us, that look down on us. Doesn't that sound better, my love? Doesn't that sound better than following muddy dogs around like a stray they took in to feel good about themselves?"

Stephanie tried to look blank faced. Gordon had written that that was a good thing to do.

"But with me," he continued, "I will mentor you to your absolute greatest and you will aid me in completing all my dreams. You can be my daughter. I can be your father, and I will love you as my own. One day, they will look at us as saints and the beginners of the enlightenment. Do you want that, my daughter? Don't you want greatness?"

His hand came around and cupped her cheek. She glared into his eyes. "The Dead Men love me. And Gordon is my dad!"

He laughed deeply and struck her cheek hard enough for her eyes to water. "Would you listen to that? She thinks they love her. Darling, they will use you and hurt you until you can't stand and then feed you to their enemy as bait for their own ends. I will give you one final chance to join me before I am forced to torture you to death."

She pretended to think about it. "I'm afraid I'll have to pass."

"Oh?" He chuckled. "And how's that? Are you going to negotiate?"

"Yes. I will get you the Sceptre, but you have to let me go."

"And why would I do that? Do you not think that I won't know you'll run off?"

She shrugged. "Well, I don't exactly have anywhere to go. If I try and run, you'll find me and even if I do try I won't get far without magic and a passport."

He stared deep into her eyes and a grin slowly spread across his features. He leaned in close enough she could smell the coffee on his breath. "You are not in a position to bargain. Take her to the dungeon!"

Stephanie was yanked to her feet and followed the man willingly out the room – she didn't like all those paper men, and Serpine wasn't helping.

But what now? She was away from those eyes but she was still with her guard. She couldn't act like her friends were all free, or even one of them was, or even that they knew where she was if they weren't in the cells around her. She needed to get herself out, though knowing if she had to break out someone else would be good too. She expected Wolf would be but she'd already gone through the maze of the dungeons and didn't expect she could find him. And her fighting wasn't good enough to take down these people and she didn't even know any magic!

"You're annoying," she told her guard.

"What?" He said. "Shut up. Stupid kid."

"Can't you tell me where we are now? What if I guess? We're at Serpine's house? Mansion? Wait, is it a castle?"

"How'd you guess that?" The man asked, looking at her.

"Castles have dungeons, dummy. What about my friends?"

"I can't tell you anything kid," he said. "Just stay quiet and keep your head down. You shouldn't be involved. You're a kid."

"Well I am, so tell me if my friends are safe."

"I don't know."

"So they're not here?" She asked.

He hesitated.

"Some of them are here? How many? I bet Wolf is."

"Who the hell is Wolf?" He asked.

"Dexter Vex," she clarified. "Is anyone else here? Are the other's safe?"

He shook his head, but she didn't think it was an answer more so than in annoyance. They came up to her cell and she was pushed into it. "Wait!"

He sighed and rubbed his eyes. "What?"

She hesitated. "I need to pee."

He gaped at her. "What do you want me to do about it?"

She bit her lip. "Put my hands on my front. Then you can leave."

"I know I can leave." He said but got a set of keys out and came into the cell to move her shackles around. She waited until he had to move around her to reattach the cuff before striking – she twisted and punched him in the neck as hard as she could, and he let go of her other hand to stumble back and she stepped towards him to deliver a blow to his nose. He cried out and she wrapped her cuffed hand around the spare cuff and used it to punch him with the metal in the temple, which was strong enough to get him on the ground and it was just a simple matter of stamping on his head three times before he stopped moving.

She breathed hard and listened carefully. There was no sound except the slow drip of water elsewhere and the quiet breathing of the man on the floor. Quietly, she searched his pockets and found several cuffs, a flip-knife and of course the keys. She also took the chocolate bar that had melted slightly but since he had captured her, she felt she deserved it anyway.

She put everything in her various pockets, thankful for Wolf's advice already and of Panda for his amazing creation. She closed the cell door on him and locked it. She had no idea where her friends would be, or if anyone would come looking. With everyone upstairs, she figured that her guard would be expected back soon with either one of her friends or else for a meeting, or just by his fellow guard friends. She started looking through the open peek-hole on the doors, going through aisle after aisle of cells. She was beginning to give up hope of finding Wolf when she saw a cell peek-hole closed in the distance. She ran to it and carefully opened it.

Wolf and Snake looked up at her. They grinned.

She put a finger over her lips and got the keys out, looking left and right as she did. The cell was opened quickly, and she got them out their shackles. Luckily, it was one-key-fits-all.

"How did you get free?" Snake asked her in a whisper.

"No one expects to get their ass handed to them by a girl half their size. Come on, we need to get the others."

"Are they all here?" Wolf asked.

"I don't know. Snake, did you see anything?"

Erskine shook his head. "I know Skulduggery is here. I heard him with Serpine, but I don't remember who was hurt or not in the fight, they dragged me from the room at the start."

"Alright. Where do you think Crow is?"

They started scouring the cells together and came across Skulduggery whistling in his cell.

"Come to – oh hello," he said when they opened his cell. "How did you get free?"

"Tell you later," she said, unlocking his shackles as Wolf and Snake kept an eye on the halls. She could see them acting as a team now, as a unit. It was very privileging seeing a group as close as this able to protected her, to see them flow together so well. She desperately wanted to learn how to fit into that flow and learn them so well she could work without words too. "Who else came in with you?"

"Saracen and Anton got free but I know Ghastly is here. Any idea on times?" Crow informed them.

"Probably none. I got free at least ten minutes ago. The guard was probably expected back with someone," she said. "If we get Panda we might be able to fight our way out but there are a lot of people up there."

He looked at her sharply as they left the cell and the other two closed around them. She closed the door to make it seem like they hadn't been there. "You went upstairs?"

"I was taken. Let's talk later."

He nodded, and they split into two, Stephanie sticking with Crow, and they searched the last few rows of cells. He wasn't there though, and they were forced to do a running check back through the cells just in case. Stephanie rounded the corner just as four paper men went around the corner of the next aisle and she almost fell to the floor stopping Crow running passed her, and had to throw herself in front of Snake to stop him running passed too.

They waited a few moments as the soft rustling and thud, thud, thud of the paper men moved through the cells. Slowly, Stephanie stepped forwards and crouched down, looking around the corner. The paper men had stood outside a cell. She crept back.

"Guards," she said. They frowned. "At Panda's cell, I bet."

They nodded, and the three men looked at each other before Wolf and Snake jogged silently to the other side of the aisle of cells to come from the other side. Crow held up three fingers. Two. One.

They raced around the corner at the same moment as the others and rushed at the paper men. The four split and Stephanie was quick to simply run passed them and get the door open. Panda was unconscious but even after she got his cuffs off and patted his cheek he didn't so much as flutter an eyelid. She looked up to see Crow looking into the cell. There was a sudden shout from somewhere else. Their time had run out.

Wolf pushed in and pulled Panda onto his shoulders and pushed Stephanie out the door with his leg. She ran with the others to the stairs. At least twenty people must have entered the dungeon, but they didn't see anyone as they'd scattered to find them. They waited a moment for Snake to check the hall and then made a run up the stairs.

They were confronted with forty paper men at least and the three able to fight immediately began to rip into them but with no weapons they were soon choking in the gas, except for Crow who stood in the middle of the group pulling arms until he had a pile in a circle around him and he had to step high to get over the bodies. They ran from the last few who were slow to run after them.

Stephanie didn't see any way out at first but as soon as she saw the window she pulled her jacket off and let Snake grab it from her roughly and sprint ahead to jump through it.

They all followed and landed badly, though Crow did use magic to make their lands a bit better focusing on Wolf since he had Panda who was still out cold. Stephanie fell to the floor badly and felt her leg pull but rolled and started running after the others. Crow was the one who kept back to stay behind her and keep her safe, the others getting far ahead much too quick for her to keep up with. She looked back quickly before they went into the trees and saw what could have been thirty paper men and at least a dozen other guards running after them.

She squeaked and ran faster after Wolf and Snake, taking far too long to get to a big wall. Stephanie saw Wolf, with Panda, scale it in just one jump, push himself to swing over the wall, flash a grin at her, and fell from sight. She turned to Skulduggery and he kneeled with his hands together and she was in the air, flailing and then was grabbed by Wolf, sans Panda, and hauled her the rest of the way over. Wolf almost stumbled but Snake was there to steady him as Crow landed to their right.

A van was on the road with the door open and a man in white carried Panda into it. Stephanie looked to Crow but he put a hand on the back of her neck and pushed her gently towards it and the doors were closed behind them just as she heard the shouting of their pursuers.

They drove faster than Stephanie had ever experienced, and she couldn't help but grin and high-five Snake and Wolf.


	7. Perchance for cain

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 7**

They laughed on the way to the Sanctuary, and hugs with Bear and Weasel were mandatory – for Stephanie only – and they were finally able to find out what had happened.

"Serpine's men had amour and weapons," Bear told Stephanie. "And they were in a small room and made sure to split us up."

"We work better together," Wolf said.

"Always have. And with others in the room we didn't have a chance to fight to our strengths. They knew that would happen, but we rushed into it and didn't realise until too late," Bear said. "We were very lucky to have you, Stephanie."

Crow nodded. "Though we do need to help you think up a name still. Calling you by your given name is getting more dangerous every day."

"She's Cub," Wolf proclaimed. "Right, Cub?"

"Yeah!" She said, putting her hands in the air. They high-fived.

Crow made a movement that was likely an eyeroll. "But you still need a real name. Code names are good for missions, we've needed them for a while I suppose, but that doesn't change the fact you need a Taken name."

"Hey," Weasel said to Stephanie, "you still haven't told us why you gave us those names."

"Aren't you meant to know these things?" Stephanie asked him.

He rolled his eyes. "I can't know everything. That would be boring. Tell me, why do I get the bad name?"

She tilted her head at him. "You don't have a bad name."

"Oh God," Snake said. "She's already acting like Skul."

Stephanie flipped her hair back and began pointing and explaining – she pointed to Skulduggery, "Crow, you always brought weird things, like crows get stuff for their nests." She pointed to Ghastly, "Panda made me a panda bear when I was little and it was the first thing he gave me and my favourite toy, so it became his name." To Anton, "Bear, you got me things that made me think you were trying to be all tough and not super cute but also wanted to spoil me like a marshmallow. I almost called you marshmallow actually but I liked the animal theme so you became Bear." Dexter, "Wolf, I'm not really sure how it happened, but it seemed to fit the you I made up from all the things you got me. It was always something new, unexpected and I loved it. I could always count on you to get me something when something bad happened too, so I sort of learned you were loyal and trustworthy, so I thought of a dog, but that sounded too tame compared to the other cool names so you're a wolf." Saracen, "Weasel, you always got me things I could eat or where I'd find _more_ things to eat when I got there and weasels were good at finding food and getting from place to place unseen. At least to my head when I was a kid that's how I thought of it, so you got to be Weasel. I like that name." Erskine, "And Snake, I always thought you'd be telling me to do the stupid things and getting me in trouble on purpose, and then you'd hide and laugh at me, so you got to be Snake. You were always my favourite when I was very little because I'd spend so much time alone and whatever stupid thing imaginary Snakie said to me were usually pretty fun. So, I like it. I like them all though."

They nodded and grinned. She thought they seemed pretty happy with that. "I like that," Wolf said. "I'm the coolest."

Stephanie started to laugh as all hell broke loose and they started bickering over who got to be the coolest.

"Guys!" She shouted at them, finally getting their attention. "You still need to tell me what happened! You got split up but you didn't tell me anything."

"Oh, yes," Crow said, then coughed as if trying to distract himself from his own immature behaviour. "We were split up and attacked with extreme force. We knew Serpine was not to be underestimated but I think when we didn't see Serpine we didn't think his lackies would be any good. Obviously, we were wrong. Though we are lucky enough that there aren't as many Hollow Men now."

"Hollow Men?"

"Those paper like things from earlier. They have the single purpose of fighting to the death. Generally they can't do anything but in numbers they are catastrophic. Eliminating a handful now is the absolute difference between life and death later."

She nodded.

"The fight didn't last long. They had a very big man that got a bag over my head and shackled me to a bedpost before I could do much, which bound my magic and stopped me from helping," Skulduggery explained for her. She had assumed that was what the cuffs did but it was good to know. "I believe the rest of the fight was over as people were knocked out. And now I would like to know what happened to you."

Stephanie was looked at by them all and Wolf let her have the stage. She hesitated. "Well, it was pretty fast honestly. I just remember attacking this guy and the Hollow Men almost made me sick – I hate them by the way – and Wolf had all that purple mist you told me about on him. He kept screaming at that first guy who was going to hurt him more, so I stabbed him in the chest. Serpine said I killed him."

They were quiet. "I'm sorry," Wolf finally said.

She waved him away. "I'd rather he stopped hurting you. But then again, I'd rather never have to see Serpine again, his magic definitely hurts too much."

"What the–"

"Excuse me I'm still speaking Mr Pleasant!" She called before he had the chance. His jaw snapped shut. "So I passed out in the office after some guy turned up and I don't remember what he said, just that he was there. I woke in the cell and that guy came in pretty soon after to take me to Serpine and he tried to make me convert to his mission and be his daughter or some shit and I told him to shove it but in less words because I didn't want to die and I was taken back to the cells with only one smack which I thought was pretty good going considering everything. I tricked the guy into switching around cuffs and then I beat his ass and came and found all you. So you all got save by a little girl. Ha."

They snorted at themselves and the tension went from the van. "We are so teaching you to fight." Weasel said.

"I did fight!"

"Better," Crow said. "If this becomes a habit, if you want to keep up with the people we have to fight, you need to be better. We get the worst, most likely to be killed missions. You will have to sit out of a few until you are up to the standards we expect. I'm sure we can find a few small cases until you're ready for the big dogs though."

She rolled her eyes. "Sure."

They told her about Meritorious and the other Elders on the way but told her they were not going to be introducing them at that moment as they didn't want to have to argue to keep her as their apprentice. Still, she and Dexter would have to go to someone called Doctor Kenspeckle in the Hibernian Cinema, a place he had converted secretly into a small hospital. They had already registered with him as soon as Gordon had died since they knew she was going to be sent into their care.

They waited for the Cleavers to get out the van and they all left, and Wolf disappeared to get them a car – Weasel whispered to her secretively that he was going to flirt one out of the Administrator which had made her blush violently because flirting was weird, but also grin because it was weird in another way – and the others disappeared to sit around for the Elders and Stephanie had to wait for Wolf next to Panda who snored lightly from the pavement. It didn't take too long before Wolf pulled up next to her and they pulled and pushed Panda awkwardly into the car and then got in the front.

Since they were hoping he would awaken soon and didn't care how, they put on the radio as loud as it went, making the car vibrated with the music, and they sang along too loud for them to sound good, which Stephanie was grateful for. They drove for half an hour and screamed the whole way, even in traffic, getting a lot of looks, and when they pulled up in front of the cinema and continued to sing until the end of the song, Panda still hadn't woken up.

Her ears rang, but she was happy to help push Panda from the borrowed car and Wolf pulled him onto his shoulders. She locked the car for him and opened the building doors. He told her where to stand and made her walk through the magic door into the medical practice, making her grin and laugh and run up to the top.

"Who is making that racket?!" A voice shouted from somewhere. Two young men walked into the large waiting hall with smiles. They waved at her.

"Hello," she said to them. "My friends need help."

"Who are they?" One of them asked.

"Ghastly Bespoke and Dexter Vex."

They laughed. "Oh, we know them, are they coming up now?"

Wolf came up sideways with Panda still on his shoulders. "Yeah," she said. "Where do you want them?"

"This way," he said. "I'm Civet by the way."

She grabbed Wolf's top and pulled him along. "Come," she commanded. "I don't have a name yet."

"It's a big decision. I'm Stentor," the other told her and they opened a door to a ward in which Wolf placed Panda with surprising gentleness onto a bed.

She put her hands on her hips. "You need to lie down too."

He grinned wickedly. "Oh yeah? Why should I?"

"Because you were in a traumatic incident and must be checked for death."

"For death?" He said, laughing.

"Yes, and if you don't I'll tell on you." He stepped towards her menacingly, but she didn't move. "And it'll be awful. You'll be lectured and told off and still have to get checked but it'll be worse. What are you doing?"

He didn't respond, just pulled her to him and started tickling mercilessly. She shrieked with laughter and immediately fell to the floor, hugging her sides and trying to breathe through the intensity of the fun. An old man with grey hair and stern words for Wolf came in at some point but it just made Wolf pretend to roar and pounce on her and he ended up on his knees tickling her until she was screaming that she was about to pee herself and she was pretty sure she did just a little bit before he stopped and they panted, giggling still in her case, and the old man came and stood a foot from them.

"Are you two quite finished?" He said sternly.

"No." They said at once.

He sighed tiredly. "Get on a bed. Both of you."

He turned to his assistants and started telling them thing so Wolf and Stephanie looked at each other. They both stood silently and got into the same bed, Stephanie sitting on Wolf's knees in the most uncomfortable for him way she could.

Kenspeckle turned back to them to tell them something and saw them. "For God's sake. Your own beds!"

"Oh!" Stephanie said acting surprised. "Why didn't you say that in the first place?" She got in her own bed and tried not to grin at the looks she was getting from the doctor, Civet and Stentor.

"Insolent girl. Tell me what happened to you."

She told him about the brief torture and her time stuck in the cell but after a check over and some food she was told she'd be fine. Wolf was checked last and the other Dead Men came into the ward just as Panda groaned and started to wake up.

They were also sent into their own beds for check-ups though Bear and Weasel got out of that, meaning they could sit on either side of Stephanie and relay the meeting, in which they tried to convince the Elders that Serpine had killed people recently, including Gordon, and had taken them hostage, including a minor female that had been left at the mercy of not just Serpine, who tortured her, but also other known criminals. It had been played up a little to try and convince them but even then, it hadn't been enough to get a guaranteed stance from the Sanctuary.

"We usually fight alone," Bear told her reassuringly in his deep, quiet voice. He was the most comforting to have around, so calm and reassuring. Panda came next though she imagined she'd go to him for council and he'd help her, whereas Bear would let her talk and probably then kill or seriously maim whoever tried to hurt her, so they never tried again. It was very nice to have such strong support. She could have used that last year through school.

It was after saying all that they tried to help her with her name. The key word being 'tried'.

"We need to play to your strengths."

"Your personality."

"You like funny things. Something warm and fun would be good."

"Or something ironic," Crow pointed out. "You like dark humour too much for something warm."

"No," Weasel argued for her. "She could have a warm name."

"Yeah," Snake smirked. "Like Flame."

"That's terrible," Panda groaned. He had a bad headache after hitting his head hard and being given a sedative.

Stephanie nodded. "It was pretty terrible."

"You need something bold. Strong," Wolf said. "Like Wolf."

She stared at him. "Wolf is my least liked name." He raised an eyebrow and she grinned instantly. "I do want a bold name though. Something easy to remember. Not a mouthful. Not boring either."

"Perhaps something _exotic_ ," Wolf said. "Maybe we should get some books."

They tried to think up some books or other things they could use to help her but were soon being kicked out of the place by Kenspeckle, getting Stentor and Civet in trouble as they had joined the efforts to think of names. Stephanie was last out and held back for a moment by the doctor.

"Are you alright my dear?" He asked.

She smiled at him. "I haven't been happier in a long time."

He sighed. "I would hate to see you get hurt on one of their hair-brained schemes."

"I like hair-brained schemes. I like crime, in fact. I want to do crime tonight!"

He rolled his eyes. "God, just like Pleasant. You two both have a perchance for cain."

"What's that mean?"

"Trouble. It means you're trouble and I'm going to have to fix you too much. Now go on I suppose but remember to rest or else you'll be very sore tomorrow."

She grinned and gave the grumpy man a hug before running down the stairs straight onto the back of Bear who hiked her higher and let her stay there. He really was a marshmallow.


	8. Clues and progress

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 8** **  
**

They got to the car they borrowed and had to call a taxi to help get them all back to Gordon's. They decided to rest for a little while before heading out and Crow went upstairs to remove the body which would be collected by the Sanctuary Cleavers and then cleaned up what he could, Wolf helping him.

Panda sat carefully at the kitchen table, looking at her nervously try to think up something to eat. She could make little bits, her and Gordon had been learning things slowly as a way of spending time together and also so Gordon wouldn't forget to make food as often, Stephanie would remind him to spend time with her. It made her chest ache for him for a moment. She still loved him, but he had set up everything so she could move on quickly and she intended to make him proud.

She found some rice, tinned tomatoes, passata, cheese and mozzarella after a while and after digging out the recipe from the messed-up folder they had created together. Panda helped her work out how much food they needed for six, then decided after a moment to add on another two portions considering they were all so big and they were all so hungry.

It took a while to make and she had had to replace some passata with tin tomatoes, which were meant to be fresh anyway, and there defiantly wasn't enough mozzarella, but with cheese on top and the fact it was alright tasting and there was more than enough for everyone, she was the star of the night and everyone doted on her. She'd always thought cooking for people was boring, but they made it fun, and Panda had done all the onion chopping so it wasn't too horrible.

When they had all finished the meal – Stephanie had forced Crow to sit with them – they all went their various ways to relax. They had made sure to have two on night duty as well as Crow at all times but Stephanie was not involved though she didn't complain with that, as the others would also be doing washing, drying and putting away since she cooked.

She washed for a long time in the shower, finding a lot of bruise and feeling a lot more aches than she realised she had. There was a particularly big yellowing bruise on her butt cheek she had no idea about but it didn't hurt and too soon she was out the shower and in her massive, fluffy towel. She took the old nail varnish off her toes and couldn't be bothered to repaint them after filing so she finished up, including her teeth and putting away the things she'd used in the draws, although they had no real home so it wasn't exactly organised.

She didn't care though so she took her clothes back to her room with her towel around her. She was sort of embarrassed to get waved at by Weasel who was going into his room someway down the hall as she was used to sleeping on a whole different floor to Gordon and had even walked, quiet freely, from the bathroom to her room naked without fear of being spotted in the past. She wouldn't be able to do that anymore, which was disappointing in a weird way. Walking around naked was fun.

She shook the strange thoughts from her mind and went to her room with her massive super king bed and beautiful sheets and all her pillows and throws in various colours and materials, some gifts from her friends, others artfully picked by Gordon. The four-poster had semi-transparent white curtains she always had the tied up. When she was younger they had been the best thing in the room.

She had a desk and fairly new computer though the monitor was the same one from years ago, possibly from before she was born, a desk that went across the span of the room held up with massive screws and brackets rather than legs, giving the allusion of a lot of space. She had a vanity and massive walk in wardrobe with custom shelves, hanging space and shoe space that had never been full but she still loved for the fact it was over the top and made her feel important.

She changed into new pyjamas and got under the covers. She slept soundly.

She had a vague dream of Gordon that night, nothing of importance, no particular event, but she dreamt of Gordon, her and her boys. That's what she called them in her dream and as soon as she awoke, she remembered that and not much of the dream itself. She decided that was what they were. She was their girl and they were her boys, her bothers. Sure, it wasn't a perfect name for them, but it was the feel more so than the name itself.

She didn't bother changing from her shorts and massive t-shirt Gordon had handed down to her some years ago, just grabbed her Panda toy to show Panda and slowly rubbed her eyes and went downstairs.

They were all in the kitchen, Bear, Panda and Weasel mumbling over tea, Crow reading a newspaper and the others far too excited for the morning and making up a big meal for them all. Stephanie sat on Bears lap and he moved back to give her room and was in a good enough mood to even wrap one arm back around her so it rested on her opposite hip, basically hugging her. Such a big, bad man, so feared across the land, and here he was, grumpy, drinking black tea and cuddling her.

"Cub!" Wolf said when he turned around. He was wearing an apron that said 'I've been a naught cook' on it and started laughing. "What do you want for breakfast?"

She stifled her laughs. "Whatever's going I guess."

"A full Irish, coming up."

"Well, not a full one," Crow pointed out over his paper.

"No," Snake agreed. "But it's pretty close."

Stephanie listened to them argue over breakfast and noticed she was the last down and only one that hadn't gotten dressed. Looking at the clock, she noticed it was ten o'clock and they must have been waiting for her.

She was given her food not long after and when they had all eaten and she'd helped putting things in the correct place when it was washed, she ran and got herself ready for the day. Back in her protective clothes, she came back to the kitchen to reconvene and found them inspecting her Panda bear.

"Hey!" She said, making them jump. "Don't touch my Pandy!"

Wolf put it in the middle of the table. "I just wanted to see Ghastly's namesake is all."

"Yeah, just curious," Snake said.

"Which is totally allowed," Weasel pointed out. "So don't get mad."

"Yeah, but this is special. It was made for me and it's special and you can't hurt it," she told them. "Anyway, I wanted to show Panda."

"He saw it earlier," Crow said, coming in from the living room. "He said it brought back memories of the wild animals his father made for him as a child. I think he wishes he made you more now."

"He made me tones of stuff. I have almost everything you ever got me upstairs. Even the nonsense stuff you gave me."

"They weren't nonsense," Crow muttered and left the room. "We're leaving in five so get ready."

Stephanie put her old toy, which was quite beaten up but still cute, at the end of the table and they got into the Bentley and the van and made their way down to the coast.

They stopped near her aunt and uncles place and Stephanie looked out the window at the nice little house. It was deceiving, how quaint it looked considering how bad the people within it had been to her on occasion. She was hardly Harry Potter but she deserved a little better from them, at least.

"Can't we just steal it? I want to break in," she told them.

"Stop whining. You get to steal it now, just walk over, go in, steal it and leave. Done," Crow told her.

"It's not the same and you know it," she said, but got out the car, accepting that she was about to embarrass herself greatly in front of everyone.

She knocked on the door and waited until Fergus opened it. "Oh," he said.

"Yeah. I was wondering how you were?" She asked. It sounded more like she was questioning the question. She certainly was.

"Uh, we're fine. How are you?"

"Grand, grand. Um, could I use your bathroom?" She blurted out, wanting to get it over with.

He looked at her suspiciously. "Why? What are you up to?"

She frowned meanly at him. "Nothing. I went for a walk at the coast, needed to pee and came here. Is that so bad?"

He made a grunt noise but let her in and she bolted up the stairs to the bathroom. She closed the door and then listened carefully, hearing him call Beryl's name and her shout back from the kitchen. She crept from the bathroom to her Aunt and Uncles room and searched the jewellery box. She found it quickly, flushed the loo and ran down the stairs.

"Thank you!" She called and closed the door on her way out.

She walked at a normal speed until she was sure Beryl couldn't spy on her and then ran to the car and got in.

"That was not fun. I hope you understand that."

"I don't," Crow said. "Now let's go."

They travelled back to the mansion and found it thankfully clear of intruders. The basement only took a moment to search with all seven of them and they used the key to get in, Stephanie getting to do the honours. It smelt dank and wet and felt frigidly cold.

They couldn't all go in as there were monsters within would sense their magic, so Stephanie, Crow and Wolf would enter and the others would stay behind to guard and keep them hidden since they didn't know if Serpine knew of the caves yet and if it gave them a few moments to get the Sceptre's alliance to them first, it would be the edge they needed.

It felt slow at first, being in the cavernous maze and just slowly wandering around, finding boring plants and fungus everywhere. She had been instructed not to touch any as it was as dangerous as the sentient things down there. Maybe more so.

Stephanie pulled out the little torch she had stashed away in her jacket and they used it to pass a little stream type thing, and to avoid a massive tendril that was moving silently and might have been a snake though she honestly couldn't tell. They couldn't use magic, so her torch was invaluable. When they heard noises up ahead she clicked it off and they pressed into the shadows, Wolf's hand on her shoulder.

The monster passed them with slow, powerful sweeps of its paws – a single claw was bigger than her foot. They waited for it to go around the corner and Wolf let her go and they began running through the dark halls with the torch to help them. Eventually they stumbled across a Snickers wrapper.

"Gordon," Stephanie said, almost welling with emotion but holding it back resolutely.

"A clue," Crow said. "We're on the right track."

They carefully followed the cave system further down into the dark and they were relying solely on Stephanie's light for guidance. They reached a large space at the end with three other corridors and an overhang above them. In the centre of the room was the Sceptre.

Crow carefully checked the air with his magic and then nodded to them. They had already decided that Crow should be the one to touch the Sceptre first since he had the most control and would be the hardest for Serpine to kill. He strode forwards and the thing started to sing. He picked it up. It… did nothing.

How anticlimactic.

" _Boring_ ," Wolf said, stretching. "Time to go."

They left the caves at a jog and Stephanie was incredibly surprised to find everyone above perfectly fine and healthy. They hadn't even spotted cars around the walls. Bear said it was too quiet, but they were grateful nonetheless and sat around the living room to think of their next move, the Sceptre sitting innocently, and loudly, on the coffee table.

"It needs to be destroyed," Bear said. "It has no place existing, especially now Serpine is after it."

"It's a valuable weapon though. It could be an asset in stopping Serpine," Weasel suggested though didn't seem too happy with it.

"I think we should destroy it as soon as Serpine is dead," Crow said. "It is an asset, and if we could get it assessed first, prove its existence, we can kill Serpine without consequences."

Wolf shook his head. "I don't like the idea of destroying it, but it's too dangerous."

Panda nodded. "Dexter's right. I know you want to be certain we can kill him Skul, we all do, but this isn't the way."

Stephanie put her hand on Crow's gently. "It's way too dangerous. We might not get another chance to destroy it and if someone else gets it, it'd be awful."

He was quiet as he thought about it. "I suppose you are right. The risk is too great. But that means we need to know _how_ to destroy it."

Panda stood up. "I think it's time I paid a visit to the family Vault. Who else wants to go?"

In the end, Panda, Stephanie and Crow decided to go to his family Vault while Bear went to the Sanctuary to try and convince the Elders of the Serpine's actions. The others would stay where they were to guard the house and Sceptre. It was a fairly long drive to The Vault and on the way Panda and Crow explained a few things.

"The Vault is not a place that is gone in lightly or often," Panda told her. "My family have collected things over centuries and I have only been in their twice myself. My mother didn't even go in there as it was from my father's side and they were always too protective over it."

"Why are you bringing me and Crow then?"

"You're family," he said. "And _that_ one won't let me not take him."

She laughed. "What stuff did they collect?"

He shrugged. "Mostly paintings, but they were very interested in the Ancients, which we told you about already, so hopefully they will have something in there that can tell us about destroying it."

They got to the art gallery in good time and caught the guards before they were leaving, allowing Panda to show his documentation, though it was unnecessary since it was impossible not to recognise him, and they waited for them to open the massive metal door, and it was shut after them, so they could browse.

It wasn't as big as Stephanie had assumed it would be, but it was still packed with things, all valuable looking. There was art everywhere, some of what she assumed was the most valuable on the walls, and cases of clothes, jewels, piles of books and a massive oval table and chairs in the centre though upon the surface was more things she couldn't identify.

"Where do we start?" Stephanie asked.

"I'll start over here," Panda said, walking to one of the corners.

"You look at the paintings," Crow told her. "If you find anything relating to the Ancients that might be useful, tell us."

She nodded and got started on the nearest rack of paintings. They were very expensive and she did her best to handle them with care, the way Gordon had taught her when they had gone through his collection one time. Panda found some maps in his corner they thought could have been places the Sceptre might have been found at one time, though they had no way of checking since they _had_ the Sceptre. They did put them carefully on a chair for photographs though, just in case there was more information about the Sceptre in those places. It must have been almost twenty minutes later that Stephanie found a picture of it.

"I found something," she said. "But it's just someone using the Sceptre, not anything about destroying."

"Tell me about it," Crow said, his voice muffled as he was bent straight over into a chest.

"It's a man, and he's reaching for the Sceptre. It's sort of hovering just out of reach, and it's glowing."

"Is there anything strange about him?" Panda asked, looking through scrolls.

"Yeah… he's shielding his eyes but they're both wide open. He looks kind of crazed actually."

"What does that mean?" Crow asked her, pulling himself from the chest.

"Well, you'd expect him to be squinting, you know? There's so much detail, there's no reason the painter wouldn't make him squint."

"Anything else strike you as odd?"

She looked it over again. "The shadows."

"What about them?"

"There's two. And the Sceptre isn't making them, the angles are wrong. Maybe the sun?" She suggested as he came over to look too.

"Yes, but what time of day would it be?"

"The shadow at his feet would make it noon, making the sun overhead, but the shadow behind him would make it morning or evening."

"Which one?"

"How am I meant to know?" She frowned at him, seeing he wasn't looking at the painting at all, actually playing with a little box. "Maybe morning."

"So, you are looking at a man who is reaching for the Sceptre in the past and present, seeing everything at once."

"I suppose so. What does that have to do with the box you're messing with?"

"Who painted it?" Crow asked. "Ghastly, get over here."

"There's a crest. Leopard and crossed swords," she said.

He lifted the box and showed them the same crest. "Whoever, family or individual, made that painting, also made this Puzzle Box. People like to put things in Puzzle Boxes that might help us in our quest for information. It's another clue, Stephanie."

He played with it a little more and then rested it flat on his palm. It clicked and there was a high pitch motorising sound before the top opened and they saw a little blue stone inside.


	9. A little crush

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 9**

"An Echo stone," Panda said, looking over Stephanie to see the little blue gem.

"What's that?" Stephanie asked.

"It's a magic stone that people must stay next to for three days and nights at which point an imprint of themselves at that moment in time, with all their knowledge, is created within the stone," Panda explained. "They're very rare and incredibly expensive to get. Whoever did this probably knows what we need, or where to get it."

Crow nodded. "Exactly."

"How does it work though?" She asked him, pulling his arm down to inspect it closer. It was incredibly smooth, and she didn't see any colour change in it. It was a constant, pretty blue.

"No idea," Crow muttered and gently reached out and poked it with his fingertip. It began to glow softly. "I'm a genius."

"You poked it," she frowned.

"Still a genius." She sighed.

A moment went by and then an old man faded up from nothing besides them. Stephanie took a step back into Panda and he put a hand on her shoulder.

"Don't be alarmed," the old man said kindly. "I'm not going to hurt you, young lady. I am here to answer your questions and provide whatever information you need, so long as I - my, oh my," he said, facing Crow. "You're a skeleton."

"I am."

"As I live and breathe… figuratively speaking, of course, as I do neither. But a skeleton, and a talking one at that."

"Excuse me," Panda said, drawing the man's attention away from Crow. "But I understand Echo stones have very little power in them and we have a lot of information we need from you."

He nodded. "Of course. I apologise, I get swept up in my own curiosity sometimes. May I ask though, what language am I speaking?"

"English," Stephanie frowned.

"Oh!" He said and looked as if he were going to ramble on when Panda cleared his throat. "Of course, I apologise again. Quick, ask me something before I get distracted."

"You're an expert on the Ancients?" Crow asked.

"I am. I'm the one tasked with documenting their existence. It's a great honour you know – I got to meet some of their descendants. Three young ladies, not much older than you, my dear, and they were sweet indeed. Weren't too interested in the Ancients though, more so in the Great Magician's great-grandson, but they were young I suppose."

"Yes, well, Stephanie isn't allowed near boys," Panda muttered, not so much as grunting when she elbowed him. "Is there a way of defending against the Sceptre?"

"No," he said. "Nothing in existence has ever blocked the Sceptre, even the Faceless were destroyed by it. That was its purpose after all. To destroy anything and everything in its path. If there were any type of defence, it would have failed its purpose. It is a perfect object, and so nothing can stop it."

"We suspected as much," Crow said. "What about destroying it?"

"Also impossible. It would be a way of stopping its purpose of destroying. It cannot destroy if it does not exist," he said, looking a little bewildered. "Why on earth would you need to know that? Do you want to destroy such an incredible piece of history?"

"Better than it destroy all of us," Stephanie pointed out. "What about its power source?"

He took a deep, fake breath. "A single crystal, black, embedded in its hilt, capable of channelling the energy that's poured into it."

"So can the crystal be destroyed?" Panda asked.

"I've thought about it at great detail actually. You see, there is many texts suggesting that it cannot be touched. If you touch the stone, it kills you, unless of course you are an Ancient or a descendant of them. I tried asking those young ladies about it but by this point the Sceptre was nowhere to be found and they had never been in contact with those stones. Then again, if it's true, they might not have even know, as it would have done nothing to them and they'd of had no reason to take notice of it. I have read one translation of a text that suggested it is possible for the crystal to destroy itself from within."

"How?" Stephanie asked.

"I er… I don't really know."

Panda sighed softly. "Tell us more about the black crystal. Do you know where they can be found? Or if those three descendants had children?"

"I don't know much of anything about the crystal. It was not written about much, I expect because the Ancients didn't want others knowing about their power source."

"Makes sense if it is possible to destroy," Stephanie pointed out. "If it needs replacing they don't want others to get in the way."

Crow nodded. "That's true."

"Yes, and I don't know what happened to those girls. I know one of them married the Great Magicians great-grandson, but I don't know if any of them had children. This Echo stone was created shortly after their wedding announcement."

"What was the great-grandsons name?" Crow asked.

"I cannot remember anymore," he admitted. "I can't recall if I was ever told."

"Do you know if the crystal was created or natural?" Crow continued.

"If you'll allow me to quote from the text that I discovered: 'The Faceless Ones created the crystals and the crystal sang to the Faceless Ones when an enemy neared. But when the Ancients approached the crystal was silent, and it did not sing to the Faceless Ones, and the Faceless Ones did not know it was taken.'"

"So there is a blind spot," Stephanie said.

"It looks that way," he said, nodding. His image grew faint and he held up a hand to see through it. "This is sort of unnerving."

"Is there any other way you can think of that could direct us to destroying it?" Crow asked quickly.

He shook his head. "The best thing to do is hide it and never tell anyone. Failing that, sink it in the ocean so they cannot get to it. Well, the best thing would be world peace. Failing that, there are references to other weapons of God killing levels that might–"

He flickered and went out before he could finish the sentence.

"We didn't learn his name," Stephanie said. "Is that bad?"

"No," Crow told her. "We got the information we needed, just as the Echo stone was intended. We need to get back together to think. But first I want to go to China's library and look over her books for any reference to that black crystal."

"And those other weapons. If they are on the same level as the Sceptre, there might be some reference to destroying them we could try," Stephanie said.

"True." Crow got his phone out and texted someone quickly before they left The Vault. They were lead out of the gallery just as two new guards, a man and woman, came in. They had serious looks on their faces and Stephanie tried not to stare – they were vampires after all.

When they got in the car, they all seemed to breathe a little easier. They took their time going through traffic to China's place on the other side of town. She'd never realised how pretty the city was with all its lights.

They arrived in China's library at around six-thirty and Stephanie could feel her stomach grumbling. Panda went to talk to China and see if she had anything they could look at as her family had once known a lot about the Faceless Ones, she'd been told, and Crow went straight for the books. With no idea of where she was after only thirty seconds of looking, she just wandered around for fun, and so she didn't look stupid. She hoped she'd find something on beginner's magic.

She was trying to work out the ordering system – they weren't ordered by alphabet, by author or even by topic – when she heard someone come up behind her.

She turned and saw a young, pretty woman with gently curled hair and hard eyes, wearing a tunic that showed off her strong arms, tight trousers and Stephanie wasn't sure if she had bothered with anything else.

"You look lost," she said, smiling. She had an English accent.

"Not really," Stephanie said as the lady put her book back. "If I shout I'll be found pretty quick after all."

She laughed lowly as to not disturb anyone. "I take it you're with someone then. My name's Tanith Low."

She hesitated, really wanting to make a friend of the pretty woman. "I don't have one yet. I guess I'll have to see you again and tell you."

Her smile grew to a grin. "I suppose we could do that. If you go two rows over you might find something you want. You're looking to learn magic right?"

Stephanie nodded.

"Yeah, two rows that way."

"Thanks," she said quickly, walking away before she could blush. It wasn't her fault the damn woman was so pretty!

She found a book where Tanith said and looked for Elemental magic as Wolf had told her it was the best for beginners, though she expected he wanted to teach her a little Adept as well for his own amusement. She read a chapter, got too distracted with her hungry stomach, and laid open the book to try and began trying to lift a page. She focused, opened her hand slowly and then snapped open her palm, just like she had seen Crow do.

Nothing happened.

She made a fist and tried again. The page stayed still. It continued to do that for at least another fifty tries.

"How's it going?" She looked up to see Tanith and gave her a weak smile.

"I'm too hungry for this," she said, making a face. "Everyone makes it look so easy."

She snorted lightly and pulled up a chair to sit across from her. "It takes time and patience."

"I don't exactly have a lot of time," she said bitterly. "And I've never had much patience."

Tanith shrugged. "There's always the possibility you can't do magic. It's one thing to know about it, quite another to be able to do it."

"I suppose," Stephanie said. "But I really would prefer to be able to do it. I've waited a long time for this. Years."

"Some bruise you've got there," Tanith said after a moment.

Stephanie looked at her forearm and quickly pulled her sleeve down. "Don't tell the others."

Tanith frowned. "Why?"

She hesitated. "I don't want them to worry."

Tanith dug into her pocket and pulled out a porous yellow rock. "Here. Break a little off, run it under water. Sit in there a few minutes and the bruises will be gone."

Stephanie smiled and felt her cheeks getting warm when she looked at Tanith's face too long. "Thanks."

She shrugged. "I don't want to scare you, but this mightn't be the best time for someone to start learning magic. Bad things are happening."

Stephanie decided to stay quiet about what she knew. She didn't really know Tanith, no matter how much she wanted to have a female friend. She didn't even know what side Tanith was on. "Thank you for the rock," she said instead.

"Not a problem," Tanith said. "Us warriors have to look out for one another."

Crow, China and Panda came around the corner then and Stephanie stood. "Thanks again. I hope I get to see you soon," she said quietly, and walked to the others.

Panda was looking at Tanith with a closed expression but didn't mention anything to Stephanie, just put his hand on one of her shoulders with a fond look and they made their way from the library.

"So," China said, "do you have a name yet, girl?"

"Not yet," she said. "But I have a few ideas."


	10. Weapons neutralised

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 10**

Stephanie immediately sat on Bear's lap when she kicked off her shoes despite the other seats and the fact he had a cup of tea he was attempting to enjoy alone. He allowed her though and she rested her head against his shoulder. It was almost eight at night and she was waiting for whoever was cooking to serve as she was very hungry.

Also, she was a little embarrassed she had thought Tanith was so pretty, so she was happy to close her eyes and pretend it didn't happen. Something about Anton made it easy for her to rest. He was quiet, soothing, strong. They hadn't known each other long in real life, but he was exactly the way she had imagined in her childhood dreams. It made her feel closer to him than anyone else would have after only a few days.

"What did you find?" Bear asked her quietly. The others were somewhere else, probably plotting. She was grateful for that though. She wanted privacy.

She yawned and looked at her knees. "We spoke to an Echo stone and then went to China's and Crow and Panda looked at books to destroy the Sceptre's power source and I looked at magic."

He sipped his tea. "Anything luck?"

"Not yet," she said disappointedly. She hesitated for a moment and then decided to continue. "I made a friend," she admitted in a whisper, grasping a lock of her hair and beginning to braid it tightly. "She was pretty. She helped me with the magic."

She saw the smile tug at his lips. "And who was this pretty girl?"

"She wasn't a girl," she said, rolling her eyes to seem less nervous. "Her name is Tanith. She's English. And I think she's here to fight but I don't know who for, so we didn't speak much I guess. She didn't mind though; I think she knew what I was thinking the whole time. It was so embarrassing. I can never see her again."

He chuckled softly. "I'm sure it wasn't that bad. Maybe she'll be on our side and you can be friends."

"Maybe," she said uncertainly. She definitely didn't want to face those feelings again. "I think I'm going to know my name soon. I feel like it's right there, but I just haven't clicked the pieces together yet."

He nodded. "I hope you find it soon, and that it is as bold as you want. A name is always best if it fits the person not just as they are, but as far as they are willing to become. It has a lot of meaning, Stephanie. Don't pick it just on yourself now – think about the type of person you want to be."

She nodded, and they were called to dinner. She ran to the table and took her place before most of the others and was grateful Crow took his place too even though she hadn't said anything. She had enjoyed eating together the night before. They had several Turkish dishes that night, all of which she couldn't name but absolutely loved, courtesy of Wolf and Weasel.

When they finished they all got ready for bed and Stephanie let them talk in the living room about the Sceptre and book stuff and the Elders while she stayed upstairs. She used half the stone in a shallow bath to get rid of her bruises and then got a shower to get really clean. She was glad for it afterwards – she felt and looked a lot better without marred skin.

She passed out in bed in just her shorts that night.

.*****.

When morning came, so did the responsibility of getting rid of the Sceptre. She pulled on her top and went downstairs slowly, finding most of her men around the dining table with toast, cereal and tea, but slipped down the hall to find just Dexter in the kitchen trying to work the blender for a banana smoothie. She reached over and put power on at the socket and it began working for him.

"Thanks Cub," he said brightly. "How are you this fine morning?"

She gave him a hug. "No."

"That bad? Want a smoothie?"

She nodded into his chest. "What are we doing today?"

"Well, the Elders have demanded we visit them, you included, but after they tell us off for having you work with us, they're going to be helping us. They admitted yesterday that Serpine _has_ killed some of their people, although they're actually forced to take him in because of you, Cub. They can't allow someone to torture and kidnap a child without serious consequences. Not that we'd allow him to live after that anyway but it's always nice to have the Sanctuary at our backs."

She nodded and shuffled along as he went to grab things around the kitchen for her smoothie. She liked his hugs; he was always so warm. "How are you?"

"I'm good," he said, placing a small kiss on the top of her head. "Trust me, this isn't our first rodeo. I'm looking forwards to finally being rid of him."

She smiled and took the drink he offered, gave him a kiss on the cheek and went to the dining room. She sat in her chair and listened to the others make small talk about little things like work and Bear's hotel. When they were all finished and sitting around the living room – she could see a routine coming into play – and they finally got down to business.

"Stephanie, I want to try something," Crow said. "I'm going to get the Sceptre and you're going to go near it. Okay?"

She frowned. "Why?"

"I just have a feeling about something. Just do it, alright?"

She shrugged, and everyone left the room. Crow brought in the Sceptre and put it on the coffee table. She was standing right next to it. As Crow left the room, the singing faded to nothing until it was silent. Stephanie looked at it and uncertainly pocked it with her finger. Nothing.

"Um, Crow? Shouldn't it be making noise or something?" Stephanie asked.

He shook his head from the dining room. "It's like I thought. You're a descendant, Stephanie."

"What? You really think?"

"Absolutely. And if we search the house I bet you'd find a family tree right back to those girls the Echo stone said about, and probably even further. I imagine Gordon knew and that's how he was able to get the Sceptre," he explained, coming back with a cloth and covering the singing-again Sceptre. "Now we just need to destroy it."

"Could you instruct it to destroy itself?" Stephanie asked.

"I doubt that would work," Crow said. "Like the Echo stone said, its purpose is to destroy and nothing more. To destroy itself would be to stop future destruction and that wouldn't fit its purpose."

"What about a mirror?" Wolf suggested. "Maybe the shot will come back on itself?"

Crow shook his head. The singing was sort of getting on Stephanie's nerves. "Unlikely to have that type of flaw. Even then, I'd rather not eradicate myself."

Wolf nodded. "Worth a try though."

Crow crooked his head. "Are you asking me to see if it will kill me?"

Wolf grinned. "Would I do that to you?"

Crow snorted. "Let me think on that. In the meantime, any other suggestions?"

They all thought about it.

"Oh," Stephanie said. "We could just push the stone out."

They all looked at her.

"How?" Panda said.

"Well, we already think the Ancients and their descendants, me, are safe against the stone itself. So maybe we could push it out and just hide the crystal. The Sceptre can't be destroyed but it's useless so long as it isn't powered, and assuming it needs a very exact amount of power, or was designed around the crystal, no one could use it again even if we handed it over. I wouldn't risk it, but at least if it's found we can claim it had no crystal in the first place. Once the stones gone we could just, like, dump it in sea."

"Why the sea?" Wolf asked. Crow seemed to be considering her.

"Well, it would take anyone quite a while to get it out, and it would be costly, so not many people would do it. If we put it in the right place, it would be basically impossible to get out. And again, even if it did somehow resurfaces, as long as there's no crystal and we never say where the crystal is, the Sceptre itself is useless and likely no other power source will work. It doesn't destroy it exactly, but it does neutralise it. If we're lucky, the stones can only be touched by descendants too, and that keeps it ultra-safe."

They were all nodding now. "This is the best plan we have, I think," Dexter smiled, crossing his arms.

"I vote Cub makes all our plans now," Snake said, putting his hand in the air. "All in favour of replacing Skul as plan maker with Cub, say aye!"

Everyone, including Stephanie, put their hands in the air except for Crow and said 'aye'.

"Am I really that replaceable?" He asked them. "I make amazing plans. They always work out."

"Your plans are rubbish," Panda said. "Let's work out how to get rid of this damn crystal."

They removed the cloth again and inspected the crystal carefully. They all about had a heart attack when Stephanie reached out and touched the crystal itself. They all shouted and put hands over their faces and told her off but there was so much fondness in their eyes she didn't listen to it. She was fine, it wasn't a big deal!

They got power tools out after a while, trying to drill into it without success before getting a hammer and chisel to try and slowly knock it out, as well as a knife sharpener to sharpen the chisel. It took half an hour before Stephanie with the help of Bear and a hammer was able to knock the crystal free, jarring her whole right arm in the process.

The Sceptre glowed for a moment before 'powering down' and the singing stopped completely. They grinned at each other and Stephanie took the stone and they split to do their tasks. Bear and Wolf left with the Sceptre in Gordon's old car to be more inconspicuous on their way to the dock Gordon's small yacht was stored at.

Meanwhile, Stephanie and Crow went back into the caves to dump the crystal somewhere deep and dark. They took a shovel to help and buried it deep. They walked for so long that Stephanie was glad for two reasons when they emerged. Firstly, she could get lunch. Secondly, even if she was captured and tortured, she could neither tell nor show them the exact place because she would never find it again.

She almost couldn't believe she had thought.


	11. Helps moved in

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 11**

"Tome has betrayed us," Crow said darkly when he came back through the door. Everyone was there except Bear and Wolf who had just dropped the Sceptre into the 'deep down, deep dark' as Wolf had told her on the phone, and were on their way back.

They had been gone for four days already. It would take at least three, if not four, to get back.

"How?" Panda asked immediately. "Do we need to move?"

"No but I want more protections on this house. Anti-teleportation definitely," he said, beginning to pace the room. "No one died but he tried to kill Morwenna and Meritorious. Many of the Cleavers and much of the staff is dead. The other Elders have gone into passive hiding. I know where they are but they have given us our orders already – search and destroy at all costs."

"They're finally taking this seriously at least." Weasel shook his head. "Would have been nice a few days ago."

"Would have been nice a few _decades_ ago," Crow said under his breath. "We have bigger problems though. Mr Bliss was helping Tome and Serpine. He tried to find out if I had the key or the Sceptre and when I didn't talk he tried to fight me. I only got away because Serpine blasted the damn Sanctuary wide open with a bomb."

Stephanie's eyes widened. "Are we going to find him?"

"Yes." Crow looked at her then. "You can come on two conditions."

She hesitated. "What are they?"

"If any of us say to leave, you leave, you run, you do whatever we say without hesitation. Do you understand? Anything at all."

"I can manage that." She would not be doing that.

"Secondly, you have to know your name. Mr Bliss referred to you as Stephanie and that means Serpine knows. And I would put money on it being China who told him."

She frowned. "Why would she do that? I thought she was helping you."

Panda snorted. "China helps no one but herself. It's no surprise she gave away information. She will wait until the last moment as always and then make her move, no sooner or later than she wants to. To be honest, it might not have even been her. Gordon talked about you a lot, he probably slipped on your name a few times."

Stephanie nodded, thinking back to when Crow and Wolf had told her not to trust the woman. The Gordon theory seemed pretty likely too though. "Okay."

"It'll be four days before the other two get back," Weasel said. "We don't have enough time. We need to act fast if Serpine is acting this aggressively."

Crow nodded. "It'll be hard without them but we're not alone. Morwenna and Meritorious have given us ten Cleavers and Mr Bliss, for whatever reason, called a freelancer by the name of Tanith Low to help us. She should be meeting us here in the next few minutes. I want information on her."

"She's English, blonde, pretty and has a sword," Stephanie said immediately. They all looked at her and she felt a blush creep up her neck. Traitor. "She was the woman with me in the library, remember? She said it wasn't a good idea to learn magic at the moment because of all the bad stuff going on. She seemed really nice."

Crow considered her words. "I'll keep an open mind then, if she got on with you so well. But I won't trust her yet. She was brought in by Mr Bliss after all. But then, he always plays his cards even closer than China, so who knows. For all we know, he wants us to stop him."

She looked out of the window and saw someone coming down the driveway on a motorbike then. "Is that her?" She asked.

Crow looked. "Probably."

They waited, and she was let in by Crow at the door. They came into the living room and she was looking carefully around with casual indifference though Stephanie could see a fair amount of excitement in her eyes despite her obvious efforts to calm herself.

"Hi," Stephanie said quietly from the sofa.

"Hey!" Tanith said brightly. "Fancy seeing you again so soon."

"Yeah, bit funny actually. You were brought in by Mr Bliss, right?" She asked.

"Yeah," Tanith replied, sitting on the sofa besides her and looking around at the books on the wall distractedly. "He came and found me two weeks or so ago. Said there as trouble and he wanted me to help fight."

"Maybe he hasn't betrayed us," Snake said. "He might just be pretending."

"What do you mean?" Tanith asked.

"The Sanctuary was raided. Tome has betrayed us and Mr Bliss was helping him," Crow said. "They want the Sceptre of the Ancients, but it has been removed from existence not so long ago."

"It doesn't exist at all," Tanith frowned.

"It did," Stephanie said assuredly. "But not anymore. Not at all if you're asked."

Tanith took a moment and then nodded. "Sure thing. So what do we do about it? Where are the other Elders?"

"Hiding, but we have our orders. The people are to hide, all helping Serpine are to be treated with aggression. All Sanctuary staff, or what remains of them, are to hide, all of those helping Serpine are to be treated with more aggression. Serpine is to be searched and destroyed at all costs. We can't risk another war."

Tanith nodded. "Sounds good," she said and looked at Stephanie again. "Have a name yet?"

"Naa, still working on it. Need to be quick though or I can't help with the fight."

She nodded. "It's always best to protect yourself first. You can't be useful if Serpine or anyone else can just control you."

Crow nodded. "Exactly. Miss Low–"

"Tanith."

"Tanith, we need to you have absolute discretion with this mission. It isn't anything personal, but if we think you are fraternising with any other Sanctuary, or the enemy at all, we will be forced to you extreme force as are our orders. Understood?"

"Yep."

"Good. Welcome to the team," Crow said, crooking his head into a smile.

"Hi," Weasel said, waving at Tanith.

She rolled her eyes but gave him a smile. "Hi."

"Yay lunch time!" Stephanie said, standing up. "Help me?"

Tanith nodded and they went off to the kitchen. "You know," Tanith said as they walked, "this was Gordon Edgley's house not so long ago. I was so upset when he died – I've been desperate to read his next book. How did you get it all set up so quick?"

Stephanie pulled the bread out the cupboard and gave Tanith a grin over her shoulder. "This is my house. Gordon left it to me when he died. I lived with him for three years after my mum died. I came here every weekend since dad died though, since I was four maybe? He was my second dad," she chatted, getting things out of the fridge while Tanith listened and leaned against the kitchen table. "He practically raised me, honestly. He got me from school most days before mum died so she could work. He set up everything so I'd be with the Dead Men when he died. I'm their apprentice now."

Tanith smiled at her. "So does that mean you can tell me all about him?"

"Sure," she said, feeling altogether too happy to talk about Gordon to someone who didn't hate him for some reason or already know everything she was saying. "He was my best friend. You can read his book as well – he just finished it before he died."

"What do you mean?" Tanith said, giving her a look.

"A few days ago, when he died, I suppose almost two weeks ago now, he was in his office and just finished writing his book. I went in there a few hours later and found him dead. I called the police and they dealt with it all and stayed with my grandma until they announced the Will and I got to come back here to live with the others. It's the only house big enough for us all."

She smiled softly. "I'm sorry for your loss."

She shrugged. "I've lost a few times at this parent thing. At least with Crow, Skulduggery sorry, he's already dead and can't be taken away as easy."

"Yeah," she said softly. "And where about is this finished book you speak of?"

She laughed and told her she'd get it for her later. They took the food to the dining room and Stephanie was able to be quiet as Tanith was pestered by Weasel for some reason or another, and Snake joined in for the fun. She tried to think of a code name for Tanith. She was so much fun and she found herself come away from the initial attraction in favour of a sort of deep friendship already, one she felt with her Dead Men. She only had so long to convince this woman she needed to stay with them and love being in Ireland over England. Shouldn't be too hard, right? Maybe she could play the Gordon card up to manipulate her. It was evil, but in a good way.

She was just finishing her sandwich when it hit her. The perfect name. That was it!

"I've got it!" She said, and then have to drink water to get the rest of her bite down as she almost choked on it. Tanith patted her back with a laugh.

"Got what?" Snake grinned.

"My name. Valkyrie Cain!" She laughed.

They all cheered, and Snake and Weasel quickly announced a celebration was in order.

"We need to Crow," they said, both hugging Valkyrie tightly. "This is our first multi-parenting success! As soon as this is over, Valkyrie, we are going to be celebrating into the night! You can have a beer and everything!"

Valkyrie laughed along with them and they decided to keep the secret from Bear and Wolf for the time being as to surprise them later and she even got a hug from Tanith that still made her blush violently.

After tugging herself free from the overly happy men, she took Tanith's hand and dragged her upstairs. "Come on, I'll find you a room. I think there's one left."

"Are they always this crazy?" Tanith asked, amused.

"No, but I think with all the bad this is just making them extra excited," Valkyrie admitted. "This hall is the bedroom hall. On the right is bedrooms, on the left is bedrooms. That room is a bathroom, the room at the very end is also a bathroom. The men use _that_ bathroom and the one at the end is mine, but I wouldn't wish for you to share with them as they fight over it enough as it is, so we can share instead."

Tanith nodded. "It really is all go around here. I like it."

Valkyrie grinned and walked over to the room opposite hers that hadn't been carved on and let Tanith in. "You can stay here as long as you like. Like really, please stay. There's too many men here already."

She snorted and unclipped her sword and placed it on the dresser to look around. "I admit it's nicer than the hotel I'm at. Are you sure you want me here?"

"Really," she said. "I love being spoilt and centre of attention, and trust me when I say I intend to keep it that way, but having someone to talk to about other things would be nice. I only really talk about some stuff with Bear, that's Anton, but I still wouldn't tell him everything. Boys are gross."

Tanith smiled at her. "I've always wanted a little sister you know. I have a big brother, and he's great and all, but it's not the same. So, I'd love to stick around."

Valkyrie grinned at her. "Excellent! Now you just need a code name."

"Yeah, you're going to have to explain that one to me."

"I will later. I need to pee now though, so have fun moving in and all. Panda has a van so he can help get things from your hotel if you want. We work best when we're together and since Wolf and Bear are gone we really need all our help close, you know? Right, I'll see you later. Have fun, I guess."

She rushed from the room and shut the bathroom door behind herself quickly before she could embarrass herself anymore. It wasn't her fault she had butterflies! They came by themselves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> katiecat_oc: Thank you for the sweet words!! I've tried to make his as funny as possible - I myself can be a little too serious at times, so this has been a great way to help develop my own sense of humour, it's been fun! There's a lot more to come, so strap in. I have 203 chapters written as of now and it's not done. I expect we'll get to about 300 before the end. That's 525000 words currently. I have an issue.


	12. Fight! Fight! Fight!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 12** **  
**

Valkyrie had decided Tanith didn't need a code name – or rather, they were having more fun using insults as code names for each other and that after just a day they were both responding to all insults quite readily so it didn't matter. On the battlefield, their enemies would hear phrases such as "Bitch, on your left!" and "Duck, cow!" and they were both perfectly okay with this.

They had just left a warehouse, where they had encountered what Valkyrie had named the White Cleaver, and just barely escaped with their lives. Panda had been about to use the earth element when Tanith had pushed him out the way of the White Cleaver and saved him. Needless to say, she was now officially on their side and not a temporary help, as Crow had so lovingly told her. They couldn't be certain where the Cleaver had gone.

"We still need to find Serpine," Valkyrie said when she'd had enough of the bickering over his inability to say things nicely. "I'm assuming we all agree he's not at his castle still?"

"Yeah," Crow said smoothly. "He would have moved on as soon as he attacked the Sanctuary, or maybe even after we escaped. His last place was this warehouse and that was a trap in itself."

"So, where do we go?" Tanith asked.

"I'm still working on that," Crow muttered.

"I think I have an idea," Weasel said, wiggling his eyebrows.

"Is it appropriate?" Tanith asked.

He rolled his eyes. "Yes, _Tanith_ , don't be so unprofessional!" Valkyrie snorted, getting her an elbow in the ribs from the woman. "You said when you talked to the Echo stone it mentioned other objects that could kill Gods, right? Well, what object other than the Sceptre is ancient, has a rich history, destructive, can't be destroyed and is just out of Serpine's reach?"

"The Book," Snake said suddenly. "He wants the Book!"

"What book?" Valkyrie asked quickly.

"The Book of Names," Crow told her. "I can't believe I didn't notice it before! Of course, he needs the Elders dead to get to it."

"It's a book kept in the Irish Sanctuary that holds everyone's three names, erasing them when the die and adding them as soon as they're born, adding a Taken name if it's applicable," Tanith explained to her. "The three Irish Elders use the strength of their will-power to keep it from being taken. It's a spell or signals or something that uses their magic to make you think or want to not go to it."

"That's right," Crow continued. "Even if you want it more than anything, even if you are at gun point, you will not be able to get to it no matter what. The only way for someone to get close would be to kill all three Elders."

"So, he's targeting the Elders, I get it," Valkyrie stated. "You said they're in a safehouse? We need to go to them and protect them then. He'll come to us."

"My thoughts exactly."

.*****.

The group of six were driven in the van by Crow, though it felt more like a maniac. Valkyrie had slid and fallen all over the place until Panda as reached out pulled her onto his knee and the ride had been pretty easy for her after that. Everyone else sat motionlessly in place, made of more muscle than anyone she'd ever met before. It was super cool.

Crow stopped them by a tiny shack in the middle of absolute nowhere and opened the back up for them to troop out. Valkyrie sank into the mud and carefully followed the others into the shack where they followed a set of stairs down to a spacious room with tasteful art, modern technology, a beautiful kitchen and doors leading off to bedrooms and every other commodity a safehouse surely didn't need but this one had.

Meritorious and Morwenna Crow were waiting for them.

"What are you doing here?" Meritorious asked. "Where is Shudder and Vex?"

"They're on their way," Crow said. They hadn't told anyone how they had destroyed the Sceptre or even that they had had it in the first place. "We're here because Serpine want's the Book. You need more protection than you have."

"And while you're here, he's killing people up there," Meritorious said, standing at his full height above Crow. He must have been seven foot at _least_. "You're objective is to search and destroy. Not wait around, let everybody die and hope someone else deals with it."

"Like how you treated this at the start," Valkyrie muttered snidely.

"And what would you know of it?" Meritorious turned on her darkly. Crow put up a hand to stop him advancing on her.

"Serpine has to kill you to get the Book," Valkyrie explained, purposefully sounding as if she were speaking to a child to annoy him since he was being nasty anyway. "To get the Book he needs to kill you. We haven't heard of any killings, or anything at all except his creation of the White Cleaver."

"White Cleaver?" Morwenna Crow asked from her seat further back. She was very regal looking.

"Serpine used some type of magic medicine to change a Cleaver into something else," Panda said, trying to be meditator. "We don't think it's human anymore."

"And it's under Serpine's control," Crow added. "We barely got ourselves out."

Meritorious looked at Morwenna Crow and then he sighed and took a seat beside her. Crow took that to sit down opposite and they all sat around or leaned on various things as a show of peace.

"You're certain he'll come here?" Morwenna Crow asked.

"Yes," the skeleton Crow replied. "I'm certain he tailed us actually. We need to prepare of an attack."

Meritorious nodded. "We will fight with everything we have at our disposal. But the child cannot have a part in this."

"That's not up to you," Crow said. "She is my…" he trailed off.

"I'm their kind of kid, kind of apprentice, friend, thing," Valkyrie supplied. "And I'm helping."

"What magic can you do?" Meritorious asked.

"I don't have to fight with magic. I was thinking, no one will suspect me of fighting anyway. If they find just me here, they won't be bothered by me. It could make them think you left me here," she pointed out. "They might not suspect you until too late."

Crow nodded. "I was thinking the same."

"We are not using Valkyrie as bait!" Panda said immediately. "I won't have it."

"I won't be alone!" Valkyrie defended.

"There is a lot of signals on this safehouse," Morwenna Crow said, standing in a fluid motion. "We will activate the anti-magic wards at the right time and prepare ourselves. We will all fight without magic and they will do the same. As I remember, Serpine couldn't fight a damn for himself."

Valkyrie grinned and got a pat on the back in support by Crow before they split up for the attack. Panda didn't look happy and she gave him an apologetic smile before helping move the furniture from the room to give them space.

.*****.

Valkyrie sat in the middle of the room and waited, listening with a fast heart as the door at the top got blasted off and several people came running down the stairs. Slowly filing into the room with suddenly wary faces, came twenty-three minions, twenty Hollow men and Serpine himself. She smiled at him weakly, feeling significantly more nervous in front of so many enemies in such a small space. They literally rook up half the room and the Hollow Men stood so close together their skin compressed against each other. They might be outmatched.

"Hi," she squeaked, getting an arrogant smirk from Serpine. She continued to look at him and tried not to glance at his hand which began to leak purple smoke. She gulped and felt her stomach get sick. "How's it going?"

"Where are the Dead Men?" Serpine asked, grinning. He looked slightly different to last time. Greyer, maybe. "Don't tell me they used and left you already?"

She shrugged. "I'm here and they're not," she said as confidently as she could. "They left on foot ages ago."

"Hmmm," he said, wandering around the room slowly, glancing into the blackened doors. "And the Elders? Where are they?"

She wondered if he could see her heartbeat. "They were sent ahead. They think I was taken home. I – I think they were bored looking after me. You were right."

He grinned, taking the bait. "If only you had accepted my offer in the first place. Now I'll have to kill you."

He walked to her slowly and his arm raised – she could see the evil in his green eyes – and the anti-magic wards were activated and the wrought iron door slammed into place.

Serpine glanced up at the sound but then his expression soured to loathing and he dove onto Valkyrie, trying to strangle her, using his weight to stop her fighting back. "Damn bitch!" He was screaming, and she thought he said more but the two Elders and the Dead Men ran attacked his men very suddenly, leaving Valkyrie dealing with Serpine.

He pulled up from choking her and smacked her hard in the face. "Do you know what you've done to me?!" He screeched and Valkyrie quickly sucked in breaths before pulling her knees up and hitting up in the groin.

He jumped up in pain and Valkyrie used the momentary reaction to pull herself to her feet and kick him onto his arse. He grabbed onto her leg and she was pulled down beside him but she grabbed the stun gun that had been concealed in the back of her jacket – which was way heavier than she ever thought a gun would be – and used the back end to slam against his face.

The hit was hard enough to make the back of his head smack the concrete floor, but he didn't let go. Instead he yanked her hard and she fell onto her back and he grinned as he slowly started dragging her from the room.

"Crow!" She screamed, unable to twist or pull her way away. "Help!"

"It's too late girl!" He growled nastily, showing all his teeth in a way that was on a distant league to a smile but she could certainly see glee in his eyes.

Acting quickly, she raised the gun and shot it, missing him as he threw her away and she hit the wall instead. Shouting in pain, she kept a hold of the stun gun and took her second shot, just grazing his shin but she did hear the sharp intake of breath over the other fighting. She quickly crawled over the floor to a chair against the wall and picked herself up, although it only made him laugh. She saw her brothers trying to get to her, but the Hollow Men and lackies kept them away.

"What are you going to do?" He asked loudly. "You can't even shoot."

She ignored him and stood behind the chair and raised the gun as he started running at her – she had no time to move and shielded her face with her arms, gun pointed uselessly at the ceiling, and then… waited.

Nothing came.

She uncrunched her eyes and found Crow had tackled Serpine to the floor. Relief flooded her and she instead quickly ran, jumped and kicked a man in the stomach that had been about to hit Tanith from behind and he went down long enough for her to run her sword through his arse and then went back to her fight. She turned and saw Crow was grappling intensely with Serpine and decided he was having fun so used her last of three stun shots by running to Meritorious and stunning one of the goons trying to overpower him through numbers and then ran back to fetch the chair and got back in time for him to turn, grab it, and smash it to pieces over another one of them.

There was no one to fight but Serpine by then and everyone was panting and trying to catch their breaths through the gas stuck in the underground base as Crow growled insults in Serpine's ear as he choked him to death. Valkyrie didn't particularly want to watch so she fetched the many, many – it was an absurd amount – of shackles and the rest of them shackled and finished with the living minions of Serpine's.

Just as Crow was standing up over Serpine's wasted body, Weasel came and gave her a hug. She hugged him tightly. "Love you," she whispered.

"Love you too, Val," he said tiredly.

"Is it over?"

"I think so," he said with forced cheer.

She nodded and pulled away to fetch Crow's hat from the corner of the room where it had somehow landed. She walked over to him, steadily not looking at Serpine's, or any, body and gave it to him.

"You're a good girl," he said, putting it on his head. "I think it's time to take those wards down."

Morwenna Crow and Meritorious took some kind of hint and went to another room to deal with the anti-magic ward and wrought iron door. The Dead Men came together, Crow putting an arm around Valkyrie to pull her into the group and she caught Tanith's sleeve to pull her into the circle too and they all clasped each other's furthest shoulder, Valkyrie having to just put an arm around Crow but managing with Tanith, and they stood there for a moment, the men and Tanith with their eyes shut and grateful for the outcome. She smiled.

It was perfect really. She was so glad they were still together.


	13. Official sister

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 13**

Wolf and Bear got back from their own adventure two days later, thanks to some very lucky weather and winds, and Valkyrie was the one that got to the door first to greet them.

"Valkyrie Cain!" She shouted as soon as they were out of the car.

They grinned – well, Bear smiled but she could see his pride so it was proportional happiness as far as she could tell – and Wolf ran and gathered her into a giant hug, throwing her in the air and catching her. She laughed and pulled herself from his arms. "I'm so proud of my Cub!" He kept saying. "And I still need a victory hug from you!"

She laughed and ran to Bear for one of his own hugs that made her relax. "I'm very proud of you," he rumbled quietly.

"Thanks," she grinned. "Come on, you have to meet Tanith still."

She led them in after they grabbed their bags and they went to the living room where everyone was in lounge clothes, which Valkyrie had struggled with at first but after seeing Crow in his full suit next to jogging bottoms and the lack of shirts on the others, she found a funny side and decided it was the best, and there was a chorus of 'Hellos' and 'Nice to meet you'.

"Shut up," Bear said to Weasel after he tried to reintroduce himself despite knowing each other for centuries.

"This is Tanith," Valkyrie said, sitting beside her in hopes of directing the meeting to Tanith rather than everyone else's idiocy. "She is my friend and she said she'd stay a while to help with training me. You're not allowed to be friends with her."

Wolf nodded. "Of course. I always encourage pets, they can be fun."

Tanith rolled her eyes and went back to the manuscript Valkyrie had baited her into the living room with. She was impressed Tanith had looked up at all.

"How was your trip?" Crow asked. "No problems?"

"No, we had a strangely good time," Wolf said. "And Bear got – er, a new friend. Impressive right?"

Bear smacked Wolf, hard, across the back of the head and Valkyrie laughed though she did try to stop, honestly!

When the laughter and exchanges of stories were completed, they were starting to get hungry, as they often did.

"We should go out for food," Wolf said. "We need to celebrate."

There were happy agreements and they all squeezed hazardously and probably illegally into Panda's van and drove out into Dublin. They parked in the centre, or as close to it as possible since it was a city that didn't do particularly well with cars, and all piled out. Valkyrie stood between Wolf and Bear and their group got a few looks on the way but with Tanith laughing with Panda behind her, no one bothered getting in their way. Not that Valkyrie would have let anyone ruin their fun.

Valkyrie picked out a nice sandwich place to eat at she thought the others might also like. Gordon had taken her there most times there had been a celebration between them and it was nice to be back in its familiar dining hall. It wasn't expensive too which Valkyrie wasn't really worried about, but it was nice since there _was_ eight of them. Well, seven to eat. It was still a lot.

"Hello," a waitress greeted when they came in the door. "How many today?"

"Eight," Valkyrie said promptly.

"Alright, come this way," she said, picking out menus. "We'll push two tables together for you."

Of course, Wolf helped the little lady with the table. Even Valkyrie, despite her somewhat lacking knowledge of the male mind, could tell he had seen an opportunity to show off to the pretty, young waitress and had taken it. She rolled her eyes and they all sat down. She was at the head and Bear and Tanith were on either side of her.

She looked over her menu. "I never know what to get," she muttered. "Gordon always got the same thing though."

"What would he get?" Tanith asked curiously.

"Spicy turkey. He ordered the same at a different place once and he almost cried 'cause it wasn't the same. He said it was gross," she grinned. "He tried to slip some into my food to trick me but I didn't fall for it."

"Why's that?"

"I had soup."

She snorted. "For such a smart man, he seems pretty silly sometimes," Tanith commented. "I like the sound of the seafood wrap."

Valkyrie nodded. "That one's nice. I think I'll copy you. I can't decide."

They all ordered and they soon received their food and ate in companionable silence with just a few mutters of enjoyment and conversation. Carefully, Tanith picked a piece of her salad onto her fork and flung it onto Valkyrie's plate.

"Hey!" Valkyrie protested, picked it up and threw it onto Tanith's few remaining salty chips.

Very, very quietly, the girls grinned and commenced war.

Valkyrie threw a piece of tomato into Tanith's drink and shook with laughter and Tanith had to bite her fist to stop from making a scene. The rest of the table had turned to the other side to watch a different conversation. Only Bear was watching them unreadably. Tanith carefully balanced an olive Valkyrie had thrown at her on her fork and, after placing it carefully on the edge of the table, hit the slightly bent end and it flung in the air and pinged off the side of Valkyrie's glass but didn't go it. Valkyrie had to hold her sides she was laughing so much and Tanith had thrown her head back, giving her the perfect chance to grab the olive and lob it at Tanith and it fell down her shirt.

Valkyrie was making airy, choke-like sounds now, trying to hold back her laughs and suck in enough oxygen. Tanith was crying slightly and trying to fish the olive out from between her boobs. Even Bear was chuckling quietly.

Taking the opportunity, Valkyrie took a whole cherry tomato and it hit off the top of Tanith's head and it jumped over the table to interrupt the seemingly important conversation and Valkyrie couldn't hold it back anymore when they turned to see Tanith's hand down her shirt and them both with tears in their eyes and began laughing loudly which got Tanith going.

"You're a cow," Tanith wheezed to her. That just made it worse for Valkyrie and she almost face planted her plate clutching her stomach.

"What's going on?" Panda asked from besides Tanith.

Bear shrugged. "Women things."

Valkyrie snorted and tried to calm down, but then she and Tanith looked at each other and it got bad again because she had stuck her hand back down her top to get the elusive olive out and it cracked her right back up. The men shook their heads and Crow asked for the bill.

Valkyrie and Tanith left with grinned and arms linked, muttering between themselves about silly things and some of the things they liked in the shops as they walked by, primarily sweets and to see movies. The men, who they could hear behind them, watched in bemusement.


	14. Thirteenth birthday ball

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 14**

"-to you!"

"Make a wish!" Tanith told her excitedly.

Valkyrie thought for a moment about it and then grinned and blew her candles out.

The Dead Men and Tanith clapped and cheered for her. Her thirteenth birthday, just a few months since Gordon had died and she had become a Dead Man in Waiting, and they had given her everything she had wanted for her birthday right down to baking her a cake and covering it in a sickly amount of sweet buttercream and then covered that in a mini pink and white marshmallows for fun.

Rumour in the manor was that Wolf had baked it, meaning it would be good, but Bear had been pushed into placing, very carefully, all the tiny marshmallows, and Valkyrie couldn't think of a better cake. Not to mention the pile of presents they had gotten her and the large lunch they had just returned from for her birthday.

"What did you wish for?" Snake immediately asked.

Panda hit him on the back of the head. "That's bad luck. Don't tell the idiot."

Erskine rubbed the back of his head and winked at her. Instead, he said, "I want some of that cake!"

Anton pulled the cake over and cut a big piece for everyone so the cake was gone but they all got to laugh over the hunk they received.

Tanith had gotten her a training sword and a promise of training her into a 'The' master weaponist whilst the others got her gifts in their usual ways. Crow got her a few books on magic, mostly beginners material on several branches, as well as two hard hats with no given reason.

Bear got her another charm for the bracelet he had given her years ago, and a photo frame she wanted to put a picture of her family, the men and woman in front of her, within. Panda, since he had made her several protective things by now, simply made her a very pretty dress and had also given her some matching shoes she loved – her first pair of heals too, which she was very excited and nervous about wearing despite them only being a little more than two inches.

Wolf got her an exquisite looking, finely detailed music box that could be wound to play an entire song that was just beautiful. Inside she had also found a pretty ankle bracelet and the smooth, pretty black ring she had seen with Tanith a while back and really liked.

Snake had bought her some questionable things, and likely the most. When she had woken up she had been somehow surrounded in her sleep by presents all from him. He had thought it was a competition, and if it was, he won by quantity hands down. He had gotten her socks, a massive water gun, some nice makeup things she'd need to watch YouTube to be able to use, a nice jacket, sparkly body wash that would leave her covered in glitter, some nice pens, all new school supplies in camo colours as well as a backpack that was essentially a shrunken army bag, a box of chocolates, a birthday badge, and a big card that had several vouchers including one to get her nails done, another for her hair and money for a nice spa nearby. Since she had woken earlier than everyone in her excitement – even Skulduggery had been meditating still – she had pulled herself from her bed, gathered the wrapping paper and quietly snuck into his room and places in on top of him. When they had woken each other up to surprise her, they had found Snake snoring under piles of pink wrapping paper and laughed at him, and Valkyrie had left her room already dressed and makeup-ed after said videos. Needless to say, they had been more surprised than her.

Finally, Weasel had bought them all tickets to see a show in a few days, as well as them all pitting their money together so they could all go to a very exclusive Ball tonight.

She was incredibly excited. There was meant to be mages her age there and she was apparently the hot topic of the magical world since Detective Pleasant, First Detective of Ireland, had been taking her out almost every day for cases in which she was ruthlessly able to take criminals down that other detectives had seemingly no chance. Crow blamed his teaching skills. All other days had been spent laughing, training, researching, and most importantly, learning magic.

Grinning to herself, Valkyrie finished off the last of her cake and looked around the table. Her strange family was happy too, even Crow and Weasel who didn't always seem as happy as she wanted them to be, nor as happy as they wanted to seem. Slowly, she was making them happier. She hoped they'd stay that way.

Valkyrie helped Tanith clear the table as it was their turn and they liked to share chores, and they went to the kitchen to wash up. "Are you enjoying your day?" Tanith asked.

"Of course," she said. "Thank you, by the way. It's really fun. And I'm so excited to go out tonight!"

"Yes, there should be lots of boys," Tanith smirked. "And girls too, so you'll have plenty of opportunities to make friends."

Valkyrie nodded. "I need some of those. Since mine ignore me so much."

"Such a deprived girl."

"Tragic really."

"You should try being nicer," Tanith grinned. "Then your friends might like you more."

They bumped hips and smiled. "But what about you?" Valkyrie asked. "Anyone for you at the party?"

Tanith snorted. "We'll just have to see. I'm having a good time here, you know, so if someone wants to ask I'll certainly go with them but I have no intention of making change myself. Anyway, I have to focus on helping you date first!"

"Who says I want to date?" Valkyrie blushed. "I never said I would."

Tanith rolled her eyes. "You don't have to tonight, but you will one day, and then I'll be ready!"

"But it's a _Ball_ ," Valkyrie pointed out. "And I can't ballroom dance, so there's not much point in that. They'd ask me to dance with them and I'd stand on them, stand on my dress – oh God, Tanith, this is a bad idea."

"You'll be fine."

"I'm going to embarrass myself completely. I'll never be able to go out again. I'll never make new friends let alone find someone stupid enough to date me!"

"And this is why you need me for dating," Tanith stated happily. "Let's finish this and we can ask someone to teach you to dance a little."

"This is going to be awful."

.*****.

"Valkyrie, we're going to be late if you don't come right now!" Panda yelled up the stairs.

Valkyrie shouted back, "I'm coming!" and then very, very carefully applied her mascara. One eye… careful… careful… second… eye… complete! She quickly applied lip gloss and took a step back to look over her full look.

She was in her ballgown, a deep blue, almost black, dress with spaghetti straps and a corset, though only with ribbing not to make her waist smaller but rather for the formal look, and the skirt was several layers of dramatic 'waves' with a very thin band of gold on the seam of those 'waves' of material. She didn't know what it was called, but it was dramatic as all hell and she loved it. She looked young still, but also a young woman with a bold personality that knows what she wants and likes.

Her arms, that were already beginning to tone up in the few months she had really been training, made her fit much better with Tanith in her golden, a-line dress with a dramatic open back and beautifully straightened hair. Valkyrie had spent a long time sitting as Tanith curled her own into gentle waves and overall, she knew she looked incredible. Hopefully she'd have someone to ask her out. Or to dance at least. That was her age. She'd already put a ban on her family dancing with her since that would look too desperate for attention on her part and as a thirteen year old now, that was honestly below her and would be incredibly cringy.

Grabbing her phone and tucking it in the little silver clutch as well as her emergency money, she carefully clip-clopped out her room and down the stairs.

They all watched her descend and she found herself blushing. "How do I look?"

"Wonderful," Wolf said immediately.

"They'll be all over you," Weasel added.

"Mature," Panda said sadly. "You remember what I said earlier?"

"Yes. No boys, especially of the older variety, no alcohol, no drugs, no hand holding, no thinking of boys and if they touch, want to touch or even _think_ about coming near me I will tell you," she recited again.

"Unless they're nice," Tanith smirked from the doorway where they were meant to be walking through to the cars. "In which case do whatever you want."

"We're going to be late," Valkyrie giggled. They all looked through to the clock in the formal living area they rarely went in and it told them the party was about to start and they hadn't even left.

They all got into the cars that had been waiting for them and they were taken off to the party. Valkyrie, unfortunately for her, was made to go in the car with Bear, Crow and Panda while the other four went in the other car. It was quiet the whole way. Boring. They even listened to classical and made comments on how much they liked the people that wrote the pieces. It was dull. They weren't even doing it to annoy her, they genuinely found that fun!

Just as they were getting out the car, Bear put an arm over her shoulder. "Just so you know, you can ask the girls out too."

Valkyrie glanced up at him and blushed a little. "What do you mean? Of course, I know that."

"I mean, if you like someone, you might need to initiate that. You are all young, at least I hope you pick someone your age. So, they may not know what they want. If you ask, you're more likely of getting a date, or dance, than if you wait for them. Just be wary of rejection. People don't always know what they want at your age. They don't always imagine dating a girl until it is presented to them. Don't be scared. Be bold. Be you. It might just take a few tries so don't get upset."

Valkyrie nodded, taking the advice as it was. "Thank you. I'll remember."

"I know you will," he said, straightening from his whisper. "You're our apprentice, our mock-child, and our friend. We'll always be here for you. Also, don't worry about the others and their little threats. If you want to talk to anyone or hold their hands or kiss them, go ahead."

She quickly hugged him and then they caught up with the others just as they got to the steps of the mansion. "What is this party by the way?"

"It's a fancy one," Wolf said.

"It's for rich people to show off," Crow added. "They only invite people like us to look good."

Valkyrie snorted. "Your damn ego."

"My ego is perfect. Now shush, you're going to embarrass us all by talking too much."

"Because I'm the one that talks too much," she muttered with a grin, getting him to glance back at her with what she imagined was a smirk and wink. Weasel got their names checked off – Valkyrie had her name specifically on the list but Tanith was a plus one for "whoever" as Weasel said. No one knew who the man decided who her date was so she rolled her eyes at Weasel who raised his eyebrows at her suggestively.

She linked her arm into Ghastly's and stuck her tongue out at Weasel. "Find someone else, loser."

Panda looked pretty smug.

The hall was massive and gleaming all by itself, but they went up the large staircase and up into the ballroom directly across from the stairs with giant, wide open doors and with men with deadly looking scythes on either side.

The ballroom itself was huge once Valkyrie was half carried up the stairs by Bear who had let her hold his arm in support, with three chandeliers and windows at the very end that showed the grounds of the mansion beyond, showing both the wealth and size of the building and its owner. Somehow, Valkyrie felt better knowing she had a mansion in comparison. If she didn't, it would have been very daunting in this hall but though hers was not as grand, she had ballrooms she played in that made this easier and her more relaxed. She was _equal_. She was not out of place.

There was a lot of people. They all looked at the Dead Men when they entered, as they usually did when they went anywhere, but much of it was appreciative of their fine suits and general good looks, such as they were on a skeleton and, obviously, Ghastly Bespoke.

One side of the room had gorgeous art and several clusters of people talking privately. On the other side was more social, where everyone was moving from one group to another with smiles and conversation, and rumours she imagined. A bar had been set up in the top left corner with mostly men hanging around as well as what was likely wives and the occasional muscular woman that likely didn't socialise with anyone from their hardened eyes, so, they were there for the alcohol. They looked badass.

The middle was taken up by the dancing, which wasn't packed but there was a lot of movement and beauty. The young people Valkyrie had been promised wasn't obvious at first as they were greeted by a greedy looking woman with a fake smile and too much jewellery but a nice voice, until she spotted them all talking and standing around the window. Some of them looked over when she did, and she looked away quickly.

They all looked a little older or younger than her. She was the awkward middle. Damn.

They finished being interviewed by the hosts mistress, as Snake had quietly told her with a secret smirk, and they went to find the host who was by the bar with some other large men, many of them with scars and one with a lot of pock marks to help the scars stand out. Strolling carefully and keeping with Bear, they went to the host.

"Oh!" He said when he caught a look at them, pushing his previous guest aside roughly. "Ah! If it isn't the Dead Men! Goodness, I didn't expect you to come at all."

"Well, we have a celebration of our own," Crow said casually. "We thought we could treat our Ward at the same time as… socialising ourselves."

"And what celebration is that?" He asked. He had incredibly white teeth, dark eyes and short dark hair. Though he grinned he didn't seem jolly more so than predatory. Valkyrie knew that it was purely a collector hunt though – the need for the perfect friends, the perfect connections, and if someone got in trouble, the Dead Men were perfect as both.

"Valkyrie Cain's birthday," Snake said smoothly. He looked pretty relaxed which surprised Valkyrie. She thought he would get overexcited.

"Ah!" He said, looking at her as Panda, Tanith and Weasel parted to give him a proper look. "Why, don't you look sophisticated. I'd expect nothing more from Gordon Edgley's daughter! And how old are you?"

"Thirteen today, sir," she said.

"Congratulations, Miss Cain," he cried. "I was quite fond of your father, you know. I was very sad to hear he died. It's a pleasure to meet you."

He held his hand out to shake and she did, having to let go of Bear to do so. She didn't bother correcting him on her relation to Gordon. If people thought he was her father, she was happy with that, even if she did love her real father just as much. "I don't think I was told your name."

"Peter Gifre," he said. He stepped forwards slightly and said, as if just occurring to him, "You should allow me to get you a celebratory drink, and then I'll introduce you to my son, Billy."

He didn't let her answer, but she heard the others follow behind to the bar and Mr Gifre got them all drinks before turning back to Valkyrie. "And what do you want my dear? I don't suppose your guardians would allow you a small wine?"

Crow, gently placing a hand on the shoulder Mr Gifre wasn't holding and sliding it over to force, without touching, his to get off her, responded. "I'm afraid that wouldn't be possible tonight. If Valkyrie wishes to be a Sanctuary Detective she needs to begin her career well, don't you think?"

Mr Gifre nodded. "Of course, of course, just a little joke of course. How about a coke, or orange drink?"

Valkyrie accepted the J2O in a thin, tall glass and even had a pink straw. "Happy birthday," the bar waitress said quietly but politely.

"Thank you," she said, taking it before Mr Gifre had a chance.

"Come, allow me to introduce you to the 'teen' corner," Mr Gifre said. "I imagine you'll be very popular, my dear, you are absolutely stunning. You could rise to the top of society here with looks like yours and your lovely voice."

He prattled on and they very slowly made their way to the 'teen' corner as he called it, with just Bear coming behind them as support. She hadn't realised she required the escort but since it was Bear, she didn't mind so much. He, out of everyone, she would tell things to before having the confidence to do so with anyone else.

"Billy," Mr Gifre said immediately, and a tall boy at _least_ four years older than her, came over dully, though he did look over her body with a small smile when his father looked away, only to see Bear behind her and the smile disappeared, as well as most the blood in his face.

"Billy, this is Valkyrie Cain, the young woman we've been hearing so much about recently," Mr Gifre said conversely. "I want you to be her personal guide tonight. Introduce her to your friends, the other young men and women here, and all the other people that will want to meet her, and I _assure_ you it will be almost everyone. Could you do that for me?"

"Yes, father," he said, glancing over at Bear again who was doing something behind Valkyrie. It was very amusing.

"Good lad," he turned and too saw Bear behind them. "Oh, Shudder, you almost gave me a fright. Miss Cain, don't hesitate to ask for anything. Billy will get you all the drinks you want for your birthday, understand? I'll see you again, I hope."

With a last look at his son and then Bear, he left to see someone else and Bear gave her shoulder a squeeze and she gave him a kiss on his cheek before she was left to Billy's mercy, though only by a hundred yards.


	15. Nadia Robin

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 15**

"Hello," she said to Billy, trying to not seem awkward. "I'm sorry about that. I was pulled away before I knew what was happening."

"It's fine," he grunted quietly. "Let me show you my friends."

He was an absolute bore, Valkyrie soon discovered, and so were his friends who looked as if they had been pinned down and groomed by their parents with a struggle before coming to the party. They didn't say anything between themselves except to comment when they saw someone trip or make a slight mistake dancing, or to say how much they hated someone's dress, or how a person had apparently slept with someone once upon a time and the _scandal_ of it.

Valkyrie sighed. She opened her purse and looked at her phone. She'd been sitting there for at least ten minutes with nothing to do and the nerves were gone now, replaced by impatience. She sighed again, loudly.

"I'm sorry," one of his female friends, whose name she had forgotten, snapped. "Are we boring your highness?"

She looked at her with annoyance. "Yes."

She sneered at her. "You're as irritating as they say."

"Considering that comes from criminals and people annoyed that I'm _better_ than them at catching criminals, I don't see that as much of an insult," she replied with an eye roll.

"Great," she sneered. "Take your entitled-ness and ugly dress elsewhere."

Valkyrie sighed sadly. "Anton isn't going to like hearing this. I _really_ didn't want him to have to hurt anyone tonight."

She got up and noticed the friends look between themselves quickly in a bit of a panic, but she walked away. The other teens were in packs talking just between themselves and she didn't feel like intruding, so she left through one of the balcony doors into the cold, late summer air. The door had been open a crack so it wasn't so bad. Outside were some younger people than her, but not so much as the other children within. It seemed as if people nearer her own age were here.

"Hello," she said, gently pushing the door to.

"Hi," one of them said, a probably the youngest there. "You're Valkyrie Cain."

She nodded. "I've been told," she said. "They're being incredibly boring inside. Is it okay if I stay with you a while?"

They shrugged and said it was fine and got back to talk about something that had happened at one of their schools. Valkyrie didn't listen but did stand beside a few of them to look into the grounds. It was a manicured look, unlike the hills and trees of the much smaller grounds Valkyrie owned. She loved the woods though. The manicured look was already getting boring.

"Who are you?" She asked randomly to the girl beside her.

"Nadia," she said hesitantly, then stuck her hand out to shake. "Nadia Robin."

"That's a pretty name," Valkyrie said with a smile. She looked to only be a year younger or maybe a few months. "What are you doing outside?"

"Same as you, it's boring inside. I have no one to dance with," she complained with a small tug on her lips that made her seem as if she didn't want to make a big deal of anything. "I want to dance all night and no one even asked. So I'm just standing here waiting for my parents to be done."

Valkyrie nodded. "Same," she said. "Though I'm still hoping I get to dance so I'm not too fussed about leaving. Anyway, I didn't get dressed up to go home so soon."

She snored. "I didn't even want to wear this," she said, looking down herself. She was wearing a boyish dress in a pretty yellow that went well with her light brown skin, making her look like a bright sun in the sea of sophistication. The boyish cut didn't make her look any older, but looking closer, Valkyrie noticed they couldn't be too far in age, it was whatever had been done to her with the dress, make-up and hairstyle that de-aged her. It seemed to only work because Nadia still had some baby-fat in her cheeks, but Valkyrie didn't think it would look right on her much longer.

"It's pretty," she stated, "but it is a little young."

"Especially next to you," Nadia joked. "We should swap."

"Not a chance," Valkyrie said, sipping the last of her drink. "Anyway, I'm bigger than you. What would I wear?"

"Nothing?"

"I don't think my friends would like that," she smirked. "Do you have a drink?"

Nadia hesitated. "No, I suppose not."

"Here, let's go get one together," she said. "Then we can ditch them with my friends and we could dance a little?"

Nadia was still and Valkyrie could only feel her shaking hands and her heart beating nervously. It was fairly innocent what she said, but even Valkyrie had heard the way she'd said it. She'd _flirted_. "Um," Nadia said, then seemed to shake herself and grinned. "Actually, I'd love that."

Valkyrie grinned in relief and held the door open for Nadia. When they were both through, Billy and his friends looked ready to jump on her, but Valkyrie slipped her hand into Nadia's elbow, getting a side eye and then a smug smirk from her new friend Nadia, which made them hesitantly lower into their seats seeing they weren't needed and had lost their opportunity at regaining favour. The girls held onto each other as they crossed the room and Valkyrie realised that both of them were not heal wearing people.

"Hello girls," Bear said when they arrived at the bar.

Weasel and Wolf were there with him and turned from speaking to each other intensely beside Bear to look at the girls. They both didn't do anything for a moment and then near identical, cheek-splitting grinned arrived on their faces.

"Valkyrie," Wolf greeted. "Looking for drinks?"

Valkyrie nodded nervously but luckily Nadia knew how to deal with nosy idiots. "We'll have cranberry juices, thank you."

Valkyrie tried to hide a smile as Wolf laughed and ordered for them, Valkyrie walking them the rest of the way over.

"I thought you were being chummy with Billy-goat over there?" Weasel grinned. "Get bored already?"

Nadia laughed. "You got left with William?"

Valkyrie scowled. "I wasn't given a choice. I was pawned off by his father."

"What did poor Bill do to get such a poor reputation?" Wolf asked, handing them their drinks. Valkyrie's had another pink birthday straw the staff had apparently brought with them.

"It's that he doesn't do anything at all," Valkyrie explained.

"Him and his friends don't know how to talk normally," Nadia revealed. "They're rich emo kids that think they're better than everyone else because they can think and be themselves. Crazy concept, right? Must be why they all act the _exact_ same."

Valkyrie giggled, almost blushed that she was actually giggling, and ended up giggling more. Wolf and Weasel covered her embarrassment by laughing over her and then handing their drinks over, so she could recover. She sipped it and realised she still her hand on Nadia's elbow though she didn't seem to mind and a lot of the other couples were doing it, so she kept it up though they weren't a couple and it probably wasn't okay. It didn't seem to be not okay with Nadia though. Which was good.

"So, what do you two plan on doing instead?" Wolf asked.

Valkyrie shrug. "We'll think of something. How long do we need to make plans for?"

Bear checked his watch. "At least four more hours, we can politely leave then since we technically have a child."

"I'm not a child."

"Do you want to stay for four hours or for seven hours?" He asked pointedly.

She sniffed. "Depends how much I can think to do."

Nadia laughed, and they put their drinks on the tall table the Dead Men had claimed and Valkyrie was taken by the hand to the dance floor by Nadia and Valkyrie noticed that though her hair had been done up in tight curls, it was dark, almost black, with a slight red-brown natural tint, and must be rather long when it wasn't in its child-like updo on top of her head. The song finished, and the girls made perfect time, taking a place a couple just vacated.

"How do girls dance?" Valkyrie breathed.

Nadia hesitated. "You're taller. You be the man."

"Okay," Valkyrie said. "Okay. I might be able to do that."

"Might?" Nadia smirked. "How much do you dance?"

"I dance a lot, but not like this," she said. "Ballroom is only this afternoon. I think I remember what I practised though."

Carefully, Valkyrie placed her hand on Nadia's and the other on her waist politely – she'd seen enough movies and recognised the song at least vaguely and knew the type of dance that went with the song – and they set off, taking a few moments to ease into it before Valkyrie started to relax in her position and even pulled off a spin for Nadia without knocking her hair and they went seamlessly into the dance again.

"Do you dance much?" Valkyrie asked quietly. Talking normally somehow was more distracting than whispering.

"Not properly," Nadia admitted. "Mostly just in my room like everyone else, but I have dance lessons for ballroom. My mum wants a perfect, proper daughter."

"You just need a nice dress and to dance, that's not too bad," Valkyrie smirked. "I need to fight for survival. I mean, I want to do it, but the expectations are more extreme."

Nadia grinned. "I'd love to do that."

"Maybe I can bring you one day. You need to get training first though," she said, eyes glancing at Nadia's small arms but kept facing her partner. "It really is dangerous. And protective clothes."

Nadia smiled disappointedly. "I won't be able for a while then. Mum would never let me not be a small pretty princess."

Valkyrie hesitated, then went for it. "You look beautiful though, so it's not all a loss."

Nadia suddenly smirked at Valkyrie with a mischievous look in her eye. "Valkyrie Cain. Are you flirting with me?"

Valkyrie blushed but didn't look away. "Maybe a little."

Nadia smiled and glanced at a couple at moved in the opposite direction as them as a form of fun. "I like it a little."

Valkyrie felt relief. "Thank God. I would be super embarrassed otherwise."

The song ended and they stayed together, still for just a moment before a slower, but still proper dancing, not romantic, one began to be played by the band. "Have you always liked girls?" Nadia asked.

"What?" Valkyrie asked, somehow shocked. She hadn't really thought about it much.

Nadia hesitated. "Well, I thought, you know, because you flirted and got me a drink, and we're dancing, that you might like me, like, wanted to go out some time–"

Valkyrie interrupted her, getting her thoughts together. "Of course, I would. I do. I mean, I'd love to meet you again somewhere and I do like you. Maybe we could make it a, you know, date?"

Nadia grinned, her sunny dress making more sense with the beautiful, bright smile wearing it. "I'd love to! God, this will be so much fun!"

Valkyrie grinned back at her and, noticing the lead up for a jump spin, she said, "Get ready Nadia," moved her hand and lifted the girl in a perfect jump at the same time as the others and then led it into a spin without trouble. They both giggled.

"Let's just dance," Valkyrie said excitedly, feeling a goofy grin on her face. "Dance all night."

Nadia nodded and kept giggling quietly. "I'm so glad we're doing this."

The girls did indeed keep dancing until they were working up a sweat and Valkyrie had begun to play with Nadia, throwing her into spins and even a jump without notice and out of time, but the girl laughed louder every time and Valkyrie found, quite without warning, that she had more than a crush on the sweet, upfront girl already and was glad they had already agreed on a date. Leaving the dancefloor finally, they went, arms fully linked, to get their drinks and talking about places in Dublin Nadia's mother might let them go to hang out.

"You two did amazing!" Tanith said when they, without even noticing, had stopped at the table.

The two looked at her and Valkyrie smiled. "It was fun." She grabbed their drinks and handed Nadia hers. "We enjoyed it."

Nadia nodded and finished her entire drink. "It was. But I'm not sure I can dance all night."

"Heals?" Tanith asked sympathetically.

"I hate them!"

Tanith nodded. "Same here. Nice to have a change of pace though."

"I guess," Nadia conceded.

"This is my sister, Tanith, I was telling you about," Valkyrie said. "And this is Dexter, Saracen and Anton who you met, and this is Ghastly, Erskine and my partner Skulduggery."

"Nice to meet you all," she said politely. "Nadia Robin."

"Pleasure to meet you," Crow said. "Just to warn you, Gifre is coming this way."

"And we're going the other," Nadia told him quickly, glancing left and, taking the new cranberry drink Weasel had got her, pulled Valkyrie along to another part of the room.

"This is going to get boring if we don't do something," Nadia pointed out. "But we might survive."

Valkyrie looked around carefully. "Follow my lead."

"What?" Nadia asked suspiciously.

"We're just going to the bathroom," Valkyrie said. "For now."

Nadia sniffed but went along anyway and the left the hall and went down the stairs at a nice stroll, Valkyrie holding the bannister and Nadia using her limited strength to get down the stairs. It was sort of fun to have someone with the same problems and flirt and joke with them. They clicked with their humour and attitude. There was no reason for it, nothing Valkyrie had experienced before. They just _worked_.

"Say," Valkyrie asked Nadia, "I didn't ask, but how old are you?"

"Why?" Nadia asked, following with Valkyrie the sign pointing for the bathroom. "Would it matter?"

"You already asked me out, so it's too late anyway," Valkyrie smiled. "But I was curious."

She sniffed. "I'm almost fourteen."

Valkyrie frowned at her. "That's not fair. I thought you were younger."

Nadia rolled her eyes. "Well I'm sorry to burst your bubble of leading along little girls but _I'm_ the elder here."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and gently bumped Nadia's hip like she did with Tanith and they stopped outside the single bathroom. "I didn't mean that. You're just cute is all."

She snored. "I'm going first."

They took turns, taking a moderate amount of time considering the long dresses they had to work around, Valkyrie more so than Nadia's simple, boyish design. After that, Valkyrie took Nadia by the hand with more confidence than she realised she ever had and took Nadia for a walk.

They mostly strolled in silence, occasionally laughing and giggling together at their sneaky walk and eventually found the kitchen which had a door to the outside open wide against the head. There were a few chefs making the little foods on silver platters for the waiting staff to take around the party. They were loud but seemed to be concentrating. Valkyrie looked around the room carefully, then pulled herself back to look at Nadia.

"Hold your skirt," she said, gathering hers up to run faster. Nadia copied and grinned excitedly. "On my count, follow me and stay quiet."

Nadia nodded, and Valkyrie waited two waitresses left with the first of the dessert platters out the 'official' doors and made a dash for behind the kitchen island. The girls crouched behind them and were in easy reach of the door. Slowly, Valkyrie turned and glanced above the counter. No one was looking. Reaching out, she grabbed a bowl of chocolate and crouched. Nadia nearly gasped but Valkyrie gave her a look and she swallowed it.

Carefully, the girls run from the room into the outside. Taking Nadia's hand, Valkyrie started to run and they, with skirts and chocolate in hand, ran through the garden with giggles flying into the quiet night air.

They didn't stop until they were at the little fountain Valkyrie remembered seeing when they had first spoken on the balcony. Giggling and clenching a stitch at her side, Nadia sat on the edge of the fountain.

"God," she gasped finally. "I'm having so much fun Valkyrie. Do you think I can see you again soon?"

She nodded. "I can see you almost every day. I'm not a real detective, obviously, so I don't exactly have to go to work. And my reflection has taken over school since I'm still registered to a non-magic one."

"So it's just me," she said, smiling softly. The music could just be heard from where they were. "I think I can convince my mum after I see you a few times. But, she'll think I'm just making up excuses for money or to do drugs or something insane until she believes that I'm really going on dates. Assuming we go on more, obviously. She's a little controlling."

"Obviously."

"But I should be able to see you, just at silly times, like ten till twelve or something stupid," she rolled her eyes.

"Won't she notice you're missing?" She asked.

"Maybe," Nadia explained. "But my aunt and uncle are visiting, so they won't be thinking about me or my cousins. Mum wants me to make friends in high places."

"Just tell her I'm on first names with the Elders, then," Valkyrie grinned. "And the Dead Men couldn't be safer for you to be around. If you told her someone from the Dead Men would escort us, would that make it better?"

"I suppose," she teased. "But I'd rather keep talking alone."

Valkyrie smiled, and they did that – talked alone at the edge of the fountain for hours, eating chocolates and finishing their drinks they had taken outside with them. Sneaking off, obviously, didn't stop Weasel from finding them when everyone was getting ready to leave much later. They had just watched the fireworks burst above which had been fun but now, it seemed to be time to part.

"Here," Weasel said, passing Valkyrie her clutch. Grinning she got her phone out and had Nadia tell her number and sent a text to the girls' phone somewhere in the ballroom.

"There," she said. "Now we can keep in touch."

Nadia smiled at her and Weasel finally turned from grinning at them to lead them back to the ballroom. As it happened, both girls visited the bathroom again – they'd been gone for hours in the cold and the sudden warmth was a blessing – and just before re-joining the crowd to go home, Valkyrie smiled at Nadia and they hugged for a moment before Valkyrie followed her brothers from the room and Nadia watched her go from besides who must have been her cousins. She kept glancing back at her until she was out of the doors and there was no way to look anymore.

In the car, this time with Weasel, Wolf and Snake, she was able to be silent for just a moment before they all turned to her with matching grins.

"Oh no," she laughed. "I'm not saying anything to you."

"What, why?" Snake asked, smirking. "We're family now, you _have_ to."

"No, I don't," she said. "I'm not telling you a thing."

"Are you seeing her again?" Wolf asked.

"Yes," Valkyrie admitted immediately. "I have her number too."

They cheered for her and they laughed, joked and thought up places Valkyrie and Nadia could go for their date after Valkyrie admitted to that too.

When they got back, Valkyrie wiped the makeup from her face, did her teeth, pulled the dress off and, crawling into bed, looked at her phone to find a text from Nadia saying 'I had a nice night. Hope I get to see you soon x' to which Valkyrie smiled and fell asleep.


	16. Dates galore

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 16**

In the morning, Valkyrie was thirsty, hungry and still quite tired but a jolt excitement rushed through her and she grabbed her phone that was in the covers with her where she’d accidentally forgotten it. When she unlocked it, she had that message from Nadia still.

Typing quickly, she wrote, ‘I loved it too, I’ll find a nice place for our date soon. How are you? X’

She left it at that, pulled on pyjamas and went down to the kitchen where the others were having their breakfasts and teas. They all smiled or grinned at her when she took her seat and she spent considerable effort not looking at them and simply spreading jam on her toast instead. Finally, when she had poured herself orange juice to go with it, she looked at Tanith.

“So,” she said, sipping her juice. “Anything fun happen on your end?”

Tanith smirked but told her she’d had a nice time talking with an old acquaintance, dancing with their friends and occasionally spying on her and Nadia out the window.

“Sounds like a nice time,” Valkyrie said and completely ignored the suggested opening. She bit into her toast and felt her phone vibrate and looked at it. ‘You woke me up! Screw you. But I’m happy to hear from you x’.

Valkyrie smiled and texted back, ‘I’m about to be interrogated’.

‘Why?’

‘They think it’s funny. Brb,’ she sent and then put her phone away for the moment. She still had everyone looking at her. “You got your question time,” she frowned at Weasel, Wolf and Snake. “And you probably told everyone else so no one can even begin.”

“You can’t do that, Val,” Tanith said, in mock-horror. “You’re our experiment.”

“Our practice child,” Snake added.

“Our chance to live like a kid again,” Tanith continued.

“You already do that,” Valkyrie pointed out. “But you also have a motorbike, so you do it better. I don’t see what’s so fun about this.”

“What’s so fun is that this is your girlfriend,” Wolf pointed out. “And it’s going to be really fun for us to tell you what to do.”

“Right, first off, I’m not doing anything you tell me, secondly, she is not my girlfriend yet so please don’t start saying that. And lastly, you were giving me all these rules last night and now you’re contradicting yourself,” she said hotly. “You can’t have it both ways.”

“Yes, but we thought you’d like someone bad,” Crow said. “Someone too old, or annoying, or someone that interrupted us or that–”

“Shut up,” Valkyrie interrupted.

He sighed. “Hopeless. What we thought would happen didn’t, and you chose a nice person your own age with similar interests that didn’t try to kiss you or do anything we didn’t like so we don’t have to worry.”

“We basically spend all night judging you two,” Tanith cheekily provided. Valkyrie threw a spoon at her which she caught and put in the right place. “And we’re getting off-topic. Where are you two going to go?”

Valkyrie sighed. “I don’t know yet, okay? Let me think first. Also, don’t we have a case to finish today Skul?”

.*****.

It took almost three weeks before Valkyrie and Nadia were able to get together for their date but in the end, it worked in their favour. They talked over that time about their interests and things they liked, and the conversation never ended between them. Valkyrie couldn’t think of anyone she liked more at that point in time. They phoned each other whenever their schedules allowed, which wasn’t often, but they texted the rest of the time, so much so Valkyrie had gotten in trouble with Crow for the phone bill he’d been charged.

Apparently, it was coming out of her pocket money which had almost made her laugh as she didn’t get pocket money, she was just bought whatever she said she wanted. She didn’t ask for anything in the shops for the week following though, so she supposed she served her punishment.

On the date itself, they went for a hike in a nature park with a very tall hill, which Valkyrie thought sounded lame on paper but it truly was a _really_ big hill, and trekked for hours chatting and playing silly games, finding the companionship they’d had at the ball all over again. Valkyrie brought a packed lunch for them including lots of biscuits for the walking, hot chocolate, sandwiches, chocolate bars, oranges and grapes, all of which they ate in a pretty picnic at the top of the hill on a large rock they used Elemental magic to get themselves on top of.

“What magic do you have?” Valkyrie asked while they ate lunch.

“Mostly Elemental,” Nadia told her, “but I want to be a doctor at the moment so I’m also branching into Adept, specifically healing magic. I want to get an apprenticeship at some point but my mum says she won’t let me until I’ve finished University.”

“Wouldn’t you need to go to medical school?”

“An apprenticeship would basically be the same, but a few years extra knowledge would obviously help. That’s how it works in the Magic Community,” Nadia informed her. “I suppose, if we stay together for that long I mean, we would be a good match in that way. You save the world and get all these injuries and I can save you.”

Valkyrie smiled and leaned over and kissed her cheek, making both of them blush and be quiet for a short time before they started throwing grapes at each other and laughing.

When they had walked back to the village nearby, Nadia bought them an ice cream just as it started raining and they sat in the rain on swings eating ice cream and trying to outswing the other before Nadia’s parents arrived to pick her up. They left the swings and ran to meet them under a large tree that kept the water mostly off of them.

“Nadia!” Her mother exclaimed when they got them. Valkyrie suddenly became nervous again. “You’re soaked through! What were you thinking, silly girl?”

Nadia’s mother used her own Elemental magic to dry her but, though she offered her hand and introduced herself as Fauve Keena, she did not offer to dry her as her own brothers would have offered.

Mrs Keena, as she was expected to call her, was a small, thin woman with very pale skin and a thousand freckles, deep orange-red hair and blue eyes, whereas her husband, a quiet man named Anand Vinay who was from India though Nadia had already told her he had travelled to Ireland he was much younger, some two-hundred years previous, and established a business before meeting now-Mrs Keena, his wife. He was dark in skin, eyes and hair but did seem more openly friendly than Mrs Keena who seemed happy to treat her like a troublesome friend she couldn’t quite detach from her precious daughter.

“Did you have a nice time, dear?” She asked Nadia.

“Yes mum, we went on a hike and had ice creams,” she told her, rolling her eyes. She, Valkyrie could now see, took more after her father than mother in looks, though she wasn’t at all masculine. She had the same dark hair, though Valkyrie did see a hue of her mother’s coming through in the sun, her father’s dark eyes and though it was a lot lighter, her skin without the freckles did seem to take after her father too.

But her form was more after her mother’s – high cheekbones, small nose, a mole on her neck, the same long fingers and her body shape seemed the same too. Valkyrie wouldn’t dare think too much about it, but Nadia had more of a waist than her mother despite being thirteen. Mrs Keena was wearing a very tight shirt that showed off her flatness. In fact, she didn’t need to think of it more, some other relative had passed down a much curvier body to Nadia compared to her mother. Her chest was probably already the same as or larger than her mothers, although only just. Not that it meant anything at all. Or that Valkyrie had thought about it. Or compare it to her own flatness. Nadia continued: “And yes, we will be seeing each other again soon.”

“I’m glad you’re meeting new people, you know,” she said softly, cupping her daughter’s cheek. “I love you.”

“I love you too Mum,” she said exasperatedly, then stepped back and took Valkyrie’s hand. “I’m going to say good-bye now.”

“Okay,” Mrs Keena said. She didn’t move, just watched. Valkyrie looked between mother and daughter, growing more amused and awkward at the same time, before looking at Mr Vinay who was outright smirking and took his wife by the hand, pulling her away to the car to give them privacy.

“Sorry,” Nadia apologised to Valkyrie. “I don’t want to leave you by yourself.”

“It’s alright,” Valkyrie said, holding both her hands. “I can fight off anyone you know. Being an awesome warrior princess and all.”

Nadia snorted a laugh. “Sure, sure. I _will_ get to see you soon, right?”

“You could come over for a family dinner if you want? We could go on a walk around the house, play hide-and-seek – don’t laugh, it’s the best game ever invented ever – and have more ice cream.”

“But you arranged this one, I need to make one for you,” she pouted.

“Better get on that then because I want to have you over at some point. How else am I meant to show off, hu?” Valkyrie grinned and got a kiss on the cheek before they said their good-byes and parted.

Nadia went off home and Tanith came out from hiding quickly after. “Ooo, you got kissed!”

“Shut up,” she grinned, taking the offered helmet and putting it on.

.*****.

It was another two months and getting close to Christmas when they next got to meet, at Valkyrie’s mansion. It wasn’t a proper date, she supposed, but it was so good to see the girl she was so quickly coming to adore, she didn’t even care. The months hadn’t stopped the permanent conversation and neither had Nadia’s mother who had some issues with her daughter growing up and dating. Plus, they had discovered video calling, so there was no stopping them now.

For the not-really-date, Valkyrie got Nadia a present for her birthday in just a week – December twelfth – which was just a pretty necklace, some perfume she had recently run out of, a top, and chocolate. She really liked chocolate.

Nadia had hugged her and been grateful for the presents before kissing her cheek again. Valkyrie grinned at her. “You’re going to get me so teased later. They’re spying on us, probably.”

Nadia laughed and they took a walk around the house as it was raining and even showed her Gordon’s office and the saddening story of her finding her surrogate father dead in his chair but lightened the mood by pointing out he had indeed finished the story and it was on its way to being published which Valkyrie knew he’s have been pleased about. She hadn’t been in the room since finding him dead. Being with Nadia made it easier. It gave her something else to focus on.

“How did the Dead Men get custody of you though?” Nadia asked. “I figured family related to you would always get to take you.”

Valkyrie shrugged. “Gordon had it organised that Crow, Skulduggery, was my guardian for when he died but said that they were all my brothers. It’s confusing really, because at first, I thought Crow would want to be my dad and take that role but we’re just really good friends, brother- and sister-in-arms really, and the rest of them are somewhere between brother, uncle and best friend so it’s a little strange to explain. Plus sometimes I think Wolf, Snake and Weasel flirt with me for fun which is not very family-like but they also are. Do you know what I mean? It’s all just for fun. Nothing weird or anything.”

“Yeah,” she smiled, looking over one of the bookcases. “It’s a unique situation. It’s going to create unique dynamics.”

She went to pull one of the books out but it stopped halfway and a loud click was heard. The girls looked at each other and stood back. The bookcase slowly opened with soft clicks to reveal a hidden room.

“Cool,” Nadia grinned. “Did you know about this?”

Valkyrie shook her head. “That’s an Echo stone.”

They stared at it a moment, not sure what to do, when it glowed and Gordon Edgley’s image slowly appeared.

“Oh!” He said. “Stephanie. And someone else. You shouldn’t be in here.”

That was the first time Valkyrie cried in Nadia’s arms. 


	17. The Grotesquery

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 17**

When the Dead Men got their next call that could go in the 'Save the World' category, it was just past July of the next year, just as Nadia and Valkyrie were an official couple that people knew and believed were really dating each other, from Grand Mage Meritorious. They were all asked to come in immediately.

The Waxwork Museum the Sanctuary was hidden beneath was empty on the top but as soon as Crow pressed the little button to open up the wall, noise blared out at them. They looked at each other, since they were most familiar with the Sanctuary than any of the others and seemed to both agree the activity wasn't threatening but certainly wasn't normal.

They walked on down into the secret building, finding the various people jogging from one place to the other looking quite harassed about something. The administrator, appointed just two weeks previously when the other one quit due to the pressure of the job, went passed them with three phones, an earpiece, two folders, a bag of papers slowly flying everywhere and hair all over her face. "They're waiting for you," she screeched at them as she passed to some unknown place.

Valkyrie shook her head. "What's got everyone in a tizzy?"

Wolf, on her right, shrugged. "Beats me. They're in the Grand Hall then?"

"It's not a Grand Hall," Crow muttered and lead them into the new meeting room. It _was_ grand, with new dark floorboards like the rest of the Sanctuary, wallpapered walls, thrones with steps leading up to them and a big round meeting table with three high-backed chairs to offset the feeling of equality.

"Dead Men," Meritorious greeted when they closed the door behind them. "You're missing one."

"Tanith Low is away in England on business right now," Crow said formally.

"Her mum's birthday," Valkyrie added. "Why did you call us?"

On Meritorious' right was Elder Crow, which often confused Valkyrie to have two Crow's but she came up with the names as a child so it wasn't her fault. On Meritorious' left was the new Elder, Thurid Guild, and whilst the Grand Mage and Elder Crow had come to respect her as the Dead Men's prodigy, Guild would obviously love to kick her onto the street with no memory of the Sanctuary at all except perhaps him kicking her out. As it was, he clenched his fists as soon as she spoke.

He barely glanced at her but did manage to speak right before Meritorious – which really amused Valkyrie because it really annoyed Meritorious – saying, "We have been informed that Baron Vengeous has been freed from his confinement in Russia."

Crow paused. "How?"

"Violently," Meritorious took over, giving Guild a dirty look. "As well as nineteen Cleavers and three quarters of the other staff and guards, he took out over half of the other prisoners before vanishing. That facility was the third safest in the world. There has never been a breakout, no magic should have been possible. The only positive, and I say this lightly, is that most of the prisoners he took out were some of their worst. No one will be missed out of them, at least."

Valkyrie raised her eyebrow at Crow and he answered her unspoken question. "Vengeous was one of Mevolent's Three Generals. He's not to be underestimated – dangerously fanatical, extremely intelligent and very, very powerful. If he did that without magic, I assure you he'd have razed that facility to the ground with magic."

"I had a colleague rupture just by being looked at by him," Wolf said darkly.

"Ruptured?

"All over the place," Crow nodded, turning back to the Elders. "Do we know how he got out?"

"Only sign was one wall of his cell was cracked," Meritorious said, speaking forcefully over Guild before he could interrupt again. "The cell is made of at least five metres of reinforced concrete and other stones beyond it, and though it was solid the cracks run through the whole wall."

"The prison is a closely guarded secret," Elder Crow continued. Guild clenched his fists again and Valkyrie wondered idly if it was a problem with women in positions of power he had. "Whoever helped him escape had inside knowledge. We'll be keeping an eye out for any missing or dead officials, but it is Russia's problem. They'd sooner get themselves killed than accept any help from us."

Guild nodded shortly. "He'll be coming here soon. You need to be ready for him."

"Why would he come here?" Valkyrie asked immediately.

He ground his teeth and Meritorious, with a hint of smile, answered her. "He has a long history here. He'll know he doesn't have long before he's found and will want to cause as many problems as possible, especially in revenge."

"Ah yes," Crow said suddenly. "He probably hasn't forgotten the time I threw dynamite a him. It didn't kill him, but it definitely ruined his day."

"You arrested him eighty years ago, we're relying on you doing that again," Guild said sharply.

Meritorious shook his head. "No. You are to search and destroy. That is all your orders. Do what you need to."

Crow nodded, and they were dismissed. As soon as they were out, Valkyrie looked at Crow. "He still doesn't like me."

"Who, Guild? No, he really doesn't," Crow said absently.

"He doesn't like you either."

"Now that _is_ mystifying."

"He doesn't like Elder Crow either," she pointed out.

"It seems our new Elder has a superiority complex," Snake said in a rare moment of seriousness. "I would be careful around him Val."

She nodded and Panda reverted the conversation back to the case. "Where do you expect he'd go first?"

Crow, stopping for a moment so the wall could slide open, said, "We don't need to know, nor will we likely start in the right place even if we tried. As soon as we hear of the deaths, we'll know he's here. He'll look for his old friends and new news, then I expect he'll hide away with his plans before coming to kill us."

Valkyrie nodded. "I'm glad he's a simple one."

"Yes, more and more people are like that nowadays. I sort of miss the unpredictability," Crow said wistfully.

"Is that why you keep Snake around?" Valkyrie asked with a grin.

"Hey!"

They laughed and got in the car and drove over to China's. It was rare for them to all go to the same place on Sanctuary business so when they got there and saw a few sorcerers around, they all stared and hurried out their way. Up in the library it didn't take China a moment to turn up.

"Dexter," she smiled at him. "Back so soon?"

He smirked at her but they all managed, by some miracle Valkyrie had never witnessed before, to stay professional. "I'm afraid this is Sanctuary business."

"Oh, how dull," she pouted. "I can only assume this is about one recently liberated war criminal?"

Crow nodded. "You haven't heard anything yet have you?"

She looked around and gave them another smile. "Let us talk privately."

She led them to her private apartment opposite the hall and they sat around. Since she had first met the Dead Men she had grown a few inches and had gained a lot of weight in muscle mass and through her height, mostly encouraged by competitions, the need to fight for her life and a certain person's appreciation for her strong arms and toned stomach. She was in no way muscular yet, but it was a good start. But it meant she didn't feel right sitting on anyone's lap anymore. It was tragic.

"Valkyrie, dear, how much do you know about Baron Vengeous?" China asked her

"Not much," she said. "Very dangerous, I know that much."

"Oh yes, quite fanatical," she said, smiling at her despite the conversation. Her eyes sparkled in the sunlight. "He's a fanatic follower of the Faceless Ones, and there is nothing worse than a zealot. Along with Serpine and Lord Vile, Vengeous was one of Mevolent's most trusted generals. He was assigned to their most secret operations. Have you ever heard of the Grotesquery, my dear?" Valkyrie shook her head.

"Before he was caught, Baron Vengeous was given the task of resurrecting the Faceless Ones from the remains found in a long-forgotten tomb."

Valkyrie frowned. "Is that even possible? Bringing one of them back to life after all this time? Wouldn't it have rotted or something?"

It was Wolf that answered with a shake of his head. "Bringing back a whole one was beyond his abilities."

"He took the remains and stuck them together with organs and other parts of other creatures to make a hybrid, calling it the Grotesquery," Weasel suppled.

"But he was missing two ingredients," China continued. "First, he needed a Necromancer's power to revive it and then, once it was alive, he needed something to keep it that way. When Lord Vile died, Vengeous thought he could harness Vile's power. Vile was a Necromancer, a practitioner of death magic – shadow magic. Lord Vile stored his in his armour."

"So, if Vengeous wore that amour," Valkyrie said, "he'd have all of Vile's power…"

"He died alone, and the amour was lost," Weasel said bluntly. "No one has ever seen a trace of Vile since."

Valkyrie nodded and took that in. "And what about the other ingredient? Does he know how to keep it alive?"

"Yes," Bear said, "but he has never revealed it."

"Ah. But we can stop him before he gets either of them, right?" Valkyrie said positively.

The others looked at each other. "Sure," Wolf said.

"Okay, okay, let's assume we don't. What will the, er, the Grow thing be able to do?"

"Grotesquery. And it would be able to, supposedly, summon the Faceless Ones by opening a portal," Crow explained.

Valkyrie looked at him doubtfully.

"It would have to be at full strength," Crow told her. "It can do it but that won't happen."

"How's that?"

"A heart had to be provided for it, but the only one suitable was the heart of a Cu Gaelach."

"I'm sorry?"

"Cu na Gaelai Duibhi," Wolf took over. "You should know what that is."

"It means… it's Hound of the Black Moon?" She said uncertainly. They had been teaching her Irish after she'd asked them to test her on her Irish for school and some of the teacher's materials for them had been wrong. Crow had even written to the school. Long rants had been had about how the education system was bad, slowly getting more dramatic until Tanith was giggling about tearing down the system. Though, it didn't feel as if Tanith needed much encouragement to hate anything government-like.

"Exactly," China said. "They're terrible creatures, ruthless and savage, things that are virtuously extinct now."

"Ruthless savage things that are only ruthlessly savage for one night every few years, at a lunar eclipse. So no matter _how_ much power Vengeous pumps into that thing, the Grotesquery will not be strong enough to open a portal until the Earth, moon and sun line up–"

"It's in two nights Skul," Saracen said.

Crow sagged. "Well that's just dandy."

It was getting close to dinner when they left China's apartment and they drove back to the mansion. It was not often they were all sleeping in the mansion as they did have other work to do. Bear could only leave the hotel for so long, Ghastly had a full time business to run and people to please, Tanith was working on her citizenship but until it went through she could not be in Ireland all the time and occasionally, though usually only for a week or two at a time, Snake, Wolf and Weasel would go off for a little adventure with their other friends. Always, though, she had Crow with her and she could call her other friends all the time. On the car ride home, her friends cancelled their other plans and made space for the next week to deal with Vengeous.

When they got home, Valkyrie ran up the stairs to talk to Nadia.

It rang for a few moments and then she answered. "Hey Val."

"Hi," Valkyrie said, smiling at the sound of her voice. "Are you free for a little bit?"

"Always for you," she said cheekily, and Valkyrie heard her close her bedroom door through the phone. "What's up?"

"It's Sanctuary stuff," she said, sitting on the ottoman/sofa at the end of her bed. "Do you know about Vengeous?"

Nadia did not know much about him, so Valkyrie filled her in on the bare minimum, not allowed to reveal everything on an ongoing case for her protection which Nadia already knew. At the end Nadia was quiet.

"What are you thinking?" Valkyrie asked.

"Where do you think he'd get a Hound of the Black Moon?" She asked.

"I don't know. I'll have to ask Gordon," she said.

"It sounds really dangerous," she said quietly. "You'll be alright, won't you?"

"You know I'll do my best. Just stay away from the magical communities for a while. Stay quiet. It'll be over in a few days regardless, okay? If I tell you to run, just make sure you do that."

"How?"

"Your parents will get you out if you tell them what I told you. You'll be fine, even if they don't let us see each other again over it," she said comfortingly. "Trust me. Other than Tanith, we're all here and I bet Tanith is coming in soon to help. They'll be eight of us, the whole Sanctuary and all of the Dead Men's friends. We won't let the Faceless be summoned, won't even let the Grossy get up."

She snorted a laugh and Valkyrie grinned. "I suppose your right. So, have you got your outfit for tomorrow night?"

Valkyrie sagged. "Oh yeah. The reunion. I suppose so. I'll just throw anything on."

She could almost feel Nadia's frown. "No, you have to dress up. Do you have a dress that fits you?"

Valkyrie went into her wardrobe and started looking around in the piles of mess for something. She found, after much telling off from Nadia to sort out the wardrobe, a dress that was a little short but still long enough some of her more protective friends would not be uncomfortable, nor would any gross relatives make comments. That would do, and she put it on her door handle ready.

"I look forwards to seeing you again," Nadia said sweetly.

"Me too. It'll be fun," she said. "But keep in mind we might not be able to go. If this thing with Vengeous is too much…"

"Yeah, I know. But I want to see you so you better make sure everything's fine for tomorrow night."

Valkyrie grinned. "And what will I get if I do?"

Nadia laughed. "You'll only know if you do it."


	18. A Showdown

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Note – much of this chapter is copied as I love the original and there is literally nothing I would change between the original and what I actually need for my fanfic. So I'm just stealing it for our joined pleasure of rereading it. Sorry, but not really ;)**

* * *

**Chapter 18**

The next day, after Valkyrie had let her reflection off to school, she got herself ready and went down to get breakfast, shooting off a "good morning!" text to her girlfriend as she stumbled sleepily along. Only Crow, who was taking a call outside, and Snake who had gone somewhere else for the night, was missing from the table. She got herself some cereal.

"How's the day going to go then?" She asked them, already in her 'serious mode'. She wanted her reward from Nadia!

Wolf answered her. "We'll be splitting up first. We don't trust him not to sneak into the country so, in pairs, we'll be going off to different places. Saracen and Anton will be going up to Northern Ireland, Ghastly and Erskine will go south, me and Skulduggery will go around an old haunt of his and you'll be at China's waiting for Tanith. They used to be close, China and Vengeous, but I doubt he'll get to her this morning. Tonight, _eh_ , maybe."

Valkyrie nodded. "That sounds like a plan."

They all finished getting ready and Crow and Wolf dropped Valkyrie at China's right after they got a call from Bear and Weasel that a vampire called Dusk had been attacking Valkyrie's reflection and given it a syringe. They'd be taking the syringe to Kenspeckle later.

Valkyrie went up to China alone, texting Nadia with a smile as she learnt she'd convinced Mrs Keena to take her to get her hair and nails done after school. They'd been arguing about letting Nadia go to the reunion with Valkyrie for a little while but once Nadia had made Mrs Keena see she could spend quality time getting ready with her daughter and then go on a date with her husband, it had been a done deal.

Just as she got to the third floor, China was crossing to her apartment from the library. "Valkyrie," China said. "How nice to see you again, and so soon."

Valkyrie smiled. "I like your necklace."

"Hm, so do I. It cost two very fine men their lives. At times, I wear it to honour their sacrifices. Other times, I wear it because it goes with this skirt. Would you like to come in?"

"Sure," Valkyrie said and followed China inside. She closed the door after herself and looked admiringly around the apartment. The view alone was incredible but she was certainly attracted to China's sense of style.

"Any new developments?" China asked, picking up a stack of letters and rifling through them.

"Not especially, but Dusk, the vampire, attacked my reflection earlier." China looked at her to continue but she shook her head. "I don't know anything yet. Hopefully we'll know by tonight."

"Of course," she said indulgently. She sat at one of the beautiful armchairs and Valkyrie sat on the sofa opposite her, recognising the teasing spark in China's eye. "So, Detective Cain, how is Miss Robin?"

Valkyrie smiled. "Fine, as always."

"Have you seen her recently?" She asked.

"No, but I will tonight. Some awful family reunion some awful aunt came up with. I doubt Gordon didn't mention Beryl?"

"Oh, I've heard of her," she laughed. "She sounds awful."

"I know! Who does she think she is, making me see _family_ of all people," she said, shaking her head. "At least I'll have Nadia."

"You seem to love her," China said softly.

Valkyrie stopped looking out the window and saw the woman with a soft look, albeit smirking a little, and raised her eyebrow back. "You always get happy when you speak about her. I've seen people fall in love quickly, even in childhood, but I can honestly say I never would have expected this pairing."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"No problem. Make sure you don't let her slip through your fingers, my dear. There aren't many young women willing to have such little time with someone they love at this age. We always have so many expectations at your age, so many dreams and things to do. Waiting on someone so they can do great things without them doesn't tend to be on young women's list of things to do."

Valkyrie nodded. "I won't let that happen. I really, really like Nadia. I – I could see a future with her, although I'm not pushing anything. It's only been a few months and we're really young! And if I have to protect her…"

"I understand." There was a knock on the door then and then the sounds of a scuffle and someone being hit to the floor. "Go to the bedroom," China said quickly. "Do not argue, go to the bedroom and be quiet."

Valkyrie did that, but left it open just a crack as she did. Staying quiet, she watched as Baron Vengeous broke the door down and came into the apartment. China was standing next to her desk. So much for Dexter's theory.

"Hello China," he said. He was wearing dark, militaristic clothes with gleaming black boots. He had a cutlass in his belt. "It's good to see you again."

"Baron Vengeous. I dearly wish I could say the same. Why are you here?"

"You mean you don't know? I'm here for you China. Within a few hours I will have Lord Vile's armour and the final missing ingredient will be within my grasp. It is time to take off this mask you wear, to take your place."

"My place is right here."

"We both know that's not true," he said scornfully. "You could no more turn your back on the Faceless Ones than I could. I've seen your devotion."

"My devotion, as you call it, has waned."

Valkyrie could see the anger seeping into Vengeous' face as the argument went on. Just as he threatened to kill China, she laid a hand on her stomach and all the furniture in the room suddenly flew at Vengeous and it, and Vengeous, slammed into the wall. With a swipe of her hand the furniture created a space around the man.

"You do not threaten me in my own home," China said to him calmly and the furniture hurled back at him.

Vengeous was quick though and Valkyrie watched in shock as the table burst into splinters and he dived under the rest which instead hit the wall behind him. He sent his hand into her chest and China hit the wall, falling to one knee. Valkyrie was about to open the door and put a stop to it when China looked up at Vengeous and narrowed her eyes at him.

"As my words draw closed, the circle binds, secures you to your fate."

Vengeous tried to reach for her but hit the invisible barrier China had set up around him. Valkyrie realised she, too, had almost underestimated China. Sometimes it was hard to remember the beautiful woman was once a fierce and deadly warrior. No, not once was. _Is_.

As they were fighting, Valkyrie texted all the Dead Men and Tanith in their group chat – they all avoided it if they could help it, there was too many of them to use a group chat except to relay the most important information – and looked up when the two men came in through the doorway Vengeous had smashed his way through.

One was dark haired, pale and oddly beautiful, the other was blonde and wearing a brown suit, faded white shirt and sunglasses. He grinned, and the carpet split and frayed, and he sank downwards into the floor and disappeared. China dived for the phone but the other man, the vampire, grabbed her.

Valkyrie stared as a hand shot out through the ground and moments later the two fell out the wall next to China.

"I expected more from you China. When you left us, I thought you would be back. No one could do the things you've done and then walk away. I didn't think that was possible."

"I found other interests," she said, looking up at him despite the pain of having her arms straight behind her. "You can too. Stamp collecting, maybe." The vampire twisted her arms and she gasped. The man in sunglasses laughed and Valkyrie got herself ready to burst in. The others were on their way, but no one was there yet. Tanith hadn't seen her phone, so she was the likeliest of getting there first, probably driving at illegal speeds and not slowing for a text.

"I can still be merciful, even if my gods are not. The girl, China. Valkyrie Cain. Tell me where she is, and I'll let you live."

It didn't take long for China to point to the bedroom but Vengeous took that as a joke. Valkyrie looked at her phone and saw Tanith had seen the message. She threw the bedroom door open and sent a burst of purple energy at Vengeous just as Dexter had taught her.

It missed but her other hand sent a stream to the sunglasses man and it certainly shook him, though not as much as she had tried to hit him with. The vampire growled but didn't let go of China and Valkyrie ran from the room with the sound of Vengeous telling the sunglasses man, Sanguine, to catch her.

She threw herself off the bannister and landed hard but started running again with the help of magic, going to the back of the building and out the fire door. She was on a quiet road but there was still the chance of anyone coming passed – she ran instead, jumping out the way as a hand shot through the pavement, into a side alley no one would look at, the type girls like her were told not to go into. She stood in the middle, waiting, and a moment later Sanguine rose from the ground in front of her.

He seemed casual, looking at her with those sunglasses on. After a short moment, he tried to rush her, and she barely kept out of reach, falling back to her arse and pushing away. She man was smirking but kept walking forwards to her. He dived suddenly, and she rolled over, hearing the air rush from his lungs and punched him in the face, snapping his sunglasses in two. They fell away, leaving her to gape and stand up as he groaned because he had _no eyes_ at all.

He sunk into the ground while still on his back and Valkyrie looked around and attempted to run into the front street of the apartment complex, but the man rose up again and picked her up by the arm and threw her back into the alley where she landed on her back.

"I don't see what all the fuss is about," Sanguine said in a heavy Texan accent. "You're just a little girl."

Valkyrie clicked her fingers, but he was suddenly there, smacking her hand away from him and extinguishing the flames. He grabbed her from behind and she could feel something cold and sharp on her throat.

"Don't try that again," he said oh-so casually. He held a straight razor with a wooden handle, and as her vision cleared she saw the initials 'B-R. S.' engraved on it. She raised her eyes – up ahead, parked opposite her and definitely not there moments ago, was a black motorcycle. Tanith's motorcycle.

"You're all alone now, girly," he said as if they were doing something normal. "That means none of your little friends are coming to help."

Somebody coughed behind them.

Sanguine turned to look, the razor moving away from her throat.

He was punched in the face and went rolling away.

"Big sister!" Valkyrie grinned, getting up and hugging her. She didn't have long before she'd be taller.

"Little sister!" Tanith grinned back, picking her up and spinning her around. "I got you presents."

"Yay!" Tanith set her down and they looked back at Sanguine who'd stood up and was shaking his head at them.

"And who might you be?" He asked, snapping into 'look, a woman' mode that men had. She'd seen that look many times. Never by a criminal that had been attempting murder literally seconds ago, then got punched and now was quite obviously going to fight his attacker all while apparently planning to flirt. That one was new.

"The end of you. Are you coming along quietly Mr No-eyes, or do I have to hurt you?" She said as she got her sword out.

His face fell. "Oh, come on! Look at the size of yours and look at the size of mine!"

Tanith let her coat fall and Valkyrie picked it up for her.

"Ooh, getting interesting now," Sanguine grinned predatorily.

Valkyrie smirked and watched as Tanith began trying to slice the hitman and he tried, and failed, to flirt with the beautiful woman. He disappeared when he was rejected for maybe the fourth time and after a few moments, Tanith turned to speak to her and Sanguine jumped out the wall at her.

Tanith, being made of stone or stronger, simply lifted the sword and cut the man's arm. His razor fell from his hand and bounced off Valkyrie's foot. She picked it up, not listening to his threats, and tucked it into one of her pockets.

Baron Vengeous chose that moment to come into the street. Unfortunately for him, China came through a side door and Crow and Wolf screeched to a halt, stopping a different car from picking up Vengeous.

"Saracen's almost here," Wolf said quickly, running to the other car and dealing with the vampire. Tanith used the opportunity to slice Sanguine and follow up with a hit to the head that had him spinning and falling to his knees, making Vengeous quickly grow more furious. He looked at Valkyrie and she looked at him. "Tell me why I shouldn't just kill you?" He growled, moving forwards.

Everyone stood between then, except Wolf who was tussling with the vampire and swearing loudly between violently throwing punches and kicks. Valkyrie shrugged anyway. "Because you need me." He grunted, and she saw the others tense. "Because I'm the ingredient," she said quickly. "My Ancient blood is the power you need to bring it alive. Right?"

He didn't say anything, but she did see some of the blockage move and begin to fight with Vengeous. She would have loved to help but now she was certain she was correct, she knew she needed to stay away.

She turned and started running.

Not a moment later, Tanith grabbed her arm and they ran just as Weasel and Bear got out of another car that had just pulled up. Everyone scattered, Wolf waiting only to shackle the vampire's left hand to a pole so he couldn't leave as Anton pulled his top off in one motion.

Valkyrie looked back only once to see the gist burst free and Skulduggery jump and shot into the air away.

Vengeous was too slow and was ripped apart in moments, blood flying all over the alley and splashing into the street beyond.

Tanith grabbed her hand and she held it tightly, encouraging her to keep running. It wasn't a fun thing to see but she was more than glad the Grotesquery wouldn't be resurrected.


	19. Lord Vile

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 19**

They all met in Kenspeckle's hospital with various but not significant wounds to talk.

"The good part is Vengeous has been killed, as our orders instructed," Crow recapped for them, pacing up and down the ward. Valkyrie ate her food Civet had brought her with a mock-flirty wink that had gotten him a few mocking-glares from her friends and a laugh from her. They didn't get food. Kenspeckle didn't like them enough. "The bad part is he already tasked a lot of people to search for what he wants so we need to stop them from gathering in one place and completing the process. It will be a lot easier without Dusk and Vengeous though. And that Sanguine man. I get the impression he'd have been _particularly_ hard to put down if not for Anton."

They all nodded. "Where are we going to look?" Valkyrie asked.

He hesitated. "I'm not sure. Honestly, I thought this was going to take ages and we'd find everything with Vengeous sometime tonight. He tends to make a lot of noise, so it would be easy to…"

Valkyrie was glaring at him.

"We'll find it soon."

She kept glaring.

"I have many ideas on where it could be. We'll split up. Done by the afternoon," he promised.

She looked at him suspiciously but nodded uncommittedly.

"He'll be looking for Vile's armour too," China said from her bed. She looked elegant and put together even with mud on her face. Tanith found it too amusing and had to look away from her immediately.

Crow nodded. "We'll find all of it. The heart, the body and the armour. It'll be over before you know it."

Wolf laughed. "I thought this was going to take ages."

Erskine groaned. "This isn't fair."

Valkyrie smirked and was about to say something naughty back when Kenspeckle came in and she decided not to have her friends killed just yet. Sex, or anything sexual in any form, was not permitted to be known to her as per Kenspeckle's wishes. She liked to pretend she was wholly innocent since he was so nice to her.

Bear caught the look and smiled at her though. She giggled a little and Kenspeckle gave her a fond look no one else could see as he handed her a small box of healing stones. She had almost run out. Turning to the others, he put his hands on his hips.

"You better not let Valkyrie near that monster," he said darkly. "I don't care if it's active or not, you shouldn't take that chance. When is the last time she got to do anything someone her age should? Do you not think of what this does to a young woman psychologically?"

He kept ranting, moving around the room and checking drips and cuts, mostly on China and Wolf, everyone else was in their own beds out of habit, and Valkyrie looked at her phone. She turned it off silence and looked over the texts from Nadia. Most of them were things happening in school, that she was bored, to entertain her, then that her mother had claimed family emergency to get her out. She was currently getting her hair done and being lectured on what was appropriate to wear at a family reunion. She had been mean and sent some texts Valkyrie didn't get often and made her blush a little, asking her about things she wanted to wear that night, mainly some shorts – they were pretty tiny, she'd sent the link she'd bought them at as if to pretend sending a picture of her butt was just something normal – and a pretty flowy top she was going to wear. It would show a lot of cleavage. She'd sent a picture of that too from when she'd worn it a few weeks ago in the shop. Yep, a lot of cleavage. She went redder.

Someone coughed, and Valkyrie locked her phone and put it away. "No," she said immediately. They laughed, and she flushed even more out of embarrassment. "This isn't fair," she muttered.

"You're the one that's so obvious," Tanith snickered at her.

"Well it's not my fault!" Valkyrie said.

"Yeah, Tanith, it's Nadia's fault, isn't it Val?" Weasel laughed. Valkyrie blushed.

"I don't like you people. You don't even know what happened!"

They laughed more and even China looked like she was enjoying it. "As I was trying to say," Crow said after laughing loudly at her. "Is that you should be free to enjoy your family reunion so long as you don't mind going alone."

Valkyrie nodded. "That is completely okay with me."

Kenspeckle scoffed. "I don't like the idea of you going alone."

"But it's a family reunion," Valkyrie said. "There's no place more appropriate, _surely_."

He shook his head. "My dear girl, you have been telling me all about how drunk and disorderly your family is going to become tonight. Regardless of relation, a young woman needs a sober, rational person to look over them when they go out."

Valkyrie grinned at him, seeing the concern behind his grouchy words. "Don't worry, I'll be alright. It would be too embarrassing if something happened, trust me, and I'll stay away from all the drunk people. You don't have to try and protect me or anything."

"Yeah, got to impress the girlfriend, right?" Snake said quietly and that started the laughing again.

"I really hate you all," she pouted.

She and Crow left a little later to go and find one of the item's he was most certain of while the other able-bodied people – Bear was too exhausted as Vengeous had used his 'explosion' powers on the gist which had taken a lot of his power keeping it together to kill him, Dusk and Sanguine – went somewhere else to get Hound of the Black Moon. They were going to kill it, so it couldn't be used by anyone else ever again. It was sad, as it was a harmless animal all the rest of the time, but it's threat was still to great to risk allowing it to live.

Crow drove them for almost an hour, stopped to get food and then continued the drive into the countryside. There, she saw some men and women walking and driving around but none looked at them. It was a mortal village, and they parked there before walking silently up the nearby mountain.

Panting, Valkyrie looked at the quiet man. "Crow?"

He was silent, as if not hearing her, and then turned to her surprised. "Valkyrie?"

She stopped. "Crow, are you alright? Skul, I've stopped walking. You aren't being yourself."

He stopped and sighed, looking at her almost pleadingly.

"What do you need?" She asked her friend. "Come on, I can help."

"It's not that simple," he said darkly.

"Neither are you but I'm still here, aren't I?" She pointed out. "You know I'd do my best." He nodded and opened his arms. She came forwards slowly and put her arms around him, hugging him tightly. "I will always do my best. You're my best friend. You can tell me anything and I'll do what you need."

He gripped her tighter and picked her up like a child and she wrapped her legs around his waist like she used to with her mother, Gordon, and probably her dad too. He lifted them with his magic and they floated up to a small ledge that had been recently blown up judging by the precarious rubble that would probably fall down the hole and hill when a storm next came.

They held each other a little longer and then he knelt down in front of her and held her face in his hands. "Valkyrie, this isn't a small thing. This isn't a forgivable thing. It – you might not be able to look at me the same way."

Valkyrie frowned, getting more worried. She stroked his cheek, just like she'd seen a couple in the hospital once do, trying to show him comfort. "I might just be your friend, Crow, but you're my family. You're my brother, my closest friend. I'd die for you right now if I had to, you know that. I love you. I promise, I will _always_ love you."

He leaned forwards and laid his head on her shoulder, and Valkyrie felt him draw on her strength. A moment later, he spoke. "I killed a lot of innocent people. Remember when I said I went away for five years after my wife and child was killed?"

"Of course."

"I spent that time in a rage, killing everyone I shouldn't, aiding the other side. I was Lord Vile. I still am, technically."

Valkyrie stood there, thinking it over. Obviously, she knew what that meant – he had killed so many people, but more than that he had killed Ghastly's mother. He would be betrayed, devastated. But she also knew how much Crow regretted that time. She had heard him so many times say how much he regretted what he'd done, regretted how he acted. She knew he'd spent all this time since trying to make it right again, even if Valkyrie wasn't sure when it would be better again. That was before she knew about Lord Vile. Previously, she had through he judged himself too harshly but now, it did make sense. She didn't feel any panic or anger though, just felt honestly bad for him. It was very easy to forgive someone that so obviously ached from their regrets every day. Someone remorsefully.

Even if he was right and she didn't know if it was forgivable. It was far too big for her to know something like that.

She wrapped her arms around him and although she couldn't say it was alright, she did hug him and said, "I love you."

He held her tightly for a moment and she was sure he was trying to be less emotional and then stood up and took her hand. He had never let her do that so it was nice to have gained that little bit more trust.

They entered the hole in the side of the mountain and slowly went down until it changed into a mining tunnel that went down at almost a complete drop for what felt like miles, Crow holding her and letting them fall at a rapid speed before using the air again to pull them to a halt and touch down gently.

He led her in the pitch black through the tunnel, or cave, or wherever they were, to a place that had been sectioned off with rope at some point. In the middle was a very old leather looking bag which Crow revealed with magic, and inside Valkyrie could see movement.

She had seen Necromancer magic from Elder Crow already, so she knew the tell-tale signs of the twisting and turning of the shadows within the bag. Only the owner, Valkyrie knew, would be able to go near it. Usually it was only the owner that could touch the Necromancer object at all, but Valkyrie didn't think that was the case this time. There was far, far too much power, which she could feel even from where she stood metres away.

Carefully, Crow moved forward and picked up the bag. Through it, the shadows wrapped around his fist. He looked at her, and they left, him pulling her out and then back down the mountain.

They travelled again but this time, Valkyrie was dropped off at a salon on the way with Crow's debit card and he told her to get whatever she wanted, letting the assistant know it was a free for all – as she thought of it – but that he wasn't going to be there. He left a moment later to hide the armour and Valkyrie looked at the young assistant.

"So what do you want to get done, love?" She asked. She was very pretty, and if Valkyrie didn't know Nadia, she might have tried flirting with the girl. As it was, she thought of what Nadia was getting done and made her list.

"Well, I'm going to need my nails done, and definitely hair, but I don't think it needs cutting or anything. I don't know if I'm allowed, but I'd maybe like to have my legs waxed?"

The girl nodded and looked on her computer to see how she'd fit. It was lucky that there was enough time with each type of person to get everything she wanted. First, she got her nailed done, just a paint and nothing too much. She got a pretty pastel pink on her fingers but let the lady, who was thankfully quiet except for a short conversation about her sweet dogs, do a French pedicure on her feet. As soon as they thought it was dry, she was told to strip off and she did that and lay on the bed.

She got a wax on her eyebrows – they had really needed doing – her upper lip, underarms, full legs, bikini… everything hurt but since she had only gotten a basic bikini line and nothing else 'down there,' it wasn't so bad. Not that she planned on anyone seeing it, but she didn't think she'd have time to shave at home and there was nothing more unattractive than fluff sticking out of underwear in her personal opinion. Sure, body hair was natural and she wasn't going to cry if anyone saw or she saw it on someone else, but it made her feel significantly better about herself when it was done.

Feeling a little sore, but knowing the healing rocks would fix that later, she got dressed and got her hair done by someone else in loose curls. It was pretty and still long, going down her back to her elbows in dark waves. The girl did a small plait and added something sparkly into the back which was really pretty and then she paid for it all with a flourish. Crow was back by then and was ready for her.

"You look beautiful," he commented when she got in the car, trying not to make a gross look on her face when her skin on her legs kept rubbing on her trousers. The wax had left residue on her legs and it was really not nice!

"I know," she grinned anyway. They drove back and got to the mansion just in time and Valkyrie rushed upstairs to throw on her dress. Tanith was there waiting for her. With a little help, they got Valkyrie's top over her head and, after using a flannel to wipe the healing stone over her and fix the waxing areas, put the dress over her head.

She was pretty in the end, letting Tanith play dress up on her with all sorts of make-up, slowing drawing a crowd as more of the Dead Men came to her room to watch Tanith play. Right when the party was about to start, Valkyrie got on her shoes and got a call from Nadia.

"Hello," she said, gently dabbing the lipstick on as she went. "Are you there?"

"Almost," Nadia confirmed, sounding happy. "Did you do everything you said yesterday?"

"Yeah, it's sorted and good. I'm about to leave, I'll be ten minutes."

Wolf suddenly grabbed the phone and started running. "She thinks you're really pretty!" He said down it.

"Dexter, you dick, give it back!" She shouted, unable to run in her heels. "You're an _idiot_!"

Unable to get her phone back she could only listen and walk after them down the hall. "She likes you a lot", "She would like to kiss you", "When are going to get married?", "Are you in love?", "Are you wearing something cute for Val?", "She's in a dress", "It's tiny."

"It is not," Valkyrie muttered, pulling it down a little. She got in the car and finally got the phone back when Bear grabbed it from Snake who'd joined in with Wolf and Weasel's teasing. "I'll be there soon."

Nadia was laughing still, and it almost made her smile but then she glared at the boys and said good-bye. They hung up and she got laughed at for a little while before Bear stepped in when she looked at him and gave him puppy-eyes. He told them to simply shut up and silence ensued. Valkyrie smiled.

When they were getting into Haggard, Weasel looked out the window and back at her with a somewhat serious look. "No kissing."

"Or holding hands," Snake said. Valkyrie rolled her eyes.

"Guys, please," she said, holding her hands up. "I'm going to be surrounded by family I barely like. I'm mostly going to say hello to my many, many grandparents and eat a lot. It's fine."

She got looked at suspiciously by Snake and Weasel.

"I still think maybe we should stay," Snake said sulkily.

They pulled up outside the golf place the reunion was at. The others, except Tanith who was on pickup duty, were going to look in on a lead where a lot of vampires were being kept after Dusk reportedly bit them. She waved at them when she got out, and soon they were down the street. She turned and went to the car park where Nadia's parents had just parked.

"Hi," she said when Nadia got out. She was immediately in a hug and held her girlfriend tightly.

"Hi," Nadia said quietly, smiling sweetly. She had a light blue dress on, down to her knees, with a sweetheart neckline and thin straps, not anything like the kind of revealing pictures she'd sent her earlier. It was very feminine unlike the last and only other dress she'd seen the girl in, and Valkyrie already knew it was her style in her mother's colours. Her hair had been done up in a twist of some type with little curls here and there, and light makeup except on the eyes, where she had a light pink and black smoky-eye, thick eye-liner and perfect mascara. Valkyrie felt a bit of a mess next to the older girl, and young considering Nadia had much larger breasts she'd had a chance to grow into unlike Valkyrie who was unfortunately still somewhat in between. It wasn't a fair comparison, and she knew that, but everyone at her school was making a big deal of breast size at the moment and it made her feel a little bad.

"You look incredible," Valkyrie whispered, looking her up and down without thinking. Mrs Keena cleared her throat and Valkyrie looked over at the same time Nadia rolled her eyes.

"I'll see you later mum," Nadia said forcefully, taking Valkyrie's hand.

"Tanith will drop Nadia home after the party," she said. "In the car, not the bike."

Mrs Keena nodded. Mr Vinay stuck his head out the window. "We're going to be late," he reminded his wife. Mrs Keena nodded and got in the car and with a wink to Nadia from her father, they were gone.


	20. The Reunion

**Chapter 20**

Nadia's parents drove out of the car park, leaving them alone with each other. Valkyrie turned back to Nadia and pulled her into a hug. "I missed you."

She grinned and kissed her lips lightly. "I missed you too."

"I expect my reward at some point too," Valkyrie warned her with a grin, leading her into the building. "I was promised."

Nadia smirked at her. "I haven't forgotten. You're like a needy child sometimes."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "No," she said boldly. "I just want you too much."

Nadia flushed darkly and then they were in the golf centre, Valkyrie trying not to think about the art of flirting and what could potentially be cringy versus actually good. The dining room had been turned into an open hall with some tables and chairs, a buffet, DJ and dancefloor. There were more than a hundred Edgley's with their various surnames if they married, their partners, children, a few friends of the family. Valkyrie took a deep breath, holding Nadia's hand tightly and bracing as some drunk man came up to them enthusiastically.

"Stephanie!" He said loudly. "I haven't seen you since you were knee high to a grasshopper! You've grown so much."

"Yeah, nine years will do that," she said, looking around for a grandparent.

"You must remember me, though," he said, nodding. "Remember, I would swing you around when you were little."

Valkyrie nodded. "Of course I do. Sorry, Nana wants to…"

She pulled Nadia passed him and she greeted her Nan, then Pap, then some other relatives and Valkyrie thought at least six hours must have passed when she got through the other side and through the whole thing, no one mentioning Nadia. She pulled her in and put an arm over her shoulder.

"I think that's enough relatives," she sighed in relief. Nadia smiled at her. "Food?"

"God yes," she said, yanking Valkyrie to the buffet. They picked up plates and took little sausages and finger sandwiches for themselves and Valkyrie found the crisps and dips too though Nadia did get a few carrot sticks to look good.

"I hope you're not going to make me eat those," she said.

"Of course not," Nadia said, then stuck one in Valkyrie's unsuspecting mouth.

"Bitch," Valkyrie said under her breath and ate it. Nadia laughed loudly and then went to a side room to eat.

Carefully, Valkyrie got a box out her bag and Gordon faded into existence. "Valkyrie! Oh, and Nadia, it's so good to see you again."

"You too," Valkyrie said. "We're at the reunion."

"Ah yes," he said, peering through the door. "Incredibly. They're so drunk so early. Someone will fall over soon, mark my words."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and ate her food, watching as Nadia stole her crisps. "Excuse me, you chose carrot."

"I changed my mind."

She took her plate away. "No way."

"You won't get your reward," Nadia whispered under her breath, too low for Gordon to hear.

Valkyrie thought about it. She sighed and pushed her plate forwards.

"I better not witness anything," Gordon muttered, glancing back on them. They both turned to him guiltily. Obviously they weren't as quiet as they thought. "I should tell Dexter and Skulduggery what you're up to."

"You can if you want," Valkyrie said, munching away, and pulling Nadia closer and deciding it wasn't worth worrying over. She hadn't seen her in a long time!

"Yeah, if you tell people you're here," Nadia smirked.

Gordon turned back to them with a smile. "Aww, so grown up."

"God's sake, not you too," Valkyrie said. They had almost finished eating already. "No one's mentioned Nadia yet."

Gordon smiled softly at her. "Don't worry, no one will take it badly. Maybe some comments about phases and all that, but it sort of runs in the family. Well, I know the homosexual gene thing is a bad topic considering the history with it, and I don't mean it in a bad way at all, but our family certainly has a suspicious amount of gay and transgender members in it. It definitely seems to be very slightly, mildly, inheritable."

Nadia looked at him, thinking. "Do you think it is? Inheritable, that is. Not just a coincidence? I don't know anything about the gene thing."

Gordon shrugged. "Some things just don't matter," he said wisely. "It doesn't matter who you are or how you present so long as you aren't hurting people, so who cares if it's inheritable. Or that's my opinion on the matter anyway. Valkyrie, you know Great-Aunt Gladys?"

"The one married to Phil or Edmund?"

"Phil. She was born an Edmund actually," he said matter-of-fact, a contemplative looks on his face. "At any rate, this family out of all families just doesn't get much of a chance of caring. We are related to so many people that are somehow ' _wrong_ ' – and I say that word sarcastically, in case that isn't obvious – it just wouldn't work out. I suppose the older generations wanted a peaceful family more than to look like perfect Christians or whatever we were. Also, we cut out the other half of the family. We're the liberal Edgley's. The conservative and especially religious Edgley's don't like us, and we don't like them. We do occasionally gain one of their members when they come out, however, and they are always welcome."

Valkyrie kissed Nadia's forehead and Gordon decided to go back in his stone after a few more minutes watching the party. Closing the door for the moment, Valkyrie turned back to Nadia.

"So," she said, suddenly nervous but trying not showing it. "That reward."

Nadia smirked. "Come here."

Valkyrie did and she was pretty sure the older girl knew she was nervous. Still, she came to her and moments later was pushed against the wall roughly by Nadia. Suddenly, she was kissed on the lips, hard, and Valkyrie closed her eyes, trying to focus on the feel on Nadia's lips and the feel of her hands on her biceps, the feel of their breasts pressed together. Valkyrie put her hands around Nadia's waist, shamelessly feeling the curve of her waist dipping in and out at her hips and back up.

Nadia moaned slightly, squeezing Valkyrie's arm and Valkyrie grinned, tensing it for her girlfriend who took a moment to rub it over. After a moment to let Nadia feel her up, which was incredibly exciting and more than they'd ever done before no matter how tame it may seem, Valkyrie crouched and picked Nadia up completely, blushing and grinning when her legs wrapped around her waist.

"I think I like this," Nadia said, looking into her eyes. It felt as if the music had melted and it was just the two of them together. It was suddenly not nerve-wracking or embarrassing or difficult. She knew what intense, desperate feeling Tanith had meant when she'd spoken to her about these things. Nadia leaned forwards and kissed her deeply and Valkyrie opened her mouth and they slowly began to experiment using their tongues. She wasn't the best at it and Valkyrie was certain they didn't have long alone, so she moved boldly, kissing down Nadia's jaw to her neck, kissing her ear, her shoulder and back up to her mouth where she was kissed furiously.

Panting, they looked back at each other smiling and, letting her down, it felt as if the world came back into view, but a little bit better.

She giggled into Nadia's hair.

"You're such a kid," Nadia muttered into her neck teasingly right as the door was opened. Good timing on their behalf at least.

"Oh," Crystal said, staring in surprise.

"Evening," Valkyrie rolled her eyes, kissing Nadia's forehead protectively – if anyone would pick on her for having a girlfriend, regardless of whether or not they were homophobic, it would be the Toxic Twins, simply to annoy her. In fact, she was ninety percent sure they weren't homophobic, they didn't seem to be _evil_ , per se, but she one thousand percent sure they'd say something homophobic to wind her up.

They came into the room further, beginning to glare. "Why are you in here?"

"I want to be."

"That's not a good reason," Carol snapped. "Aunt Linda is looking for you. Dad wants to talk to you too."

Valkyrie sighed, putting Gordon's box back in her bag and taking Nadia's hand. "Come on, let's face the family."

"Are you dating?" Crystal asked quickly. Valkyrie looked back at her.

"No, I'm just taking advantage of her," Nadia snarked back.

They left the room and Valkyrie couldn't help but laugh at her stupid cousin's attempt at harassing her. They went and found her aunt Linda, just managing to stop laughing in time to look not happy enough to talk for long.

"Oh, Steph," Aunt Linda said, quite drunk. She was actually technically one of her biological fathers' cousins, but everyone their age was aunt and uncle, everyone older was grandma and grandad, and everyone above that tended to be called Nan and Pap. It was an easy system that helped a lot when they were a really big family. Her twin ten-year olds were messing around with some other cousins, her five-year-old twins on iPads in the corner with fizzy drinks. "I've missed you. Tell me, how are you doing?"

"Grand, I'm grand," she said easily. "Having fun."

"You're going to school? Dance, singing, cooking, swimming?"

"Yes," she said trying to get out the hug she was still in. "Well, no singing or much swimming anymore but I still do school and dance and can't get away from cooking."

She pulled away sharply. "You're doing the cooking at home? Is that why you're not singing? You tell my Stephanie right now–"

"I decided!" She said loudly before her aunt went off on one. "I chose to stop and to take on more martial arts. I love it."

Aunt Linda thought about it for a moment. "So not cooking?"

"Only when I want to. We all do the cooking, share the chores," she added. "I need to stop them using too many spices. They'll kill me."

Nadia snorted. "You won't be enjoying dinner at mine."

Aunt Linda let her go and looked, finally, between the two girls. "Steph, who is this young lady?"

"This is my girlfriend, Nadia," she said. "Say hello."

"Hello."

"Hello," Aunt Linda also said.

A horde of relatives descended upon the table and Valkyrie pulled Nadia away before baby stories and awkward moments about her dead parents could be brought up. Looking around, she found Beryl and Fergus sitting somewhat sober together and moodily at a table. Sighing, she led Nadia over for the final visit.

"Carol said you wanted to see me," she said when she got there, standing behind them. They jumped and turned around.

"Oh, there you are," Beryl said, plastering a smile on. "Look at you, so grown up."

"Thanks," she said.

"And you brought a friend, it's nice to meet you," she said, shaking hands with Nadia.

"How do you do?" Nadia said, adopting a strict, polite attitude. Valkyrie could see the snark radiating from the girl already.

"Oh, I'm fine, how are you dear?" Beryl said, grinning without a smile.

"I'm happy to be here," Nadia said. "As Stephanie's girlfriend, I feel honoured she'd bring me to such an important family event."

Beryl looked blank for a moment before she said "Oh," and her husband took over, his drunkenness taking over.

"She must what to marry you," he muttered, a little dazed from the alcohol. "S'what it means, right, wife? You want to marry someone, bring – _hick!_ – bring them to the fam-ly reunion."

Valkyrie nodded seriously. "Yes. Going to a family reunion with her means we will marry. Set the date next week."

Nadia snorted, and Beryl glared at Valkyrie.

"Don't be so rude," she said. "I can still petition to have you taken from those men. Really, leaving a young lady with a single man, giving someone you barely know all you have–"

"He's a widower."

"Sorry?"

"Skulduggery Pleasant is a widower. He was married, and he had a baby with her, but they were murdered. That's why he's quiet and he was chosen to adopt me. He is raising me to be independent and invited his friends to live with us, including a woman, so that I wouldn't be alone or bored or treated badly. Not that Skulduggery ever would, but that's why he was picked and why I live with the other guys. They were all soldiers, they fought for _your_ freedom and they still work in Ireland fighting for our lives, and they have never hurt me, they have only and _will_ only ever protect me. They love me. And all you do, when I'm given my inheritance from my surrogate-father, when I'm given his friends as guardians, is glare and be snotty about it. You need to grow up."

They started at her and after a moment, Beryl burst into tears. Fergus looked at her with wide eyes, then to Valkyrie, and back again a few times, before opening his mouth and closing it. Valkyrie gave up and took Nadia into the entrance hall.

She sighed, and Nadia hugged her. "Was I too mean? I feel like I was too mean. They're obviously drunk and don't know what they're saying."

"No, baby, you said the right thing."

She sighed and let herself be held for a few moments before smiling. "Come on. I need to dance with you still."

They grinned, and the rest of the night was spent in each other's arms, dancing and becoming bolder as her relatives became drunker and more annoying. Together, though, it was fun to play around, touching each other in mostly innocent places – only acceptable to be seen by the children places! Not that they were thinking of the children…

Getting to the end of the party at around two in the morning, Tanith came into the hall to see the girls rubbing against each other with challenging grins on each other's faces and let them mess around, dancing between the relatives and eyeing each other up.

Eventually though, Valkyrie led Nadia into a spin and caught sight of Tanith, giving her a wink that made her older sister laugh. Bringing Nadia in, she held her by the hips and told her it was time to go. Nadia looked around, saw Tanith standing there, stuck her tongue out and started kissing Valkyrie. Everyone was too drunk or didn't care so they were able to basically make out in the middle of the dance floor – Tanith didn't care and if Valkyrie had before, Tanith could easily see the switch in her brain turn off as soon as Nadia's lips connected with her own.

It was sort of funny for Tanith to watch. On one hand, it was her little sister, who she wanted to protect and hold and train and help, but also see her flourish and make mistakes and grow into a woman who did to woman things like sex and make out and have fun and dance. It didn't mean she didn't occasionally feel a little concern though. Valkyrie very obviously wasn't ready for big things and Nadia was a year older than her.

Plus, watching the girls kiss was not something she intended to make a habit of. She just didn't want to see her sister get hurt because she thought she was ready for something she didn't understand, not that she didn't want her sister to do what she wanted. She made a mental note to talk to Valkyrie some more about the subject so even if she did decide to do something like sex so young, she would at least understand what she was getting into. Tanith was very firmly on the pro-choice side, and wouldn't be entirely surprised if Valkyrie pressed on in her relationship, she just wanted to make sure she knew all the facts before she did anything.

On the plus side, no teen pregnancy, which could only look good for their 'parenting' skills.

After a little while, Nadia pulled away – Valkyrie was looking a little wide eyed and dazed with desire – and they made their way to Tanith. Nadia and Tanith spoke about the party as they all got in the car and it was a nice ride back to Nadia's parents' house where Valkyrie walked Nadia to the door, kissed her for a little bit and said goodbye before Nadia disappeared inside. Tanith watched Valkyrie stand on the porch for a little bit, twisting her foot around as she thought and then went back to the car into the passenger seat.

It was silent on the way back. Valkyrie was happy, just sad to see the girl go. When she was home and had thanked Tanith for the rides, she stripped, showered, removed the make up and went to bed. She didn't fall asleep until over an hour later, flushed and naked under the sheets.


	21. The 'Talk'

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 21**

The next day, about eleven, Valkyrie woke, washed again just in case someone would know what she had done at night and went down for breakfast. The others looked tired and were eating soup.

"Only just get in?" She asked, sitting down.

"Yes," Crow said. "But we completed the mission. All that's left is getting the Grotesquery, but we are _certain_ the Hound we found was the only they had a chance of getting to."

"We're good then."

"Exactly," he nodded. "We'll be getting the Grotesquery today while everyone else sleeps. Be ready soon."

"Is Tanith coming?" She asked, pouring herself orange juice.

"Yes, but it won't be a fighting day," he said. "Hopefully."

"I assume you haven't told her that."

"God, no. She wouldn't come. I'm going to change, I'll see you in the car."

Valkyrie finished her breakfast, gave the Idiots a vague and censored story of the previous night and brushed her teeth. Tanith was already in the back seat waiting.

"Hi," Valkyrie said, getting in. "You were quick getting ready."

"Well, I have things to do later."

"Ooh, like what?" Valkyrie grinned at her, shooting texts off at Nadia all the while. "Hot date?"

"Hardly," Tanith scoffed. "I need to talk to _you_ about _your_ hot date."

Valkyrie looked at her suspiciously. "What does that mean? I think I know what that means but that's not fair because you already did _that_ , and I didn't like it at all. You're not allowed."

Tanith grinned at her. "Bull's eye."

"Bull _shit_. I won't let you. You _gave_ me the talk, you can't do it twice!"

"You don't get a choice. I'll pin you down. So we can do this tonight, hidden away with ice cream, or I can chase you around the house and have Dexter and Erskine sit on you, so I can talk _at_ you. Your choice."

Valkyrie hunched in her seat, trying to text Nadia without seeming like she didn't want to talk – it was hard to talk about talking about sex with Tanith and flirt with her girlfriend at the same time. "I'll think about it. There is so much I left out. The science is not nearly the same, I promise."

Crow got in the car then and they set off, listening to the classical radio and chatting about little things on the way. Mostly Valkyrie went between two messages – one with Nadia where she spoke about a fight she'd had with her mother over a school she wanted to send her to in England, and another between her and the Idiots. It was called the 'Idiot conversation'.

The Idiots, which were Saracen, Dexter and Erskine, generally teased each other and occasionally flirted with her – or each other for laughs – in a purely innocent way or shared gifs and other pictures. It was fun to be a part of as none of them had fallen asleep yet and she knew they were all in their underwear in their beds, lying under their covers on their phones smiling at silly messages. It was just amusing to think of. No matter their size or strength, they needed each other to stay sane and together. Valkyrie loved their silly messages together, even the flirting which was a little strange, she knew, to others. But it worked, and she couldn't bring herself to care what anyone else thought. It wasn't like they'd corner her alone and do it, that might be a bit weird.

They arrived at a facility the Grotesquery, according to China, was being kept. It was an abandoned barn really, but Crow kept calling it a facility, insisting it was just deceptive to keep morals up in Vengeous' men. When they went in, however, it was both bare of modernity and anything that wasn't a barn. It even had chickens.

"I think it may have been hyped up," Valkyrie said. Inside one of the stalls was the Grotesquery – Tanith found it – and all they had to do was put it in the car.

"Skulduggery..." Tanith said. She was glaring.

"Yes, I know, I thought there was going to be a fight," he said, holding his hands up.

"No he didn't."

"No you didn't," Tanith said, high fiving Valkyrie. They stood with arms crossed against Crow.

"No one's on my side," he pointed out. "This isn't a fair fight."

"Well, Valkyrie needs training," Tanith said. Suddenly _they_ joined sides and Valkyrie realised she wasn't going to enjoy this afternoon.

"Come on, I'll drop you off and get rid of this," he said.

Valkyrie huffed but they all got in and went to the gym, dropping her and Tanith off. She already had gym clothes in the boot, always prepared for Tanith to throw her into a training session, and after changing, they met in the gym room.

They warmed up together – that was probably worse than the training, keeping up with Tanith – then hit the weights. She started with the leg press, her easiest with all the swimming, running and dancing she did growing up, pushing some medium weight Tanith set it to for four sets of twenty reps before standing and being forced to plank for ten odd minutes while Tanith did the same with much more ease, smiling and chatting to her about whatever she wanted since Valkyrie was too busy thinking 'don't fall, don't fall, don't fall' to participate.

They moved to running uphill, racing each other – Valkyrie lost but did better than last time – then squats with weights, and more back and legwork. It was not Valkyrie's favourite type of work out, but it was always the most rewarding.

They went to the sparing hall next and Valkyrie and Tanith took a bamboo training sword each, which looked ridiculous to Valkyrie, and Tanith had her do some training movements, just moving from parry to attack, which was parried by Tanith, and she responded with a jabbing attack that Tanith allowed to hit her for the fun of it, then she had to block a lunge attack and follow it with a riposte, a counterattack that Valkyrie put all her strength into to push Tanith away.

Tanith enjoyed using every type of sword fighting she could as a part of her own style, though, so soon Valkyrie herself was using Japanese, broadsword and all the Haidong Gumdo training moves, moving through them faster and faster, then moving seamlessly into half-sparring. Only half since Tanith mostly told her what to do and almost none of her attacks ever hit, but she herself was often hit so it counted as sparring according to Valkyrie.

Panting, Valkyrie lunged and batted Tanith's training sword away, stepping in and finally, finally, getting a genuine hit in on Tanith's side but was far too slow moving back and was hit so hard she almost fell over but did manage to get herself stable enough to parry the next attack, and the second-attack and do an attempted counter Tanith blocked with a swipe under her legs, which she jumped and she had to duck to avoid being knocked-out.

Standing and panting, she pushed forwards and instead of fighting, kept pushing, just enough that Tanith tensed to stop her and then picked the woman up and threw her to the floor, trying to thrust the sword into her stomach but being blocked and quickly tried attack after attack, on her legs, arms, head and they were all blocked expertly with a smile. It was barely even sword-fighting, Valkyrie was just desperately trying to hit her with anything!

Sweat was rolling down Valkyrie's back now and she held the training sword up and stepped back, indicating for Tanith to get up. She did slowly, holding out the sword and when Valkyrie was certain Tanith didn't think she was going to attack, she attacked. She brought the sword down on Tanith's wrist but she simply moved it out the way and did a feint to Valkyrie's left shoulder and then suddenly brought the sword down, but Valkyrie already knew Tanith liked to do that and had the sword ready to block. It wobbled violently with the strength Tanith had used behind the attack and Valkyrie's wrist hurt blocking, but she swiftly used the opening to kick Tanith in the ribs, which she managed, getting an 'oof' out of her before Tanith grabbed her foot and yanked her to the ground.

Tanith's foot was placed steadily on Valkyrie's sternum. The bamboo sword at her neck.

"Damn," Valkyrie panted. "I did... so much better."

Tanith laughed, happy to hold her down for a while longer. Apparently, her own instructor had done the same to her and she'd hated it, but doing it to Valkyrie was really amusing so she always took the opportunity. It seemed therapeutic.

As for Valkyrie, she was choosing not to fight this battle. She would only lose and make it more fun for Tanith. "Yeah, you did a lot better actually. But still nowhere near good enough."

"I know," she panted, trying to get saliva into her dry throat but struggling between the heavy breathing. "What now?"

"Tut tut, you didn't think I was done with you yet, did you?"

The rest of the afternoon was spent training with a little break for drinks and sitting before more training. They ended the session, both sweating awfully, with a shower and then a stop at a café across the street that did amazing protein shakes with greens and vitamins in them, covered up by lots of chocolate sauce. They were really good. Sometimes they'd get sausage rolls as well.

Since the others would still be asleep, they got takeaway and a bus home, muttering between themselves about who was hotter, Bear or Wolf, then Snake or Weasel, deciding overall Wolf was hotter conventionally with Bear as second place, just too intimidating to be recognised as such by most people. In personality though, it was between Bear and Panda for Tanith – Valkyrie decided she needed someone with more excitement and would have to pick Wolf because he was less flighty than Weasel but not as settled as the others. Snake would annoy her too much. All hypothetically of course, as she didn't feel any type of sexual or romantic attraction to any male, but she could observe. And tease Tanith about what she wanted.

"You _have_ to choose," she demanded, referring to the Bear versus Panda debate.

"No I don't," Tanith laughed. "Maybe I fancy them both a little."

"Yes, that's fine. That's allowed," Valkyrie conceded. "But you can't _date_ them both, you have to choose and get married and not be awkwardly sitting in opposite corners. I don't like this indecision."

Tanith rolled her eyes. "Some people date multiple people quite happily. Who's to say I won't do that?"

Valkyrie nodded. "That is acceptable. But for the point of the argument, you have to choose."

"Okay."

"Okay. Now, choose."

"No."

"You fancy Panda more."

Tanith didn't say anything.

"I knew it," Valkyrie smirked. "What are you going to do about that?"

"Nothing at all right now." Valkyrie gave her a look and she continued. "I'm still new to the group. If I mess up, I'm disposable. I'm not good enough friends with everyone to be a main part and until I am, there's no guarantee I can recover from a mistake relationship or awkward morning after incident. So we're all staying away from that. Anyway, I prefer them to come to me."

"Aren't you meant to be pro-women, doing what you want?"

"Yeah, but some things are personal," she shrugged. "And I expect them to ask me out rather than the other way around. Except maybe a hint that I am expected to be asked out in the near future. I will ask out women though, it's just the men. I'm horribly sexist, you see."

Valkyrie shrugged. "Fair I suppose. But what will you do if they both like you?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, what if you find out, because you sneak around or ask someone, and find out both of them want to ask you out. Because _then_ you have to choose. I mean, if you find out Panda is madly in love with someone else at the Sanctuary or something, it would be pretty easy at this stage to let go and work on Bear. But what if you aren't sure which and they get into a fight over you and you have to pick one and they both really like you. Then what?"

Tanith laughed. "Val, I really don't see that happening. And even if it does, I'd just say I don't know what I want, and I'll have to think about it for a while until I've decided. If they push, I'll know they aren't the one. End of."

Valkyrie thought that over. "I suppose I'll accept that answer."

They were at their stop and left, running over to the mansion and quietly letting themselves in, grabbing some cutlery, plates and ice cream before racing over to one of the snugs the others didn't go in – mostly because Tanith had put a sign saying, 'Enter at Pain of Horrid Death' on it, and 'Bitches Only'. They picked out a television show and watched quietly, shovelling in food while it was still warm.

When they had finished, Tanith gave her a look and Valkyrie almost shrunk away but then decided she'd rather get it over with quick. She put her phone away and sat better to help her get through the conversation. _The Talk_.

"Okay," Valkyrie started unwillingly. "How quick can we make this?"

"Less than ten minutes I bet," Tanith said. "Then ice cream."

"Okay, go."

"If you don't feel ready for sex, don't do it," she said quickly, almost twice her usual speed and getting them both to grin immediately. Valkyrie liked the idea of a rapid sex education, it would get it over with quickly. "I don't care _when_ you decide you are ready for it, but when you _are_ , make sure you both get checked out at a gynaecologist first, I don't care if it's both your first times. There are too many horror stories not to do that. Or, use a dental dam until you both get checked."

"A what?"

"It's a sheet condom–"

"No, Tanith, no, God no, I know what it is, we've been over this," Valkyrie said, getting that flush of embarrassment - worse than a blush, it made her feel like she was fainting. "I mean, 'what, I can't believe you'd suggest that.' It's really weird and you know it–"

"You shouldn't dismiss–"

"There's not a chance in hell I would ever–"

"Alright, alright! But at least hear out the other thing I was going to say," she said, holding up a hand. When Valkyrie let a few moments go by, she continued. "Use some gloves instead. No, listen! I can get you some gloves and I'll tell you why. You have horrid nails and you are likely at risk of scratching anyone you dare touch at the moment. Look at them. Do it." Valkyrie did, and she kind of saw Tanith's point. Though short, they were all jagged and unkempt. They were always being broken and chipped into sharp edges no matter how hard she tried to keep them nice so she'd given up trying. It didn't help she bit the skin around them and had little cuts around her nails from that too.

"Also, until you get checked since that is _still_ the other must, you can't do any sharing of hands from one to another so if you can just take the glove off, you're all ready. Convenience." Valkyrie could see she'd been thinking this speech over. She'd been worrying. "And lastly, you get small cuts and grazes on your hands from fighting all the time that aren't worth going to Kenspeckle to soak, so you can't be touching anyone with those open wounds. It'll hurt you and her with whatever's in the cut and whatever goes into your hand from her. You _will_ get an infection. Everyone _will_ laugh at you. And yes, we will absolutely know what caused the infection so don't think you can get out of it. Unless you want to start taking better care of your hands, and you literally cannot all the time, gloves are a must."

Valkyrie slouched. That was a good argument. The last one, anyway. It still felt so awkward to imagine actually having sex let alone using weird gloves. Then again, that heat of the moment when Nadia would kiss her was overpowering.

On one hand, she was rational and took what Tanith told her to heart. Tanith had been with women before and wasn't stupid. If she said it was better to be safe than sorry she didn't want to ignore her. Plus, she didn't think Tanith would suggest protection unless she thought it was needed. If she thought about it and was at least honest with herself, she knew Tanith was right about the dental dam and the gloves. She was just self-conscious and thought that it might be weird. And she didn't know how Nadia would feel about it and if she suggested something like gloves and Nadia was all, like, ' _no that's weird_ ,' Valkyrie would be embarrassed.

"Fine. I'll accept the gloves," Valkyrie muttered to the sofa after a moment to think. "And I'll do the gynaecologist thing too, but it has to be far away and I'm never doing it again. And I don't want to do it yet."

Tanith rolled her eyes. "Deal. Now, something else I wanted to say is, you _need_ to speak with her about sex, touching, absolutely anything, before you do it. You both need to know what's okay and when the time comes, you and Nadia won't feel pressured or unsure of anything. It'll be totally normalised between you. Most people date lots of people so by the time you're my age, talking about sex with someone is so normal its not even a taboo thing. I know it's still strange to you right now, but one day you'll just come out with it without thinking and it won't even matter. Okay?"

Valkyrie nodded once. It kind of felt wrong to hear Nadia's name in the conversation. Too personal. "Anything else?"

"Only that consent is the key to sex," she grinned teasingly. "But you already know that."

She rolled her eyes. "Obviously. You said it about twenty times the first go around. It was ringing in my ears when I went to sleep."

"Good, I'm pleased to hear that," she laughed, passing Valkyrie a tub of ice cream.

"It was still really embarrassing, though. You can't do it again."

"Yeah, I can. I think you're starting to enjoy it. And you know, after the first time having sex people are usually way less uptight about it. You'll probably come to me after and we'll talk all about it like it's nothing and have more talks and I'll help you learn more."

"Are we going to watch a movie now?" Valkyrie asked.

"Yeah. Pick one, quick, before I eat all this."


	22. Valkyrie makes a dress

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 22**

After the embarrassment of The Tanith Talk, Valkyrie had not thought about anything for a while, content to simply flirt and, admittedly, she did 'mess around,' as she called it in her head, more over time, becoming more comfortable with the idea.

Eventually, though, she did think about it, late one night weeks later, and decided she would wait a while longer before stepping forward with her relationship. With Valkyrie's fourteenth birthday coming up in a few months and Nadia's fifteenth not long after, she didn't expect it to be a long wait necessarily, but certainly not until after those events. She hadn't spoken to Nadia about it yet and didn't intend to. She just didn't feel exactly ready for that.

She pushed that from her mind as she took the roll of tulle material from the stack Panda had sent her to retrieve. They were making a dress for one of his client's children, and if she learnt enough, he was going to let her help him make a new protective coat for work.

Holding the surprisingly heavy roll, she brought it over to Panda. "Is this right?"

He glanced at her. "Yes, roll it out on the table. I need you to measure six metres, cut it straight, then cut that lengthways from the middle. Okay?"

"I can do that."

Valkyrie lay the material down on the large table. The material was maybe three metres tall but there must have been hundreds of yards tightly rolled up around the tubing. Carefully, she rolled it out and cut it to Panda's specifications, moved the roll so it was out her way, and carefully used the middle guide on the table to slice the material. She had helped him design this dress for the eight-year-old. It was going to be blue in a ball-gown style but have a support skirt under it to help with the weight. The tulle was going to be layered on top of the hoop skirt to give it a big, blue princess effect.

Folding the pieces, she took them to Panda who was just finishing with the shoes, a pair of silver flats the mother had specifically ordered. They were not the prettiest, but the mother had been very insistent. At least Panda had convinced her against the orange feathers.

He moved them aside and she very carefully helped him fold the top layer of material while he quickly folded the layer that would sit under hers. It was difficult with all the pins and knowing it was going to a real person. She didn't want to mess it up and she wasn't exactly the best with delicate things. When Panda was done, he cut another two pieces like she just had, and did two more under sections and finished the bottom one just as Valkyrie did the top one. He inspected it.

"That's good. You left the right amount of space with the pins this time."

She nodded. "Yeah, it was easier to pin like this too."

"You can help me feed it through the machine," he said. "Here, check the thread – and gently feed it through."

Slowly, Valkyrie stitched the tulle with the machine, her tongue pocking through her lips, and soon the top layer was in its neat, permanent folds ready for the dress. She took it over to the dress and with Panda's help, they pinned it to what they had already made. Within minutes, Panda had stitched the rest of the layers and they had pinned and sewn it to the rest of the blue material, sewn it together as a skirt, pulled it over the feather-light hoop skirt and they carefully began hand sewing tiny silver sequins to the layers of skirts, including underneath so when she spun around it would still sparkle.

"You did really well designing this," Panda said suddenly. He was very quick at sewing the sequins on. She felt almost flustered working next to him sometimes, seeing him move through things so easily. It had helped when Snake accidentally got it into his head to help one time too and she had been a lot, lot better at it than him.

"Err, thanks," she said. "But I don't think I can do it again. I'm enjoying the making part though."

He smiled at her. "You do have to get quite creative. Sometimes I get ten, twenty people come in and they all want the same design, the same colours, the same styles and they all have to be unique. It can get a bit difficult then, because if one is better than the other, or one of them prefer another dress I make, they might come storming back in. The women tend to be the worst. No offence."

"Scared of angry women?" She said cheekily, looking up at him and poking her thumb with the needle. "Shit."

He rolled his eyes. "If Skul catches you swearing outside of fighting criminals, he won't be happy."

"You have participated in my vocabulary lessons," she reminded him. "Other than Wolf and Weasel, Tanith is probably the worst."

She saw him get a little red at the mention of her sister and she grinned. He looked up at her and scowled. "Don't even think about it."

"I'm not," she grinned.

"You are, and I said not to. Don't. It's not happening."

"Are the others on your back too?"

He grumbled under his breath and looked back at his work.

"Me and Tanith were talking a few days ago," she said, looking down too.

"Oh?" He said hopefully, looking back at her. She didn't say anything. "Valkyrie Cain, if you leave me like this, don't think I won't ground you."

She laughed. "Yeah, sure. Just like you did last time."

'Last time' she had received a group grounding where the others had gotten together after they found out she had bought some expensive clothes one day when she went out with Nadia after being told she wasn't allowed to spend over a certain limit. She had had her cards, cash, and pocket money revoked for a month. Instead, she had just asked for money or someone's card when they went anywhere and instead of spending too much of her _own_ money she earned from work or pocket money from chores, she just spent their money. A lot of it too, as they had felt bad for grounding her and just wanted to give her things. They had decided not to take away money from now on and it just didn't work out.

"That was different," he said. "Tell me what she said."

She rolled her eyes. "She hasn't decided. She liked you and thinks someone else is nice too, but she wouldn't pick between you both, but she also said she wouldn't necessarily say no if either of you asked her out. _I_ think she has a preference to you although she didn't say it in so many words. I'm not sure if she wants to date anyone right now though, she said she likes how things are. But, like I said, I don't think she'd say no if you asked her out."

He nodded, thought about it, and looked back. "What do you think?"

"Me?"

"Yes," he said, getting embarrassed. "You know her best."

She grinned. "Make her some clothes. She would love that. I think she just needs an indication you like her too and she'll stop worrying so much."

"But you said she prefers me? Despite there being someone else she likes."

Valkyrie shrugged. "Came off that way. I don't think there's any major preference either way, she just spoke about who she thought was attractive and liked the personality of." Ghastly blushed a little when she mentioned attractiveness. "Honestly, I see her gravitating to you to talk to and be around in the day to day."

Panda nodded resolutely. "I'll think about it."

Valkyrie smirked, and they finished their dress quietly, Valkyrie letting Panda think of what he wanted to make Tanith.

When they went home later, all sitting around the table, or rather everyone who was currently home, Erskine suggested they organise a Christmas Sanctuary party. Valkyrie loved the idea and that was enough for him to say he'd have everything organised in the next week or two. She grinned and was glared at by Panda until Tanith said she had to go – a vampire case she had to do with a few friends – and she sent a picture of a dress Tanith had liked to him. It was above her normal budget, Valkyrie knew, and it was a bit cheeky to suggest Ghastly make someone else's design, but it would definitely score him a few points, she bet.

He looked at it and nodded, putting the phone away. Valkyrie tried not to laugh at him. Crow caught her eyes and they both had to hold it back for Panda's sake.


	23. Training at school

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 23**

With the Christmas party in the process of being organised, and her birthday in just a few months, the summer had fallen upon them and with it, letters from her clubs and school for her 'parent/guardian'. She opened them when she got to her room from a case. Her reflection had done her homework already since it was almost midnight, and the letters had been left on the table.

The one from school told them about a nationwide competition 'Stephanie' had been picked to participate in for the school swim group. A second letter told them about an event herself and two 'parents/guardians' were invited to as a reward her for her learning over the year. It was just a bowling trip though so Valkyrie put it in the bin as no one would be interested except maybe Tanith, and that was a long shot.

The one from dance was about another competition, although this one was in England and the dance studio had been specifically invited after their last young-teen group had won the Irish championship the year previous. She was already a part of that group but she hadn't expected to be selected for any competitions.

She left them until morning but when the June light started filtering through her curtains, she heard her phone vibrating. Sitting up quickly, she wrestled with the covers and picked up the phone. Nadia.

"Hey sweet," she said huskily, grabbing the cup on the bedside and drinking from it.

"Good morning lazy butt. How are you?" Nadia said.

"Grand, grand. Tired. What are you doing? It's only – it's not even seven."

"Mum just got me up for school. Sorry, I was listening to the radio and they were speaking about a dance competition in England and your dance teacher, at least I think it's the same one, did an interview about it."

"Oh, yeah," Valkyrie said, getting out of bed. She found the letters. "It's in a month's time. They invited me."

"Are you going to go?"

Valkyrie thought about it. "I mean, do you really want to see me get dressed up and stretch my legs on stage?" She asked. "I think I might go."

Nadia laughed. "Are you asking me to watch you dance? I'd love to go."

"Let me see what they want me to do first. If it's rubbish, I'm not doing it."

They laughed, and Valkyrie took the phone downstairs, and the letters, and found Crow with his newspaper ready for the day. "Here." She said goodbye to Nadia and she sat down in front of Crow just as he finished reading the second letter.

"This sounds exciting," he said. "Do you want to do it?"

"Yeah, but I'll need to train more," she said, not too sure about that part.

"Valkyrie, we have our whole lives to solve crime, you might as well compete while you can."

And that's how Valkyrie got herself into a dancing and swimming competition. Her schedule was reorganised and because of that, she was out of work. Without work, she had to go to school for the last few weeks too. Between the classes, it was just practice, practice, practice.

On the week of the swimming competition, Valkyrie was dropped off at six in the morning at school for her swim practice. She got herself into her swimwear and joined the other competitors from her school, two boys, and the three did their stretches. Their instructor came in and grinned at them, far too happy in the mornings.

"Good morning kids!" He said, white teeth sparkling in the yellowy lights. "The comps almost here so you better be even faster than last Friday."

Valkyrie nodded sadly. Tanith was in one hundred percent trainer mode, and Wolf and Crow were helping too. She had spent the weekend running, weight training, wrestling, swimming lengths, doing assault courses underwater, holding her breath, absolutely anything that would give her more muscle, more strengths to do it faster than the others. Since her division was all speed, she had been put through the paces. The only thing that made her go through it what they said was the encouragement she got from Nadia over the phone before they fell asleep.

"Good to see your enthusiasm Edgley. What about you Smith?" Mr Swansy asked. Smith nodded. Valkyrie was pretty sure his parents were bribing him to do this. "O'Conner?"

He gave them another pep talk, though he wasn't very good at them, and started by having them swim a few laps and they did so nicely. They then did their real work – trying to get up and back down the lengths as fast as they all could. Valkyrie came first every time out of the three of them, being the same height as the boys and likely had more muscle mass than them giving her more of an edge, even despite their teenage testosterone bulking them up. Mr Swansy timed them, pushed them to keep up with him running down the pool, shouting for them to go faster. It was tough work but when they were all exhausted beyond working any more, they were congratulated for their 'excellent efforts' and sent to change.

Going to the girl's locker, still alone, she got her phone out and called Nadia as she did every morning.

"Hey Val," Nadia said quietly. She was hiding from her parents as usual. "I can hear you breathing."

"I'm out of breath, sorry," she said. She sat down for a moment and took a long drink. "How are you?"

"I'm fine," Nadia said. "Excited actually. Mum said we could get together over the summer. Without the excuse of school, she can't stop us."

Valkyrie grinned. "I'm glad. I've been missing you."

"I'll let you get your shower."

"Thanks. I'll talk to you tonight?"

"Always. Have a nice day!"

School was dull as usual, the insensate teachers blabbing about things Valkyrie was way ahead of in her own studies with her brothers.

"Stephanie, do you know the answer?" The teacher asked.

She hadn't been listening. Oops. Distracted by thoughts of Nadia. "Could you ask it again?"

"If you'd been listening I wouldn't have to," she said mockingly. "I asked if you could tell us something about Othello from the first three chapters?"

"He's presented as an honourable military man as to trick the audience into thinking he can do no wrong and making his downfall more painful."

"More about his personality Stephanie," she asked. Valkyrie could see she had a tick – her finger would twitch a little when she got irritated. "His personality."

Valkyrie gave her an annoyed look back. "He likes doing little girls."

**.*****.**

"Stephanie," Ghastly sighed, coming into the headmaster's office. They couldn't risk Crow coming in. "I hope she hasn't done anything awful."

Anton came in after, the two men sitting either side of her. She saw the headmaster shrink a little in his chair. He was certainly scared of Bear and more than a little put off by Panda's scarred face.

"Er, I'm afraid Miss Edgley, your Ward…?" He started questioningly, looking between the two men.

"We are her guardian's brothers," Panda explained. "I’m her guardian in the event her current one dies, though. He sent us in his place as he is quite absorbed in his current case."

"Current case?" The headmaster asked nervously.

"He's a specialist military and secretive case detective," Panda lied easily. "Stephanie has shown a great interest in following in his footsteps. I hope her education is challenging her enough for her to do that."

"Yes, yes, that is why she is here," he said, sitting up a little and shuffling some papers that had nothing to do with them. "Today, Stephanie caused a bit of a disturbance in class."

"How so?"

"Her teacher sent her to me and explained that she had been inattentive all lesson, then caused an argument with her teacher as well as using crude and disturbing language." He glanced at Bear then looked back at Panda with growing unease. "I wished to speak with you about the content she may be being exposed to that is making her talk about such things in the middle of class."

"What was the argument?" Bear asked deeply.

"She–"

"I didn't ask you," he said, looking at Valkyrie. She tried not to smile at him. "Tell me what you did."

"She asked me to explain Othello, so I did, and she rephrased her question to make me wrong despite the fact I had actually answered her question. She only did it because she was annoyed I hadn’t been listening the first time around. She asked me about what we learn about Othello’s personality at the start of the book, and I was annoyed she changed the question, so, I told her we learnt he likes little girls. Which isn’t wrong even if I was being a little snarky.”

“Okay,” Bear said slowly, raising an eyebrow.

“And she said I was wrong! She tried telling me Othello is in love and so is whoever-her-face-is, and I said he was a paedophile and she got upset and started trying to get me to see her way, but I didn't because she's wrong. So, I told her she's trying to convince underage girls that marrying old men is a good and romantic idea, she said she wasn't, I told her she was because she was trying to romanticise Othello who is literally meant to be in his forties and the girl is, like, twelve. I never raised my voice, but she started shouting at me, grabbed my arm and tried pulling me out if the room. I told her to stop because it was hurting me, but she yanked me. I pulled my arm away and she held on and tripped over. She started screaming really loudly I’d pushed her, and the rest of the class even told her I hadn’t, but she stormed off and I followed her here after getting my stuff without her even telling me to. Now I'm here and so are you."

Her acting-parents nodded. "I don't think it is appropriate that the teacher tell my Ward she should be romanticising a relationship such as the one in Othello to young women as young as Stephanie, especially to the point of getting into an argument about it in class. Your employee is advertising destructive, manipulative and abusive relationships," Panda said calmly. “I certainly see a few areas in Stephanie’s story she could have made better decisions, but your teacher seems to have acted out of place as well, more so given she physically touched my godchild.”

The headmaster was getting sweaty. "Err, I didn't know the full story until now. Stephanie, are you sure you weren't trying to antagonise your teacher?"

"She called me racist for not thinking child marriage was romantic," she said, glaring at the pathetically weak man. “I didn’t even say anything about his race at all, I said he was a paedophile. Technically, that probably makes _her_ racist for thinking I was being racist for saying he was a paedophile. If you think about it.”

Bear shook his head, and Panda took a deep breath. Panda continued speaking: "I think Stephanie has been picked on by not only her teacher but by yourself also. I can’t imagine it’s normal practice to have a student sent to your office only to not ask for their perspective, surely."

"Sir, that's not the case at all. I'm sorry if it looks like that as obviously I was not told all the details before I called you," he said. There were sweat marks forming beneath his pits. "Stephanie, I will follow up with Mrs Vallendor about her forcing you from your chair, however, some of your words could be quite upsetting to your peers."

"I understand.”

“And I can’t be certain I can take you on your word about her putting her hands on you until I’ve spoken to the rest of your class–”

"I have scratch marks on my arm."

She was told to show the scratch marks and Valkyrie did. The teacher's nails had scraped her arms when she was being pulled up. That turned Panda onto full on angry Karen and Valkyrie sat back while he started shouting about how she had been attacked at the school and wanting to pull her right then.

It took a lot of convincing but soon Panda was settled by the headmaster and Panda accepted he couldn't legally pull Valkyrie from school as he was not her parent even if he had been sent in Crow's place. It was decided Valkyrie shouldn't be going to her literature lessons for the remainder of the year but would continue with her other lessons for then. It took some time to sort out and Valkyrie was honestly impressed Ghastly was able to find some many ways to say how angry he was without repeating himself.

By then it was the end of the school day so the headmaster walked them out the office to find the other Dead Men and Tanith, bar Crow who had to stay hidden, all in the waiting area for them. It would be more than strange to have a covered up man on the school grounds so he just couldn’t come. "Tanith!"

"Stephanie!" She said back, hugging her. "Aww, such a little troublemaker!"

"I'm almost taller than you," she pointed out. "I need to get to swimming."

"We know, we came to watch," Wolf said. He had her bags. "Come on, we'll be late."

The headmaster, now talking with Weasel and much more relaxed, led them to the pool. They sat in the stands, the headmaster left, and Valkyrie came out in her swimsuit a moment later.

They cheered her and she got a wolf-whistle so she started modelling the outfit for them with a sassy grin. The boy's parents were there and looked a little shocked that they were doing that.

Mr Swansy came out. "I trust you were all good today?" Valkyrie smirked. "Had a hearty lunch?"

They did their warm-ups again and it didn't take that long for Wolf to turn up by the poolside where he shouldn't be and take over Valkyrie's training, pushing her harder and harder than Mr Swansy did, and she surprised herself with how fast she went in the water.

"Edgley!?" Mr Swansy shouted at her. "You've been holding out on me!"

The lesson was incredibly tiring but rewarding, ending in a race between the three competitors that Valkyrie won by over two full seconds. The best part was when she noticed one of the said boys shuffling quickly to the changing rooms to hide his crotch – she supposed Wolf had gotten rather wet during the training session, and she’d certainly seen him eyeing her up brother. If she hadn't been so affected by the gay, she'd likely be in the same position.

She wanted to smack her own head for thinking stupid things sometimes.


	24. The attack

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Warning: Contains offensive language. And other topics of offensiveness. Sorry... Like really sorry, I feel bad!**

* * *

**Chapter 24**

They went to a nice place near the dance studio for dinner after she had washed, changed and got her reflection out for her homework – she was too busy for that rubbish and Crow was enjoying giving her extra work at the moment, making it too overwhelming a workload to do without it.

They all enjoyed dinner there, and had all seen her swim and dance, but not all at the same time. Crow was once again not present as he couldn't be seen but he was a big supporter of hers when she practised her solo at home. Valkyrie thought he secretly enjoyed pretending to be a dance coach too. Unfortunately, he was good at it and her dancing had improved. His ego inflated dramatically and she had little choice but to do what he said.

She ate a light dinner, had a milkshake, laughed with her friends, then went with them to the studio. She was in the group dance first – no one spoke to her, all going to another school and a bit older than her, so they had their own friendship group that didn't include her – and they practised that. She did backflips and silly things in the back with Tanith and got glared at by the instructor, the queue she needed to get in line with the nine other girls.

They did their well-rehearsed routine, focusing on their movements and each other's bodies to move fluidly in the contemporary dance they were doing. It was fun, despite the intensity of the music and pressure to perform, and she always found herself suddenly being taken over the movements, moving between and with the other girls in time and without thinking.

It was moments before she was done with those two hours of practice she loved the most, the most tiring part. The burn in her muscles, the music beating in her ears, her heartbeat thudding strongly. As the strongest they had in the group, she had to pick up one of the girls for a verse of the slow song they were using and stand on just one leg as she leaned forward and the girl leaned back, guiding them in what was meant to be a heart throbbing moment of the song where Valkyrie held the girl back from throwing herself into the 'lost sea' that was the others. It made her job that much more fun since she had a leading part. She was looking forward to performing it.

As soon as their instructor let them go, Valkyrie grinned and rushed over to her brothers and Tanith.

"How'd I do?"

"It was great," Tanith said enthusiastically. "It's even better than the last time I watched."

"You improved a lot over the month," Bear said. Valkyrie grinned at him, feeling the warmth he was looking at her with. He was always supportive.

Now she just needed to do the competitions!

.*****.

Those competitions came far too quickly. First was swimming, the last day of Year Eight at Secondary School, and Valkyrie was driven by the school to a big stadium in Dublin for it with the other two competitors. It was a boring drive and the pep talk was the worst yet, but they all got in their swimming gear and got themselves ready for their heats.

It would be a quick day, most of it waiting around as the female races were in the second half of the day and they only got one go at racing as there were so many heats and races due to all the schools and groups competing. Dozens of girls were waiting in the changing rooms, sitting on their towels on the floor, some of them having commandeered changing rooms for their little cliques to stay in, some of them having found a bench earlier. There were no teachers from any of their schools, leaving them to their own devices.

Sitting in front of her locker on a bench space she'd claimed for herself, she got out her phone and called Nadia.

"Hi," she whispered into the phone. "Are you here?"

"Yeah," Nadia said. Valkyrie could hear her smile. "I'm so excited. You're going to win, right?"

"Absolutely."

"Good. I got you something for afterwards, I think you'll like it. The leaflet says you start in half an hour."

"That's right. I think my teacher forgot about me though. He hasn't been in for ages."

"Oh, I think I can see him, in the red shirt right?"

"Yeah."

"He's flirting with one of the other school teachers."

"What, really?" Valkyrie said, laughing. "What school?"

"I think it's that private school that won the last round, Millennial Catholic School or whatever it is."

"I know that one," she said, rolling her eyes. The female competitors from that school, sitting on the other side of the room to her, were incredibly loud and annoying. "At least there's something to laugh about. I'm glad I don't have to listen to another one of his pep talks."

There was some muttering on the other end and then Nadia came back. "Tanith says we can celebrate if you win."

"Could I take you out if I win?" Valkyrie asked her.

"Who, me or Tanith?" Nadia asked.

"Both, either, I don't care."

Nadia snorted. "Sure, sure. And yeah, but where to?"

"A movie? And dinner? Just us, right?" Valkyrie suggested.

"I like that. I'll let you go, your teachers on the move. Err, he might just be trying to flirt up another person though. I love you, good luck girlfriend!" Nadia said.

"I love you too, see you soon," Valkyrie said, hanging up. She put the phone away and sat back. One of the girls on the middle changing benches that seemed to have been dragged in just for this competition grinned over at her. She was older, spottier and had a cheeky look on her face.

"Was that your boyfriend? Sounds like you're going to be having a good night tonight," she said suggestively. The other girls laughed a little, but she didn't detect any maliciousness, which she had sort of expected for a competition. Maybe she was the mean one.

"No, it was my girlfriend," Valkyrie said when they quietened.

They sat forwards a little. "You have a _girlfriend_?" That first girl asked.

"Yeah," Valkyrie said, trying not to smile at their odd enthusiasm. "She's a year older than me."

"Who has to be the boy?" The first girl's friend asked.

Valkyrie frowned. "Well, neither of us, that's the whole point."

"Yeah, I get that," she said with a little attitude. "But there's always one of the two in a, you know, lesbian couple, who acts like the guy would."

Valkyrie shook her head. "Maybe for some people, but most girls who want to date girls just, you know, date _girls._ Lots of people have types and stuff, and some girls do like tomboy girls, but me and Nadia aren't like that. I guess she's more girly than I am but we both wear dresses, both do sport, both like going out. Neither of us is 'the guy'."

The girl put her nose up, but the first girl nodded excitedly. "My brother just came out to my parents," she said. "They didn't take it very well, so my grandparents told them off."

Valkyrie snorted. "I don't have any parents to tell but my adopted family don't care at all. I think my mother actually knew, thinking about it. She would always comment on my friends as a kid saying who was pretty and I was spending time with, teasing me and saying I had crushes on them. I think maybe she knew before I did."

"How did you come out to your family?" A girl sitting next to her said.

"Sort of by accident," Valkyrie said. "They had just adopted me and were taking me out to a party for my birthday and were all warning me about the boys and that I had to tell them if one of them so much as thought about me," she said, laughing. "But then I came over with one of the girls, who's my girlfriend now, and they were all laughing at themselves because they had set no rules up about it. So yeah, they're cool with it. They found it really funny."

A few of the organisers came in then and marked off who was swimming next, Valkyrie included. They left the locker and filed to their lane, shaking out and waiting to be called up and get ready to swim. The girl next to her nudged her harshly.

Valkyrie stopped looking for friends and family and turned to the girl.

Her eyes looked at her loathingly but she kept her face carefully blank. "You better not infect the water, lezzy," she muttered through her teeth.

Valkyrie stared at her, not entirely sure she'd heard correctly. "Excuse me?"

"It's gross and unholy," she continued, looking blankly at the water as the first girls and their school name got called. "You're probably not even into girls, people your age just do it for attention. It's disgusting."

Valkyrie huffed a laugh, not sure what else she was even meant to do. Who was this girl? She was as thin as a stick insect, barely as tall as Valkyrie's chin. Meanwhile, Valkyrie had the height, was significantly better looking and had a much, much better chance at winning just by the thickness of her arms and legs. She was better than whoever-her-face was, basically. "You're embarrassing yourself."

"You won't win this," the girl said. "Or else."

Valkyrie laughed properly and stepped forwards for her name and found her family as soon as she did. They looked a little concerned, but Valkyrie grinned and gave them the thumbs up. They smiled and hooted for her loudly. She'd win and show that bitch who's best. And infect the water while she was at it, apparently.

They were set, ready and after a moments silence, off, shooting through the water with speed. Valkyrie put everything she had into the powerful strokes, kicking hard in the water to dart to the far side and turned and kicked off the wall, no clue at all of her placing. Putting on as much speed as possible, she gritted her teeth and swam back the to the start, touching the wall and sticking the head out the water finally, sucking in a much-needed breath.

She looked around and saw several girls, she didn't know who won. But it was done after all that training and waiting.

It was sort of anticlimactic.

She pulled herself out and, breathing hard, looked over at the board. The judges slowly wrote out their times on slips and then stuck them in order on their board. All the girls watched, shuffling in the cold as their teachers and family watched, for their times. Turning the board for them, Valkyrie let out a cheer – she was first.

In the seats, her family shouted their victory on their feet, and Dexter had pulled Nadia onto his shoulders. Nadia blew her a kiss and Valkyrie pretended to catch it and waved at them as she was herded back to the locker so the next heat could swim. That was her done for the day, unfortunately. But she'd won and now she could go on a date!

She was congratulated by the others she'd met earlier and she shook the second-place girl's hand – she didn't look happy but was gracious Valkyrie supposed – and went back to her bag where the other girls she had been talking to before were still there, as they were in different races to her. They stopped muttering when she got there.

"Who won then?" The spotty girl asked her.

Valkyrie turned around from her bag, having taken her towel and a pre-folded bundle of clothes out, and grinned at her. "I won of course. I want that date."

A teacher came in calling new names and Valkyrie slipped over to the showers and washed off, struggling hopefully for the last time in a long time to get the horrible swimming cap off. She showered slowly – no one was allowed to leave until everyone was done but they could go to another room with nice seating – and carefully used her magic to help her hair dry just a little so it wasn't dripping down her back but wouldn't be obviously dry to anyone else.

Dressing, she packed her stuff in the bag and came out of the cubical.

Three girls stood silently there.

"Hi," Valkyrie said conversely, trying to zip up her bag. She tried a smile. "No autographs."

One of them huffed at her and reached to grab her but Valkyrie moved out the way to leave, not wanting to have the day end badly, and got blocked by the other two. One of them was the girl insulting her earlier, whom she raced with. Some other girls were around but avoided looking at them.

"What do you think you're doing?" The loser competitor asked. "I warned you not to."

"You're a dirty lesbian," one of them said. She had to be the oldest, ugliest and most disgusted. The competitor was angry and the last just looked happy to be in a fight.

"Look, listen," Valkyrie said, pulling her 'Edgley' bag higher on her shoulder to leave. "I just came to win and leave, alright? You don't like me, that's great, have fun with that, but the only thing keeping this horrible, disgusting lesbian near you is yourselves. So fuck off."

The girl pushed her, and Valkyrie almost fell over on the wet floor, steadying herself on a cubical door as she grew angry. One of them stamped on her foot and though it didn't hurt, it did make her look down like an idiot and the angry loser competitor yanked her hair down and Valkyrie slipped to the floor.

It just all took her completely by surprise.

They tried to kick her and although some did get through, she was able to push the competitor down and grab the leg of the youngest, pulling her down and, with angry ferocity, pulled on the leg and dislocated the knee.

She started screaming and the other two – both standing now – looked at her more warily.

"See!" The competitor said to the others that were crowding and watching them. "Look at her – she's a dyke rolling around on the floor attacking people! Look what she did to Megan! Fucking lumpy armed gimp!"

Valkyrie glared and stood up slowly. The others were mostly watching, muttering and seemed to be stuck in the headlights as Megan screamed in pain. Her knee would be fixed in a few weeks, and Valkyrie knew from experience she was only screaming that loud for attention. It would have barely ached!

Baring her teeth, she jumped forwards and punched the loser competitor in the face, blood spurting on her hand, and the other, maybe sixteen-year-old, girl grabbed her arm.

"You're a disgusting freak," she snarled in Valkyrie's face, then spat on her and threw her on top of Megan. Valkyrie hadn't expected her to be so much stronger than she looked and got stamped in the abdomen and curled up in pain, not able to get up when Megan was hitting her from beneath and wiggling so she couldn't move. She got a shoe between her legs suddenly, making her scream in agony.

She pressed her legs together but that left her getting a foot in the face and the world went black.


	25. Emotional Bonding

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 25**

"Val? Valkyrie, baby, wake up," a voice said softly. There was a sharp ringing in her ears and her whole body hurt. There was throbbing everywhere but it was dull, like it wasn't her body at all. "Val, could you look at me? Make a sound? Please, I don't know what to do."

It was Nadia's voice Valkyrie realised, and she was lying on her back. Wincing, she opened her eyes and when the bright lights woke her fully, the pain hit her like a truck and she moaned, twisting into the fatal position instinctively.

"Valkyrie, you need to lay flat, you have to let your muscles relax," Nadia told her gently, stroking her hair. "Where does it hurt?"

Valkyrie opened her eyes and noticed the shower room was clear of everyone except them. She could now hear Tanith's voice outside and realised she was finding out what had happened and shouting sense into the bystanders for not helping her baby sister after she had fallen unconscious. "It hurts everywhere Nadia," she admitted. "That girl – she was stronger than she looked. Got me on the ground and kicked me everywhere. I don't think I ever want to stand again."

"She got you between the legs?" Nadia asked - her voice was sympathetic but Valkyrie could see the pained look on her face. Valkyrie hid her face in her hands and Nadia laughed quietly. "Don't worry, I'm sure some of those pain relief leaves will help."

"No, I just need a new body. This one's a dud," Valkyrie moaned. "I'm done."

Nadia kissed her forehead softly. "It'll be alright. Come on, sit up and let's see how bad it is. They've put the show on hold."

"Oh," Valkyrie said, feeling sick to the stomach. "That's just great. Fuck my life."

Nadia helped her sit up and when the dizziness faded she stood up and checked herself over in the one mirror next to the door for blood. And there certainly was some. "Oh, Val," Nadia said, looking her over.

Valkyrie felt sicker, some of it from embarrassment, but she was sure most of it was from the sticky blood she could now feel dribbling down her leg. She was wearing a skirt and it was bright red and obvious. "That isn't good."

"Maybe just your period?" Nadia asked. They were pretty open about things, so speaking about it wasn't embarrassing even if seeing it would have been.

But as it was: "No, that was last week. God, help me in there and let me see." Plus this wasn't a little bit like a normal period leak. This was quick, thick, and there was a lot.

Nadia helped her into a cubical and left her alone but didn't let her lock the door, just in case. She lifted her skirt, pulled down her knickers and inspected herself. She had a somewhat deep cut on her skin just above her pink folds, a rip in the skin that was slowly but steadily bleeding and too big to clot quickly. She had to pad it, get in the car, knock herself out and let Kenspeckle fix it and never see him again. It was sad because she liked Kenspeckle, but there was no way she wanted to see him after this.

She noticed as well that she actually had a few bruises between her legs – a few more kicks that girl got in when she was unconscious and vulnerable on the ground. Her clit was swollen painfully and purple from a disgusting bruise and her pelvic bone must have been stomped on. It was slowly turning a dark yellow with bruising. It really hurt.

Sobs suddenly pushed up her throat and Valkyrie breathed slowly and replaced her underwear, not having any tissue in the shower to clean up the blood on her underwear, incredibly sensitive skin, her clothes, her legs, her face and neck from her surely broken nose. It was so embarrassing. She'd have to walk in front of everyone, let everyone see her like this. Her teachers, the other competitors, the parents, her friends. Sure, they were brothers and sisters but there were some things no one wants showing. She barely wanted to speak to Nadia.

"Valkyrie?" Nadia whispered. "Baby, sweetie, can I come in?"

Valkyrie breathed deeply, pushed the offending tears away and opened the door. She stood as tall as she could, trying to find some sort of courage to face the world with.

Nadia took one look at her and pulled her into a tight hug.

Sobs clawed their way out of Valkyrie and soon she was crying on her girlfriend, telling the older girl about what she'd been told before the race and when she got out the shower. Nadia began crying too and they held each other, Nadia telling her about how when she was unconscious, the other girls started fighting between them, shouting to stop but then the two older girls started kicking her all over and didn't stop until a bunch came out of the locker into the stadium shouting for help. It had taken ten minutes before Valkyrie's brothers, sister and girlfriend had been told what had happened but only Tanith and Nadia had been allowed to see her. Tanith was doing the shouting while Nadia stayed with Valkyrie. Neither had let anyone else near them, even the medics.

Slowly, they calmed down and let each other go.

"Sorry," Valkyrie gasped, noticing the reddish-brown stains she'd transferred onto Nadia. "Oh my God, I'm such a damn mess, I'm so sorry."

"It's fine Val," Nadia said tearfully. "Come on, I have some tissues. Let's get you looking more decent."

It took a while to do that but by then Valkyrie and Nadia could hear the Gardaí had turned up. They went out and Tanith wrapped a gentle arm over her shoulders, which she kept back. Her head stayed high even when she felt bile in her throat.

The Garde, officials and offending girls – who were glaring at her from across the change rooms as she strolled out – as well as the Dead Men all watched her. Random parents, staff and other competitors whispered behind their hands.

Her brothers looked deadlier than she'd ever seen them.

She was pulled into a hug by Snake and instead of an immature joke to make her better, he just held her and muttered in her ear "I love you. Don't worry, we'll sort everything," and she nodded into his shoulder. She pulled away quickly.

It took hours to get through everything. She had to be interviewed at the station and so did the other girls and then their parents, or guardian in Crow's case. Crow decided to press charges after Valkyrie told him she didn't want to be involved at all, and between the girls they were arrested with premeditated assault, hateful language and, for the girls kicking her when she was down, attempted manslaughter – the last two had been kicking at her face, neck and 'genitalia' as the police were referring to it, making it violent enough to be manslaughter. She heard her brothers muttering to each other that it was unlikely to go through though. They'd get community service at best.

Valkyrie had to write out a passage the Gardaí could use in court on her behalf but as she was underage, she did not have to do anything else. She just wanted to pretend this had never happened.

Soon enough it was time to go and, exhausted, Valkyrie sat in one of the waiting seats for her brothers to turn up. Tanith put an arm around her.

"Cheer up," she tried with a half-hearted smile. "I thought you had a date to plan?"

Valkyrie snorted. "Yeah, I think that can wait for now. I need to see Kenspeckle. Like, soon."

"Have you switched it?" Nadia asked. She was referring to the tissue keeping the blood from seeping down her leg.

"I did when I went to the loo, it's stopped bleeding now. They took pictures as evidence," she whispered furiously. "We need to move to a new country."

"We could move to Switzerland?" Nadia suggested. "We could get married and live in the mountains."

"Total seclusion. I like it."

"Guys, come on, you won't ever see these people again," Tanith said. "And if you do, the boys and I will shred them to pieces."

Valkyrie smiled. "Thanks, Tan."

The trip to Kenspeckle's wasn't nice but did let Valkyrie reflect on the situation enough to tell the doctor what happened by herself. No one, due to her spread legs, was in the room with her so she didn't feel _too_ uncomfortable. Civet and Stentor, in a relationship themselves and eavesdropping through the door, were both upset and angry for her, giving her surprise hugs before she left for dinner. They promised they'd poison whoever hurt her and Valkyrie was pretty sure they were serious and Kenspeckle would help them. Hopefully the girls wouldn't die though – might be linked back to Valkyrie. Permanently damaged, on the other hand…

Although it wasn't a date or even that enjoyable really, they did all go out for dinner that night and slept peacefully in their beds. Separately of course. Nadia was staying over as the next day they took a plane to England, specifically London, for the dance competition. Almost as soon as her feet touched English soil that next day, Valkyrie was at the borrowed dance studio with her group and instructor.

Her family had told her she didn't have to continue. No one would begrudge her that. But she insisted. She wanted normality and she desperately wanted to win a second competition to go hand in hand with yesterday's success, such as it was.

"Stephanie," their instructor said when she glided into the room. "Stephanie, I've been told you got yourself into a scrap."

"Yes, Miss Molly," she said, pointing at her face. "I was attacked by some competitors at my swimming competition and my neck is bruised."

And it was – she could use the healing stone on her body, but it would be suspicious on her neck and face, so they'd left that, making her look rather abused. At least she could sit without wincing.

"Dear girl – why did they attack you?" She asked.

"Because I'm in a relationship with a girl," she explained. "Honestly, I think they're all lucky my brothers didn't kill them!"

She laughed a fake laugh and watched her instructor grimace a little. She knew the woman fancied one or two of her brothers, but she was also somewhat homophobic, or at least not comfortable with the idea, and left the conversation there. The woman already didn't like Valkyrie which didn't help. Too much messing around in her free time. Valkyrie ignored it since the woman had still let her on the team when she had found out about her being homosexual near the start of the year.

They practised for the whole day.

Much of the week was spent practising, the others going off and doing more amusing things than watch her repetitively practice the same moves, going so far as to get into a case and solve it while she was at dance. She had been jealous and more than a little peeved and hadn't stopped sulking until Nadia had grabbed her shoulders, pinned her down and kissed the daylights out of her, making her pant, flushed and very, very aroused. The Dead Men and Tanith had laughed at her. The emotions had gotten a little better after that and she'd even secretly teased Nadia, joking that everything still worked down below at least - a dark joke but a positive one for her, and it made her a little better about it all.

The day of the dance was pleasant, and no drama happened, letting Valkyrie do the group performance with ease and then a quick congratulation from their instructor before going through the solo performances swiftly and for the last time. All alone behind the curtain, Valkyrie fixed her hair and bold makeup and her costume. She was lucky to have the part. She hoped she could prove she had it because she was a good dancer and not just to get her instructor in whoever she fancied good books.

She stepped onto the stage, the crowd silent, and got into her starting position on the floor. The music started in a slow, sad song, and she moved with the melody, up and down with the song, angry and sad as the voice sang softly in Irish. The words, translated, were behind her on a projector with a white screen and just her shadow moving across it, deftly placed lights reflecting it beautifully.

She twisted and turned on the ground, 'trying' to get up and when the music switched to the part about inner strength, she threw herself up and put all her heart into the dance, feeling both the words and the music, pushing herself to perform for these people. Falling to her knees at the end, she gazed into the black hole the lights created in place of the crowd and as the music stopped it went up in cheers. She stood slowly, bowed, and exited the stage.

She kept her head down behind the curtain, taken over by the emotion of the song. It had been a tough week for her and the intensity of the practising had left her no time to grieve even if the edges had faded. Dancing her heart out, apparently, did the trick.

They sat as a group for the awarding and their group only won third but as a solo performance, Valkyrie received the second placing and a Scottish girl got first. The feeling of getting so close was wonderful and sad at once but Valkyrie was mostly relieved it was done.

"You did it!" Nadia grinned, gripping Valkyrie in a strong hug when she was let free from the instructor. "I loved your dance."

"Thanks," she said, smiling at the beautiful girl, looking at her full lips. "Can we go back now?"

"Stephanie, sweetheart!" Miss Molly said, coming up behind her. "Darling, you did so wonderfully tonight."

"Thank you, Miss Molly," she said politely. The woman was looking at Wolf openly, but he was chatting up one of the dance mums. Weasel was doing the same, grinning as he tried to win her over before his friend. Or maybe they were chatting each other up, Valkyrie could never tell. "I think we need to get dinner, so I'll see you again."

"Oh, of course," Miss Molly said. "You know, I really need to get dinner myself."

"It's too bad, we're eating in tonight," she said. "Nadia, you ready to go?"

They ran off and pulled Wolf and Weasel away between them. Getting back to their hotel, they all laughed and laid the takeaway out on the dining table.

"-and then, I grabbed the boy by the back of his neck and lifted him – 'What do you think you're doing here?' And the lad wet himself."

They laughed at Snakes story. "You sure you didn't do that part?" Bear said, smirking. They laughed more, and Valkyrie rolled on the floor silently, unable to control the happy tears rolling down her face.

"No! Damn you, I scared the idiot and got my phone back of course. Before it got broken too," he said defensively. "I'm not that bad."

They were silent for a moment before Nadia muttered "Sure," and they were all laughing again.

They still had two days of holiday left. Looking at Nadia laughing, Valkyrie knew how to spend them.


	26. Date Weekend

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 26**

Waking up Friday morning, one of two days before they returned to Ireland, Valkyrie rushed out of bed, got dressed and put some cream on the bruises on her face and neck. The swelling was gone, thankfully, but that had now turned yellow and green with red marks dotting in them and the veins around the area were often throbbing painfully. The bruise itself didn't hurt much though and she was able to kiss her pretty girlfriend so, with something akin to a skip, she left her room to get breakfast.

Skulduggery, Ghastly, Dexter and Tanith were already up drinking tea or in Skulduggery's case, reading the Irish newspaper from his phone whilst consulting an English paper as his phone slowly loaded articles. They didn't have as many food options in their hotel apartment, but they did have her favourite cereal, coco-pops, so she poured herself a drink and the food and sat down to excitedly eat it.

"Someone's in a rush," Tanith said cheekily. "Another hot date?"

"Yep," she said with her mouth full. "I see you don't."

Her sister grinned. "But who says I don't?"

Behind her, Panda looked up slowly at Tanith and then sharply at Valkyrie, indicating to find out what exactly Tanith meant. Hiding a smirk, Valkyrie drank from her glass and continued the conversation. "Can I know who with?"

"He's tall, blonde and pretty," Tanith said. "I've known him a while. Know the parents too."

Valkyrie did smirk now. "Sounds serious."

"We're friends I suppose. Bit of a love-hate relationship you know. We're going monster hunting," she said. "I'll be back before our flight."

"You sure about that?"

"Pack my case if I'm not here tomorrow night, will you?" Tanith said, laughter shining in her eyes. "Have fun on your date Cub."

Tanith left, and Panda watched her go with something like panic. Lucky for him, she didn't turn and see his desperate look but Valkyrie, and of course the staring men, watched her hips sway right out the door. She turned back to Panda when the door locked behind Tanith.

"Told you," she sang.

"I made the dress," he muttered, burying his blushing face into his tea.

"Did you give it to her?" Wolf asked, smirking with Valkyrie.

"Not yet," he growled before sighing. "This is a fool's quest."

"Good job you're a fool then," Valkyrie said encouragingly. "Send her a note or something. Tanith doesn't do fancy. She'd run through a mud field if you put steak on the other side."

He smiled to himself and Valkyrie noticed his eyes wash over as his thoughts went to some gutter or another. Shaking her head, she finished her food and washed it up, thinking about what she wanted to do for the day. It was the hot season in England, mid-July, so she'd put on shorts and t-shirt but looking at Nadia come into the kitchen, she felt somewhat overdressed. Nadia had, somehow, smuggled itty-bitty shorts passed her mother's censoring and paired it with a crop top and only a lightweight, oversized knit top Valkyrie and everyone else could see through to her smooth skin.

"Well, that was clean," Wolf said, taking the wet bowl from Valkyrie's hand right before it fell to the ground.

She snapped out of it and slapped her brother's arm before drying her hands and turning to her grinning girlfriend.

"I thought we'd go out today," she said casually.

"Oh?" Nadia said, scrolling through her phone.

"Maybe get a train to Covent Garden, then see if there's a show we could watch this evening, and tomorrow we could go to Camden Town?" Valkyrie suggested.

"Mm, that would be nice." Nadia looked up at Valkyrie slowly, put her spoon down and laced her fingers together as if they were in a meeting.

Valkyrie sighed and put her hands on the table, leaning forwards and over Nadia. "Nadia," she said, smiling in spite of herself. "Would you please go on a date with me?"

"I'll think about it."

Valkyrie grinned and ran around the table, chasing the girl out her chair, and around the table, almost knocking the paper out of Crow's hands and then over into the living area. Valkyrie almost grabbed the girl, making her shriek.

"Stop it!" Nadia laughed, putting her hands up. "Don't you dare do it!"

Valkyrie waited a moment for Nadia to start laughing and then ran at her, picking her up over her shoulder and running around the sofa. "I'm bigger than you, you can't stop me!" She shouted mockingly, spinning around faster and faster. "I'll rule the world and you will be eternally dizzy!"

Giggling, Valkyrie threw the older girl onto the sofa and collapsed on the floor beside her. Nadia, tears running down her face, rolled off the sofa right on top of Valkyrie, flattening the girl to the floor.

"Nadia, you bitch!" Valkyrie got out, making Nadia break down laughing even more. After a moment to get her breath back, Valkyrie ended up laughing too until Nadia leaned over and kissed her sloppily on the mouth. Slowly, the world faded from view and Valkyrie's hands went to Nadia's waist, feeling little bits of her warm skin through the holey fabric, their mouths moving together slowly, tongues joining the frame for just a moment before Nadia was lifted right off of Valkyrie.

"Hey!" Valkyrie exclaimed, seeing Panda and Snake had pulled her girlfriend up by grabbing an arm each. Nadia was flushed but didn't seem entirely embarrassed, and Valkyrie tried to copy. "That wasn't very nice."

"Not on the floor," Panda said tiredly. "It's unseemly."

Valkyrie got up and glared as Nadia sorted out her top. "We'll see if I help _you_ again." Panda's eyes widened but she ignored him and turned on Snake. "What's your excuse?"

"It's the floor," he said, pretending innocence. "Poor Nadia here deserves more."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and let Nadia go back to her food, getting herself ready, mainly her hair that had been messed up rolling around, and they left early to get the most of the twenty-five or more degree weather while they could. They chatted about some of the things they wanted to do in London on the train to Covent Garden. Being such a beautiful day, the underground was hot and humid, leaving both of them breathing in deeply when they finally left the station.

Grabbing Nadia's hand, Valkyrie smiled at her and pulled her down the street towards the shops. They looked everywhere, laughing and chatting, talking about everything they would buy in the future, how they wanted their future homes and lives to be, most of which being lavish. She found herself watching Nadia fondly as she was told about the different things Nadia would do to her family home if it were hers, about the awful chandelier Valkyrie had heard ranted about at least a thousand times and the place Nadia wanted a pond to write at.

"I just don't know though," Nadia said suddenly, pulling herself away from her imaginary house and Valkyrie from admiring her. "My parents are so desperate to make me earn all my own money, which I want to do, I _want_ independence, but I also sort of want all the materialistic things right now too."

Valkyrie grinned. "We're all like that I think. We all want love and comfort and just the necessities so long as we have our families, but wouldn't everything be so much nicer with the materialistic bits too? I think so. I suppose I'm quite lucky. My dad's business was passed to Gordon when dad died, the same with the family business as Gordon was in a position to take it as he is older than other family members, and he ran them right up until his death."

"What about now?" Nadia asked curiously.

"They run in trust," she said, frowning. "Or I think that's what it's called. I don't need to do a thing until I'm eighteen although I might not have to after. I can pay someone to continue running them for me if I want, and I almost definitely will. It's how Gordon got that mansion and all the other places. I should take you to France actually. It's a really nice place although I haven't gone for a few years."

Nadia grinned. "I did always wonder where Gordon got the money. I mean, he was a great writer but still just an author."

"Yeah, he didn't tell anyone he had the family business. Everyone is still wondering who has it. A few cousins won't take to each other because they think each other has it. No one's willing to get involved to say who does or doesn't have it for fear of backlash. Honestly, it's a blessing they don't know because I'm already in the bad books with a lot of them because I got everything from Gordon who not only earnt a lot on his own but also got all the money from his grandparents who owned the business. You'd think they'd have clicked he had it when he got all their assets but no."

"He sounded kind of flashy, even when I spoke with his Echo stone. They probably thought he'd say if he had it."

"Yeah, I guess. Oh, they have crepes!"

Their time in Covent Garden was wonderful and they binged on as much food as they could stuff in their mouths. When it finally came to find a show, they were exhausted but were excited to see 'A Mouse Trap.' It was a great play, and they held hands and watched with joy.

"Oh, I'm really glad we didn't see that with Skul or the others," Nadia said when they got out, grinning despite the chill in the evening air. "He'd have ruined it before we sat down."

"He's an idiot sometimes."

They took the train back to their hotel, stopping at a restaurant for dinner and eating with just a quiet chatter about the play, too tired from the activity to do much else. They slept well that night – Tanith wasn't back yet and Panda was wandering around looking flustered and irritated – and come morning, they were giddy with excitement to see the city again. Panda was quiet but at least wasn't sulking too much.

"I got all my money," Nadia said, "and I sorted what clothes can be thrown away, so I can get anything I want!"

"God's sake," Valkyrie muttered as she ate her breakfast. "It's just Camden Town."

"Have you been before?" Nadia frowned, sitting next to her. She'd eaten already, too excited to sightsee. "I thought maybe we could see the National History Museum before we go."

Valkyrie groaned. "A museum? That'll be boring."

Nadia glared at her. "Well, you're taking me out and I want to see it."

"Well if I'm taking you out, don't I get to choose?"

"No way," Nadia said resolutely. "Come on, I want to get there before the crowds."

Valkyrie sighed but did as her girlfriend requested and they left right after Valkyrie did her teeth, being nagged the whole time to hurry and ended up running to the station before their train left. The beauty of the underground, Valkyrie conceded to herself, was that she could go absolutely anywhere almost immediately, and it wasn't long until they were in line to the Museum. They went through the random search – Valkyrie got searched while Nadia laughed and left her there – and then onwards to the exhibits.

Valkyrie was in awe of the structure of the whale on the ceiling and the ice age animals, barely taking in Nadia's disappointment of not seeing the dinosaur skeleton. It was a thousand times more imposing to see the giant sea creature in its full size than just the idea of it on television or pictures. Taking Nadia's hand, Valkyrie led them to the taxidermy birds and other little creatures.

"Cheer up," Valkyrie whispered to her. It wasn't too crowded but most of those around them were little kids, making the girls look down at where, or rather who on, they were stepping. "Maybe I can take you to see Sue in New York one day."

"I've never been to New York," Nadia said. "But why are you whispering?"

"No reason."

"Valkyrie…" She said warningly.

"Alright, alright," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "I just had an idea. But it's a secret. I can't tell you."

Nadia studied her for a moment but then let it pass. "Fine. But you're getting lunch."

"Yeah, yeah, like all the other meals," she said, bumping their hips together. "This is strangely pretty you know."

"It is," Nadia replied, looking at the large, dead birds. "They still look regal. I wonder how they stop rotting in taxidermy."

"But it's just skin and feathers?" Valkyrie questioned.

"I know, but skin rots."

"Leather doesn't."

"I suppose," the older girl conceded.

They wandered through the building for hours, getting an expensive lunch in the café before they moved back to the trains and made a sweaty trip over to Camden Town. It was a much longer walk down than Valkyrie had expected, and she applied some sunscreen as she went, passing it over to Nadia while she rubbed it in.

"Why are you using factor fifty?" Nadia laughed. "You look like a ghost."

Valkyrie stuck her tongue out at her. "Don't make me hug you."

"Don't you dare," Nadia warned, facing the sunscreen at her threateningly. "I don't want weird marks on my clothes."

"It could be worse," Valkyrie grinned.

"Don't do that either. Whatever you're thinking."

Valkyrie laughed and pulled her down the street, finally finding the stalls Tanith told her about. The shop fronts were amazing in themselves, but it was getting lost in the stalls, in the madness of the people going in and out that brought the atmosphere the girls were loving. They looked over the wares on sale and the possibly stolen items from some of the dodgier people. It was fun though, and they tried almost every food they found, getting orange juice, Japanese noodles, pick&mix sweeties, pizza the size of their head, salads with fruits they'd never heard of. They were too stuffed to get dinner, giving them more time to wander hand in hand.

Valkyrie bought silver and bronze jewellery, a band shirt, a new skirt, a phone case and some hair ribbons Nadia encouraged her to get because she thought it would be adorable to see Valkyrie with a bow in her hair. Nadia spent all of her money getting some complimentary necklaces and rings to Valkyrie's choices but all in gold, a dress, makeup, and orange shawl, then ended the date by getting them ice creams.

"I enjoyed that," she said, leaning on Valkyrie's shoulder as they walked back to their hotel in the evening sun. It was getting cold and she'd already put the shawl to use.

"Me too," Valkyrie murmured, smiling slightly. "It was a good weekend."

Nadia yawned. "I'm going to sleep like a baby tonight. And the rest of the week."

"Wait a moment." Valkyrie stopped them just outside the building complex and pulled Nadia to her tightly.

Nadia smiled up at her and licked her lips. "I've really enjoyed this week," she said quietly, eyes bright in the moonlight. "It's going to be so weird staying away from you again."

"It's the summer now though, we'll have more time together," Valkyrie whispered, kissing her nose. "Like you said we could."

"It just won't be the same as this though. I like seeing you in the morning and kissing you before bed. Even if we slept separately forever I want to do at least that."

Valkyrie kissed her cheek and slowly down to her mouth, speaking only when she got to the very corner. "We will one day. You can move in with me and I'll give you anything you want. You can do anything you want so long as you see me in the morning and kiss me before bed."

Gently, Valkyrie pressed her lips to Nadia's and the world could have fallen apart around them and they'd have never noticed. Nadia reached up and wrapped her arms around Valkyrie's neck, standing on her toes to kiss her more fully. Their tongues started playing for dominance, pushing and twisting, and Valkyrie's hands drifted down to Nadia's ass, squeezing her. Nadia giggled, and Valkyrie bit the girl's lip, kissed her again and let her hands drift up under Nadia's loose top, stoking the soft skin there. She jolted forwards at the touch of Valkyrie's cold hands but as they warmed up, Nadia held Valkyrie tighter in the kiss, gaining more control and pressing Valkyrie against the wall. Almost immediately Valkyrie was gasping and letting out a low moan as Nadia pressed her hands against her bare, uncovered stomach, travelling up, up and cupping Valkyrie's bra covered breasts beneath the crop top.

"I love you Valkyrie," Nadia whispered into her mouth, kissing her before she could reply, kneading her breasts.

"Ahem," someone said.

Slowly, she removed her hands and sighed loudly. "Go away Tanith," Nadia said, resting her face in Valkyrie's neck. "I swear your family is everywhere."

Valkyrie giggled quietly behind her girlfriend, seeing Tanith and her 'weekend date' Panda had been stressing about – Tanith's brother. "Hi Tanith. Hi Tanith's brother."

"Hey. But please," he said, waving happily. He looked like Tanith's twin rather than a brother twenty years older than his sister, with blonde wavy hair, grey eyes and a cheeky smile. Still, he was a foot taller, lacking a sword and wearing a simple t-shirt and jeans. They both looked as if they'd been fighting as their hair was messed up and they had dust and mud splattered all over. "Don't stop for us."

Tanith elbowed him in the ribs, making his grin grow, but Tanith just rolled her eyes. "We should probably put them out of their misery."

"You mean telling them your hot date is your brother?" Valkyrie asked. "Or letting them see our dishevelled looks?"

She snorted. "I'll decide when I see them."

Tanith hugged her brother tightly, telling him goodbye, and the girls waved him off. They went into the building together though Valkyrie did wish she and Nadia could have stayed out a while longer to make out.

"So, had a good weekend girls?" Tanith asked.

"Yeah," Nadia said, giving Tanith the rundown of what they had done. "It was a good weekend."

Valkyrie nodded. "What about you? You _look_ like you had fun."

She laughed. "Oh, yeah, it was good. I even ran into Aurora Jane, an American girl I dated once. It was nice seeing her again."

Valkyrie gave her the side eye. "I thought you were trying for Panda?"

"Oh, I am," Tanith nodded. "But it was still nice to talk to her. Flirt a little. We're just friends. I doubt we'd cope to date again, we didn't the first time after all."

Valkyrie nodded. "I hope this makes him hurry up. It's painful to watch a grown, successful man blush and ask a thirteen-year-old for dating advice."

Tanith and Nadia laughed as they stepped into the living room of their apartment. All the Dead Men were sitting around, mostly smirking and watching Panda who was fidgeting and pointedly not looking at them. The girls looked at each other, shook their heads, and went to bed.


	27. The Teleporter Murders

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 27**

Valkyrie and Crow entered the mages house carefully, looking at the walls and floor, the furniture and corpse lying face down on the carpet. Valkyrie looked over it quickly, seeing the knife in the back and look of slack shock. There was nothing broken or ruined in the house. Not even a teacup out of place. The dead man's wallet and keys were on the entrance hall table. Nothing stolen.

"He was taken by surprise," Valkyrie said.

Skulduggery got the rainbow dust out of his pocket and sprinkled a little over the room. No colours came up. "No magic. What could all this mean, Cub?"

"Light could have trusted his killer, or the killer could be skilled, quiet," she said quietly, looking at the many pictures on the walls of friends, loved ones. He'd enjoyed having photos it seemed. It was almost creepy to have the life and vibrancy on the walls when the owner was dead on the floor.

Mr Bliss came into the room. "The _other_ detective is nearby."

He was referring to Detective Crux, a nasty little man employed as Second Detective by Elder Guild, topped only by Skulduggery who was First and Head Detective, making Crow not only the most accomplished detective in the country but also in charge of the department at the Sanctuary by default, although ninety-eight percent of the running was left to other people.

Unfortunately, he hadn't been able to find enough wrongdoings by Crux to fire him yet. "Why, Mr Bliss, it sounds like you don't like him. Is it that you found emotions in your hollow heart?" Valkyrie smirked at him.

He had no reaction except to look at her blankly. She wasn't sure if he hated her or was indifferent, but she knew he would do nothing to her since she was with the Dead Men, possibly the only force he wouldn't take on directly. It was incredibly amusing to Valkyrie after she'd gotten over her beginning intimidation of him, and she had taken all of her teasing she used to give to Meritorious and now threw it in Mr Bliss' face. He didn't say anything for a long, long moment, enough for Crow to come up beside her and rest a hand on her shoulder. "Can you send him away?" Crow asked.

"I will try," Mr Bliss said, then left the room. Moments later, Valkyrie and Crow watched as Mr Bliss walked to a Sanctuary car, get in and was driven away.

"I think he hates me."

"Strange, that," Crow said lightly, shaking his head. "Come on, we need to meet the Elders."

They got in the Bentley just as Crux pulled up in an old, battered Ford. He glared and sneered at them as he got out his car. Valkyrie waved at him with a fake smile.

"I hate him," she said through the smile, looking at him as they drove past. She dropped the act when he was gone. "Like, really hate him."

"I'm sure you'll survive. You can tell that talisman all about it."

He referred to her 'Hate' talisman, which she was meant to tell all about the people she hated in hopes she'd stop hating so many people. So far it wasn't working. If anything, she'd become more aware of quite how many people she hated, and it was a lot. She'd gotten it last week for her fourteenth birthday from Crow. She'd gotten a lot of presents, as per usual, but the day itself had been spent with Nadia and she'd enjoy it a lot, going out to the movies and to get dinner, and it had doubled as their unofficial year anniversary. Unofficial as they technically started dating a few months after they met, but it was more fun to say they'd been dating from the start so it was now her birthday. It wasn't too far from the truth to be a lie, they had only been seeing and talking to each other since they met so it was all very within reason.

She had to think of what to get Nadia for her fifteenth birthday now. She was struggling.

They pulled up to the Waxworks Museum in good time, ready to meet with the Elders. They gave each other a nod before going in, smiling when they opened the door.

"Good afternoon, Grand Mage Meritorious, Elder Crow," Crow said cheerfully. "What is it you'll be needing today?"

Valkyrie saw a flicker of amusement in Meritorious' eyes – they'd been playing this game for six months since they had defeated Vengeous and Guild had had a fit in his office, ranting to his wife about wanting to fire Crow and the Dead Men. Which he literally couldn't. The Dead Men were not hired by the Sanctuary, they were merely outside, paid help. The Sanctuary could take them off of payroll at any time and it would mean nothing as they had no contracts, no agreements, no nothing. He _could_ fire Skulduggery and Valkyrie purely from their detective jobs, but that wouldn't stop them from working cases.

They'd just do it off the record and cause all sorts of problems. Guild didn't seem to consider that.

"We want to know how your investigation is going," he said regally.

"We came from the late Cameron Lights home," Valkyrie said a little more seriously. "There was no evidence, again."

Meritorious nodded. "I want you to get in contact with the last Teleporter and protect them."

"There're two left," Crow said. "But we'll do our best."

Meritorious shook his head. "We just had a report from Chinese Sanctuary of a Teleporter death. We have only one more now. But, before you go, there is one more matter we wanted to discuss," he said, getting up from his chair and coming over to them. He stood in front of Valkyrie, towering over her really, and brought something out of his pocket. "Valkyrie Cain, I am declaring you Co-Head and Second Detective for the Irish Sanctuary for your constant patriotism and unfaltering commitment to the organisation."

Valkyrie started grinning and held back her laugh. "Really?"

"Absolutely."

He placed a medal and her official detective's badge, with her new status, in her hand. The medal was for bravery. She was now of equal status to Crow, and officially his second-in-command. In a real war, she would actually be his second-in-command according to Sanctuary hierarchy, making her responsible for armies and the country in his absence. It was an honour to receive. And so much sweeter because now Crux was a normal detective only, which was amusing even if he was still a part of the department. Glancing over, Guild was literally seething in his chair, hands clenched and face red. Meritorious grinned, knowing he was the only one with the power to do this.

"Thank you, sir," she said. "I won't let you down."

"We're counting on it. We thought it might help with keeping the Dead Men in line for us," he said, giving her the shadow of a wink. He had really warmed up to her once she started irritating Guild. "You two better find out what is going on with these murders. I want this sorted before any more deaths."

They agreed and left, going to the car. One moment Valkyrie was going to ask about getting lunch and the next she was screeching because someone was in her face.

"What the fuck?!" She shouted at him, fear turning to anger quickly. She took a deep breath, holding up a hand. "Sorry, sorry. Just… don't do that. Hi."

"Yeah, hi. Pleasant, I need your help," the man said, looking harassed and panicky. "These murders, please tell me you're dealing with it and not that idiot Crux?"

"This case is international," Crow said calmly. "But as it stands, both myself and my Second, as well as Crux, has been placed to investigate by the Elders. Crux was Guilds idea."

"I'm _not_ going to that idiot. You have to do something, and fast, or I'm next!" The Teleporter wailed.

"Come on, we should talk over a meal," Valkyrie said, indicating to the car. The man glared and looked as if he'd refuse but when Crow nodded and got in the car, the man sighed and got in the back by teleporting.

"Valkyrie," Crow said when they were driving, "this man is Emmett Peregrine. And the last Teleporter it seems."

"I just heard about Cameron," Peregrine said quietly. "I've been on the run for the last week, I haven't stayed in one place for more than a few hours."

"You could stay with us while we work this out," Valkyrie suggested. "No one comes to my house and as long as you talk to no one and stay put, you'll be safe. We can catch the killer and you can get some sleep and something to eat."

Crow hummed and thought it over. "It's a good suggestion."

"Pleasant, you cannot be serious," he said, leaning forward to get his point across. "For God's sake, she's a kid. I'm not hunkering down in a kid's bedroom hidden from her parents for weeks on end waiting for you to get this blasted person."

Crow shook his head. "Valkyrie inherited her Uncle Gordon Edgley's mansion two years ago, as well as myself as her legal guardian and, through me, the Dead Men as her family. She is a Dead Man for all intents and purposes. There is more than enough room, space, safety and protection for you to stay with us."

"And this should take days rather than weeks with you helping us with clues," Valkyrie pointed out. "You could just stay the night if you want. Get some sleep. You look like you need it."

Peregrine sighed but Crow took a different turn and went back to the mansion in silence instead of out to lunch.

Bear was at the hotel, Panda at his shop and Wolf was with a pair called the Monster Hunters in Japan fighting some monster or another and Snake was no-one-wanted-to-know-where with no-one-wanted-to-know-who.

They still had Weasel and Tanith at home though, and Crow, Valkyrie, Bear and Panda would join them in the evening to keep Peregrine company and for protection, which they explained to him. He was happy with the arrangement by the time they got to the mansion and sat down with them at the meeting table – a large round table Gordon had stored upstairs, and the Dead Men had placed in the original office space on the ground floor for this exact purpose. It had great window space to look over the grounds while discussing horrible, terrible things.

Tanith and Weasel, already up to date with the investigation, joined them.

"Is there any person you can think of that could have killed the other Teleporters?" Crow asked when they were settled with tea.

"None. That's the thing, I've been thinking this whole time, who could have done it?" He said with forced calm. "But there's no one. Maybe one of us could be killed, but there was almost fifteen of us before, to kill fourteen Teleporters… it seems incredible."

Weasel tilted his head a little, looking at the same but seeing through him. "What about people you all knew? Or at least most of you?"

He thought for a moment. "Sanctuary officials. The Dead Men, but everyone knows you, except you ladies of course. No offence. A handful of sorcerers probably, but no one stands out to me. Teleporters aren't well liked as you may have heard. Our social circles are small and we all know each other's friends."

"Meaning you almost definitely know the killer," Valkyrie pointed out.

"What are you saying, I can't trust my friends?" He snapped.

"Basically," she pointed out. "Because all the scenes are the same. No sign of struggle, no sign of break and entry, no sign of magic. It's someone you all know and trust explicitly even with the shadow of the other Teleporters being murdered over your heads. It _has_ to be a friend."

"What is it?" Weasel asked suddenly.

Peregrine shook his head. "Nothing. Well, I was just thinking, really, that there is one person we know who I might trust like that but it's ridiculous."

"Tell us anyway," Tanith instructed.

He sighed. "A mortal man, he must be sixty or more years old. He's a farmer. It's stupid, I've known him for nearly ten years. Cameron introduced us."

Crow cocked his head. "His name?"

"Paddy."

Valkyrie smirked. "Doesn't sound like a killer. I know three Paddy's."

Tanith rolled her eyes. "At least a third of Ireland is made up of Paddy's."

"He lives at his farm somewhere," Peregrine continued. "Other than him, there's no one. And there is literally no way it can be him, I visited him in hospital last year when he had knee surgery! His hips about to give out, how's he meant to kill anyone for crying out loud! It _has_ to be an assassin."

"How about new people you or anyone close to other Teleporters, just met?" Crow asked.

"No one. Well, except the kid."

"The kid?"

"Yeah, a right cocky bastard. Turned up a few months ago from England, seventeen he is. We, that's me and Cameron, tried to offer training him but he just laughed in our faces and told us to leave him alone. He mentioned staying in Ireland if you want to find him. He's one of those natural-born, magic at his fingertips sorcerers, but like I said, no training. He probably couldn't Teleport more than a few miles. I doubt he did it. He's only interested in drinking his life away and partying as far as I can tell."

Crow nodded. "We'll go speak with him anyway."

Peregrine nodded. "Thank you for letting me stay here. I haven't slept in days. God, the last Teleporter murder happened fifty years ago," he said, rubbing his eyes.

"Oh?" Crow said, suddenly interested. "Who was that?"

"Trope Kessel, I think," Peregrine said, looking up in surprise. "I barely knew the man."

"Who murdered him?" Valkyrie asked.

"No one knows. He told a colleague he was going to Glendalough, and he was never seen again. They found his blood by the shore of Upper Lake, but no body was recovered."

"Could Kessel's murder have anything to do with these ones?" Tanith asked curiously.

He frowned. "I don't think so. If someone wanted Teleporters dead, why wait fifty years to continue?"

"It could be our start though," Crow said. "Emmett, thank you for answering our questions. We'll try and finish this quickly, so you can go back to your life."

He nodded. "Thank you again for giving me a place to stay," said, standing and shaking Crow's hand, then turning and shaking Valkyrie's. He had very rough hands and his nails had been bitten short, his clothes rumpled and a few days of stubble on his face. He had a trace of body odour too. "And yourself. This is your house."

"It's fine. Eat something and Saracen can find you a room and show you the bathroom."

Weasel grimaced at being given jobs but seemed happy enough to entertain their guest, patting him on the shoulder to lead him from the room.

Crow, Valkyrie and Tanith set off for their new leads. Well, Valkyrie and Crow did, Tanith was just bored and wanted someone to fight. Valkyrie wouldn't be looking to her for any investigatory help.


	28. Sea Hag and Saracen, sitting in a tree

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 28**

It took several hours to drive up to Glendalough, a rocky area in Wicklow Mountains National Park, in the east of Ireland, not far down from Dublin. It took until ten at night to reach the area and in the Autumn weather, the girls were cold.

"I am not happy in this weather," Valkyrie muttered. "I don't know how you do it."

Tanith laughed quietly, letting out little puffs of condensation. "I look good though."

"All your important bits are gonna fall off one day."

"Like my brain?"

"You have a brain?"

Tanith snorted a laugh.

The area looked like a forest covered mountain had had a chunk pulled out right in the middle, leaving little mountains surrounding a crystal-clear lake in the centre. It was silent and pitch black. Valkyrie could see all the stars and the moon above. It was stunning. Smiling to herself, she thought about how much Nadia would like to visit the national park with her once spring came. It would be a nice date.

"You're smiling again," Tanith whispered as Crow reached into a tree stump by the side of the lake.

"Shut up."

"You look like a lovestruck fool."

"Maybe I am. Crow, _what_ are you doing?" Valkyrie finally asked. He had been looking and waiting.

"This, my dear girl, is the bell that calls the sea hag," he said, presenting a dainty silver bell. He rang it and it was almost inaudible from where she was standing beside him. He put it back.

" _That_ was bloody rubbish," Valkyrie said. Tanith nodded beside her. "It was tiny! I bet she didn't even hear."

"I'm sure she did," he said.

"You'd think a summoning bell would be big though. Something with a toll, not a tinkle."

He nodded. "It was rather unimpressive."

"Why does it live in the lake?" Tanith asked him suddenly.

"I think we are about to find out," he said quietly, watching the lake. Valkyrie and Tanith turned and watched the water ripple and, slowly, an ugly, mossy, old mermaid-like creature immerge.

"Who disturbs me?" She said in a voice that sounded like someone drowning. It had a surprisingly Irish twang to it considering she supposedly lived in the water with next to no human contact.

"I do," Crow said. "My name is Skulduggery Pleasant."

"That is not your name," the sea hag scowled.

"It is the name I have taken. These are my colleagues, Tanith Low and Valkyrie Cain."

"You put so much power in names," she said almost sadly. "I once had a name but have long since submitted it to the Deep. It brings happiness. Tell me, have you ever seen such happiness as this?"

She raised her arms, looking at the three of them. She had a piece of seaweed hanging from her hair, stuck in the tangles. She had bare breasts and they were really old and wrinkled. Did all boobs look like that in old age? Valkyrie didn't know. Her nipples looked like they might fall off.

No one reply. When she gave up on an answer, she continued. "Why have you disturbed me?"

"We seek answers," Crow said. "We heard a man died fifty years ago, right here at this lake. If the victim told you anything before he died, if you know anything about him or the one who killed him, we need to hear it."

"You want to know another's secrets?"

"We need to."

"That girl," the sea hag said, raising a pointed finger at Valkyrie, "has not said a word since I appeared. Yet before that, with scarcely a pause, she spoke. Have you nothing to say now?"

"Hello," Valkyrie waved quietly. Tanith pressed her lips together to stop a laugh.

"I heard you speak of my bell. You do not like it?"

"It's a nice bell. I just thought it would be…" she searched for a word. "Grander. I thought it would be big and gold and grand."

The sea hag flicked her fish tail and drifted to just an arms breadth away from Valkyrie. Tanith stepped in front of her, hand on her sword. The sea hag didn't so much as look at her. "Would you like to drown?"

"Err, no thank you."

"What is it you want?"

"The man, from fifty years ago?" Crow said quickly.

There was another shift in the water and a corpse floated out until just his feet were below the surface. "Help me," he said.

"If you help us, we will help you," Crow said. "Are you Trope Kessel, the Teleporter?"

"I am."

"How were you killed?"

"With a knife, in the back."

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow. That was how all the other murders had happened. Perhaps it actually had been the same killer.

"Who killed you?" Valkyrie asked.

"A man called Batu."

"Why did he kill you?" Crow asked.

"I was, I suppose, a scholar," he said dully. "I was studying how the Faceless were driven from our reality. I did not what them back, I was just curious as to how it worked, the magic, the mechanics. I died because I trusted Batu and the good I believed all humans possessed. I was wrong as Batu was none of the goodness I believed him to be. He killed me when I told him what I knew, and he wished to protect his secret."

"What secrets?" Crow asked, sounding more cautious now.

"The gate to their reality," he said.

"Such a gate exists?"

"It does, but I only worked out how to find it, not where it was," he said slowly, tiredly. "The wall between realities has weakened over time. A powerful Sensitive could find it. Two things are needed to get through – an Isthmus Anchor, which is something from the other reality. The second is a Teleporter, who can force the gate open."

"Maybe the killer isn't bad," Valkyrie suggested. "Maybe he wants to make sure it never opens again, like a really, really twisted good guy."

Tanith and Crow nodded. "Thank you," Crow said to the corpse. "What is it you want in return?"

"I want to be buried," he said hopefully. "To be dry and surrounded by earth."

"Shut up, corpse," the hag said immediately.

"Isn't there something we could give you as a trade?" Crow asked. "We could transport you back to the sea."

The hag, who seemed adamant a moment ago, suddenly paused to consider. She swayed closer to Crow until they were just inches away.

"I would like to go to the sea," she said slowly, "but I want something else as well."

Crow tilted his head. "It wouldn't have anything to do with Saracen Rue, would it?"

She sneered. "I want to talk to him."

Crow got out his phone and called Weasel. He picked up after a moment. "Sherlock Bones, what's up?"

He pointed the phone at the sea hag. "He can hear you."

"Saracen Rue," she said. "You have not visited me."

There was a very, very long pause in which Valkyrie and Tanith started squeezing each other's hand to make the other maybe not grin as much. "Is that the Maiden of the Sea?" He asked charmingly. "No, I haven't seen you in a long time."

"You said you would."

"I did. I did say that. Unfortunately, things came up and I had to go away from the county. I was never able to come back to you."

"You forgot about me," she growled.

"No, I didn't," he said, trying to sound earnest. "Honest. It's just, after I was gone for five years or so, by the time I got back, things had changed. I didn't realise you wanted to see me still. I'm sorry."

She considered. "Visit me."

"Tonight?" He asked, surprised. "Look, babe, it's been thirty years."

"Thirty-seven."

"Where has the time gone?" He chuckled. "It was only yesterday I was visiting you. But trust me, things have changed now. I have to be a role-model." Valkyrie almost burst out laughing. All the Idiots tried to teach her were bad and inappropriate things. "My feelings have changed, and I'm sure you don't feel the same either. You're probably very angry. I'm sorry I made you angry and upset."

She sniffed somewhat delicately. "I want to see you."

"No, you want to punish me."

"Maybe you need punishing." Valkyrie felt a tear of laughter fall down her cheek as she tried to keep it in.

Weasel laughed a little nervously. "Perhaps, but I don't want to die. I'm sorry about that. You need to let me go. Find someone nice. Someone you can spend your life with. In the ocean."

She nodded, though her shoulders had shrunk. "I am in a lake."

"We will get you out," Crow said for Weasel. "Then you can find someone to love."

She considered it. "I suppose so. Yes. You will come for me soon. Before the new moon."

Crow nodded. "I'll tell the Elders. Thank you."

She threw herself into the lake, the dead man floating to them and then wobbled, and faceplanted into the ground. He didn't speak or move again.

"Well, that was strange," Valkyrie grinned, her cheeks hurting from the grins.

"Yeah, what was that about?" Tanith giggled, knowing the sea hag could hear them. "Also, thank god for her and Saracen being after me. I would not have been happy contracting anything _she_ had." Valkyrie snorted and laughed in earnest now.

Weasel, from the phone, chuckled. "Don't worry, it was innocent enough. We just spoke a lot."

"Suuure," Valkyrie said as Crow picked the man up with magic. "Because you're well known for that, aren't you?"

They said goodbye and got in the car while Crow got the body in the boot and called the Elders to tell them the progress they had made. He got in and told them transport for the hag had been approved. They drove back to the mansion.

There, they found Peregrine had gone to bed in one of the rooms on the third floor away from the rest of them, and the other men had stayed up for them. Cleavers removed the body from Crow's car for burial when they arrived and quickly disappeared.

"How was it?" Panda asked. Tanith sat in the seat next to him, bringing her legs up and leaning slightly against him. He went red but didn't move. Tanith smirked down at her nails.

"It went well," Valkyrie said absently, texting Nadia.

"How are you texting her at two in the morning?" Crow asked. "Shouldn't she be asleep?"

"Of course. But I had to tell her about the sea hag. She'll see the messages in the morning."

He sighed. "The trip was worth it. We learnt Trope Kessel was killed by a man called Batu in the same way the others had been killed and recovered his body. You may have heard Saracen's conversation with her."

They all grinned and jeered at him good-naturedly. He took it with a grin.

"We also learnt some motives for killing the Teleporters and that Kessel learnt how to find the gate to let the Faceless in. Needless to say, Batu knows and we need to silence him as quickly as possible. There may be a small chance he is killing Teleporters to stop the Faceless coming in but he's still killing and others he may tell might try to bring them in."

They all nodded and went to bed so they'd be rested to reconvene in the morning.


	29. Fletcher Renn

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 29**

It was very early, almost six in the morning, the next day that Crow, Valkyrie and, again, Tanith made their way to the Grandeur Hotel in search of Fletcher Renn after they, in a visit to China, worked out his most likely location. The lobby was bare in the early hours, lacking even a receptionist, and they went up in the elevator quietly.

They already knew the room – no place would be good enough except the top suite for a boy of Renn's likely pig-headedness.

Crow checked his gun on the way up.

The elevator door opened and they walked down a long corridor to get to the room they wanted. Quietly, Valkyrie picked the lock with the new set she got for her birthday to replace the last set she'd stolen and had slowly disappeared as pieces went missing on various missions. She wasn't very quick but could do it silently. Soon, they were nodding to each other and very, very quietly walking into the room.

Renn was face down on the bed, dribbling, and only in his boxers. Nice.

Quietly, Valkyrie and Tanith went to either side of the bed. Crow sighed softly, but the pair of girls grinned at each other, jumped on the bed and lay down on either side. Renn flew in the air as the bed bounced and landed right side up and stared at Crow who had his arms crossed and face covered.

He was about to say something when Tanith said, "Hi."

He looked left at Tanith and his face grew red.

"Hi," Valkyrie said. He turned and saw her on his other side waving at him. "Nice day we're having."

"Err," he squeaked out, looking back at Crow. "Err."

Tanith rolled her eyes and got out of bed. Valkyrie sat up but stayed on the edge, crossing her legs.

"Hi," she said. "Sorry, we didn't mean to startle you. It was just a joke."

He began to breathe a little easier but didn't look any less shocked. He kept glancing at Tanith, seemingly unable to not look at breasts, at Crow who was now looming over Valkyrie from behind and at Valkyrie who was trying to be the olive branch. "Um, hi? Who are you?"

"My name is Valkyrie Cain," she said. "This is my partner in crime, Skulduggery Pleasant, and my sister Tanith Low."

"Sister," he said quietly.

"Yes, sister. I'm also Skul's adopted daughter. Child. Kind of. He’s my guardian and my real parents are dead."

"His daught–" he looked up at Crow and then back at Valkyrie a little paler. "Yes. That makes sense. Yes."

"Something like that," she rolled her eyes. "We’re here on business, obviously."

He ran his hand through his hair, which was quite long and flopping all over the place. "Yeah, I don't want any."

"You will," Valkyrie said, darting forwards and putting a handcuff on one of his hands. It dulled his magic and she left him to play with the other one. He looked at it with horror. "You're a minor," she explained. "As a Sanctuary official, I have it in my rights to dull your magic and take you into protective custody for as long as the duration of this investigation takes. You are not in a position to choose."

He glared at her. "You can't do that to me! You don't even know me."

"Fletcher Renn, English, seventeen, came to Ireland six months and three days ago. You were witnessed in three nightclubs teleporting. You’ve broken the law. We have the right to arrest you for a prison sentence going on ten years per incident. You're looking at thirty years in medium security prison unless you comply," Crow said menacingly. "Stop staring at my colleagues."

"Right," he said, looking back up at Crow, then blushed and coughed. "Um, sorry."

"Don't tell me that, kid," he growled.

Fletcher looked at Tanith and apologised for staring at her boobs but not in so many words. Tanith shrugged. "Sure. Come on, let's get breakfast together."

He shook his head and got into some clothes from the floor. "Are you going to bother telling me why you're here?"

Valkyrie put a hand on Crow's arm as she got out the bed, trying to soften his temper. "We're taking you into protective custody for a case we're doing. Fourteen Teleporters have been killed in two weeks, fifteen overall. You’re likely next, since you are a Teleporter and all. As a child in the eyes of the law, you'll be coming with us."

He looked at her dubiously. "You look younger than me."

"I am. I'm just turned fourteen. But don't let us fool you – Tanith's in her eighties."

Tanith snorted. "Thanks."

"It's not my fault," she smiled back. "What did Peregrine and Light tell you about sorcerers?"

He pulled a top over his head and wrestled his shackled hand into the sleeve. "Those Teleporter dudes? They were idiots. I'm not signing up to anything."

"But what did they tell you about our world?"

"Keep magic out of sight–"

"Failed," Crow said.

He took a deep calming breath. "And something about how to teleport further. I'm happy as I am."

Valkyrie shrugged. "Sure. We'll fill you in on the rest while we drive."

They did just that, Fletcher getting more confident as they drove, especially in his attempts to talk to Tanith and Valkyrie. They got to Panda's shop in good time and they all burst from the car to get away from the annoying boy.

"Hey, not so fast," he said, pushing between the sisters. They both sighed quietly. "Where are we?"

"My brother's place," Valkyrie said. "Tanith's boyfriends."

Tanith opened her mouth to deny it, noticed Fletcher looked disappointed and less interested in her and nodded quickly. "Yes, my boyfriends. He's very protective. He wouldn't want you talking to me. He's a soldier by the way. Practically a mercenary."

Fletcher looked even less interested in her knowing that, but more so in Valkyrie. They got into the shop and went to the back to find Ghastly sitting at a table with four sandwiches ready for them. They all sat down, and Fletcher gaped at Panda.

"Boyfriend!" Tanith said when she got in, sitting next to Panda. He looked at her with wide eyes but said nothing. "I was just telling Fletcher how many people you killed for annoying me."

He looked at Fletcher, then at Valkyrie. She nodded subtly to him. "Yes," he said suddenly, passing Tanith a cup of tea he'd made for himself. "I break their spine vertebrae by vertebrae."

Fletcher went a bit pale but did tuck into his sandwiches when the others did. Crow sat in the end chair and looked at the paper from the counter.

"Hey, why doesn't he get anything?" Fletcher asked suddenly, looking at Crow.

"I'm a skeleton," he said, not looking up.

He laughed after a quiet moment. "Yeah, good one. But really, why?"

Crow looked up slowly, put the paper down and took off the glasses, scarf and hat. Fletchers choked on air and screamed a little.

"Ghastly, he's annoying me," Tanith said to Panda. Panda raised an eyebrow at Fletcher who bit his tongue so hard he winced. Valkyrie giggled and finished her food.

"Come on," she said to Crow. "We need to find this Batu guy."

"Wait, what about me?" Fletcher asked, standing with them.

"He meant all of us, donk," Valkyrie said, walking ahead. It didn't work, Fletcher just went faster to catch up.

"Hey, wait," he said, coming up beside her. "How are you his apprentice or sidekick or what anyway?"

Valkyrie sighed. "I'm his partner. I was his apprentice until yesterday. I got promoted to a real job then. Now I'm co-head of department at the Sanctuary with Crow."

"Crow?"

"Skulduggery's code name. I knew the Dead Men, that group I said we lived with, when I was little and hadn't actually met them. They would bring me gifts and I sort of learnt about their personalities and things from them. I was a spoilt kid. I suppose I was a good detective too because I learnt a lot about them without seeing them."

"Why did you give them those names?"

"If I know you more than two weeks, I'll tell you."

He nodded. "Alright. Alright, but why does Ghastly live here when you said he lives at your house?"

"This is his shop. He's a tailor as well as a Dead Men, which is a group of soldiers that are still in the Sanctuary's employ, though only on commission, they're not Sanctuary people officially. Crow is both; if he acts as a Sanctuary official or Dead Man he has to say so people know. Other than the Elders and administrator, we're the highest paid people. We get a salary each even though not all of us work all the time or even for months at a time if there's no need. The idea is that if anything comes up we are the first call, first in. Most likely to get killed."

"Most likely to get killed?" Fletcher asked, looking at her more seriously than he had been before.

"When there's a big threat, such as the one killing all the Teleporters, the Dead Men are called. Me and Crow are already on the case as Detectives but there have been times all the Dead Men have been called on a Search and Destroy. I've been on two in as many years now and they're pretty intense."

"What's a Search and Destroy?" He asked.

"It's were we actively search for any and all people involved in the crime, attack, whatever it is, and destroy it all mostly with, you know, death. Basically, everyone on the opposite side dies. Until the leader is killed and then we reassess the situation to see if we need to keep going. If there’s still enemies killing innocents, we keep hunting. If it stops, we go back to normal and can look for them as regular detectives."

He looked at her sadly. It was strange to see him like that. He looked younger, not old and wise like Nadia, Tanith, the others did. "You've been made to kill someone?"

She shook her head as the others came over. "No. I've killed some people in self-defence. But I'd never be made to do anything. It’s not easy, but I don’t want to die. You know?"

He looked at her strangely and they got into Panda's van. Tanith, Valkyrie and Fletcher all sat in the back together. Valkyrie took a moment to send a text to Nadia, smiling at the little message she'd been left. She loved hearing from the girl more and more.

They were teasing each other more too, although neither had taken a step further and she didn't think either of them would yet. Nadia, especially, would just come out and say something if she wanted to, so Valkyrie wasn't concerned she was holding the girl back. Nadia would say something when she was good and ready. Valkyrie was happy, appreciative even, to wait.

"Do you have a boyfriend too?" He asked her. "You're smiling a lot."

She locked the phone and put it away. "I don't. And I'm not."

"Oh," he said, then continued the questioning, not stopping even when they were told Crow and Panda were going into Finbar's shop to talk to him. Tanith got out the back and abandoned her like a filthy traitor. Bitch.

"Tell me about you," Fletcher said suddenly, grinning.

Valkyrie glared at him. "I like hitting people. You?"

"The opposite," he said, running a hand over his spiky hair. He'd done it before leaving the room, taking almost ten minutes. Crow had been about to shoot him.

"Getting hit?"

"What? No. Never mind. I just wanted to know about you rather than your job is all," he sulked.

"Fletcher," she said with a sigh. "Maybe I'm over thinking or you're just a little too forward and I'm taking it the wrong way, but I'm not going to start liking, dating or enjoying you. Alright? Any of this maybe-flirting, interested in me business that might be going on needs to end right now before it's a thing."

He grinned. "You think it could be a thing?"

"Absolutely not," she scowled. "That's the point. Stop."

"You can't blame me for trying," he pointed out.

"I suppose not," she conceded. "But I'm not interested so please stop bothering me."

"Alright," he said. Valkyrie could tell he was going to try again. She considered telling him she had a girlfriend, that she was, probably, a lesbian, but then changed her mind, deciding that he needed to stop because she said no, but just because she wasn't available. It was the point of it and she felt weirdly strongly about it too. They sat in silence after that.

Crow, Tanith and Panda got in the car and recounted what happened at Finbar's some time later. "Finbar asks if you want a tattoo," Tanith told her.

"Yes!" She said, trying to get out the van. Tanith just laughed and stuck an arm out, pulling her in with so much ease it was embarrassing for Valkyrie to have tried so hard to fight her. She tumbled down next to her sister, sitting right next to her for the ride to wherever when Crow swore.

"What was that for?" Valkyrie asked curiously. He didn't swear often.

"Solomon Wreath," he said frostily into the phone he was talking into. He hung up a moment later and turned the car to somewhere else. "He has information for us."

"Who is he?"

"A Necromancer," Panda said grimly. "He stopped Skulduggery getting to Serpine in the war right after he came back as a skeleton. As you can tell, relationships haven't gotten better."

Tanith frowned. "I _think_ I've heard of him."

"What’s a Necromancer?" Fletcher asked. Valkyrie sighed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the Kudos strangers! :)


	30. Raven

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 30**

They pulled up at a dingy, burnt, falling apart house at the end of a street filled with graffiti. No one had yet graffitied the inside of this one despite being abandoned. Not brave enough apparently.

It was a large house, and only Valkyrie and Crow went in, leaving Panda and Tanith to mind Fletcher. They split up in the house, moving around to find the apparently illusive man. Valkyrie had gone to the large living room, looking around at the burnt sofa, wondering what had caused the fire when she felt someone behind her and turned.

A thin man stood there, gaunt almost, and pale from lack of sunlight. His hair was darker than hers, but his eyes were tiger brown, so bright they almost gleamed. He didn't seem to be a sad man, or malicious, or angry, or mean like she had expected a sick man that hid Serpine to be.

Instead, he looked put together in a black, finely tailored suit. He didn't seem like a warm man, not like her brothers. He seemed to lack companionship, she was sure. She'd seen it before, knew too many of the Dead Men's soldier friends. He carried a slender cane.

"Solomon Wreath," she said, certain it was him.

He bowed his head at her. "Valkyrie Cain. I've heard about you. You were involved in taking down Nefarian Serpine, Baron Vengeous, and Dusk. You stopped the Grotesquery from being reanimated. Such talent. Such potential. But has he corrupted you yet?"

"If you mean, turned me against you, he did tell me you hid Serpine, yes," she said immediately.

"That's not quite what I meant. They say Skulduggery Pleasant changes every person he meets, turns them darker, angrier, more cynical. Haven't you noticed?"

"I've noticed both of you are picking up only on the worst parts of each other," she said, rolling her eyes. "Don't worry, I take a positive hate-everyone-until-they-give-me-cake approach. You got cake?"

"I could get you cake," he said, smiling.

"You have none now though, so you remain the same," she smiled back. "Bring cake next time."

"I apologise. I should have chosen a more civilised spot for our first meeting. First impressions are important of course."

"Don't feel too bad, Valkyrie is my partner," Crow said from the doorway. "You can treat her like you'd treat me."

"That's a shame, I actually liked her. She had a sharp mind. Perhaps a little too smart," he smirked.

"What do you want Wreath?" Crow asked. "Our time is precious."

"All time is precious, but you'll what to hear what I have to say. Unless you'd rather I went to Remus Crux with this information. I've heard he's running all over town looking for anything to give to the Elders before you can. As one detective to another, Crux is a man who values a progress report over actual progress."

Valkyrie snorted and tucked her hands in her pockets, but Crow was unimpressed. "If you're hoping for us to bond over our hate of the man, you will be disappointed."

"That's not all we share. Our cases coincide. I've been running a case on the Diablerie for the past few years. They're looking for Teleporters. They're in Ireland."

Valkyrie bit her tongue to stop herself swearing and raving. She wanted to call Nadia, tell her to tell her parents and leave the country immediately. These people were bad news. Mr Bliss wouldn't even fight them despite being the strongest man in history, but any one of the Diablerie would try them on.

"Who?" Crow asked.

"Jason Gallow, Murder Rose and Gruesome Krav reunited two years ago somewhere in Africa. I have evidence they worked with Billy-Ray Sanguine, that he might have even joined the Diablerie officially once Vengeous was set free by him, perhaps as a reward, but both himself and Baron were killed by the Dead Men several months ago. Which, of course, you know. I believe them to be the ones killing the Teleporters."

"And Batu?" Crow asked. "What of him?"

"I suspect he doesn't exist," Solomon said. "Or else it's a code name. I've heard you've got one."

"Crow," Valkyrie supplied from the side. Crow gave her a look, but he was a skeleton, so Valkyrie couldn't be that offended even if she could see it was meant to be mean. "But while I agree it could be a code name, I do think he exists. Not many people stay under the radar for fifty plus years, and perhaps even know all the victims and the Diablerie, since he must be working with them – I don't think any one of the Diablery would be trusted by all the Teleporters and from what you said, none of them are quiet enough to sneak up and kill them all without a fight or someone teleporting away."

"So, either he doesn't exist and they've learnt new skills, or they have someone working for them doing the killing," Crow nodded.

"Or it's the same as before. Batu hired the Diablerie and did the killing himself. And stayed under the radar because it's a code name. Meaning that's why he's not on any criminal records," she said. "And even if he was, it's a code name so we wouldn't recognise it."

Crow and Solomon nodded in unison. They were scarily similar in characteristics now Valkyrie looked at them. And almost exactly the same height. "Do you know why they're killing Teleporters?" Crow asked Solomon.

He shook his head. "No. I've tracked where they've been but not been able to get close. I'm sure you understand an unwillingness to get close to _that_. I do believe that their mission hasn't changed from before, though, as they are working with a silent, single-minded determinism."

"Sounds like what we know then," Valkyrie pointed out. "They're looking to use a Teleporter to bring back the Faceless Ones. Don't ask how, we barely understand ourselves."

He frowned. "How many are left?"

"Two. Emmett Peregrine and one other we will not tell you of," Crow said before Valkyrie could. "Both are in protected custody."

Solomon thought for a moment, obviously ignoring Crow's warning. "They must be young," he said. "The other Teleporter. I didn't know there was another. They only need one for what you mentioned I suppose. Someone young and untrained, easily manipulated."

Valkyrie nodded. "Sounds about right."

"Valkyrie," Crow said sharply. She looked at the floor in annoyance.

"And they will want to kill Peregrine before taking the other because otherwise, Peregrine could undo whatever the new one does by their instruction. That would make sense," Solomon continued. He grinned suddenly. "Look at us three. Working as a team. A unit. Three detectives working in harmony."

Crow growled in anger. "I don't trust you, Wreath."

Solomon looked at him slowly with something Valkyrie couldn't – perhaps didn't want to – place. "I know. But you know why I did it. You all do. And I'm sorry. If it helps, I have found three others as well as myself who are willing to fight the Diablerie with you and the Dead Men. We don't want them in our country no matter what they are after. No matter the cost to ourselves."

Crow hit Solomon so hard and so fast Valkyrie didn't even see him punch; she just saw Solomon slamming against the wall. She turned to see him struggle to pull himself up. "You certainly hit as hard as you ever did," he groaned, wiping blood from his lip.

When Crow spoke it was even and without anger. "Solomon, it's good to have you aboard. Welcome to the team."

"A delight, sir, as always."

Crow said nothing, just turned and left the house. Valkyrie waited until he was gone and had slammed the car door closed before turning the Solomon and helping him up, walking carefully around his cane that was smoking shadows, looking for its owner.

“You can pick it up,” he told her, dusting himself off.

She grinned and grabbed it, feeling the power within. She immediately tried using it, drawing shadows towards herself. They wrapped around her arm and felt incredibly cold.

“Impressive,” Solomon commented, holding a hand out. “You have some natural talent.”

Valkyrie shrugged and gave it to him. "Maybe. You seem to know him well. I feel like a lot of this story has been left unsaid. Like _a lot_ , a lot."

He looked the cane over and she took his hand. He looked at her hand for a moment, obviously considering pushing her away, before nodding shortly. "Yes. We don't talk about it. Me and Skulduggery that is."

"You were friends?"

"Something like that. But I don't want to overstep my place. It was my fault things ended this way."

"Like supporting Serpine?"

He smiled sadly, and Valkyrie suddenly saw the handsome man behind the pale, gaunt face, the thin frame and taunting smile he'd been giving Crow. "Valkyrie Cain," he said slowly. "Skulduggery is over four hundred years old. I'm almost exactly the same age. We were born on the same day, in the same room, by the same midwife with just a year between us. We grew up together. But don't tell him I said that or he really will kill me."

"You can trust me," Valkyrie smiled up at him. "I might be young, but I'd never betray my friends."

"I'm your friend?" He raised an eyebrow.

"I give almost everyone code names, you know. You can be Raven," she said softly. "An omen of death, black, a counterpart to the Crow but a little bigger."

He chuckled and suddenly brought her in for a hug. Maybe Valkyrie was just used to older men hugging her, but she hugged him back anyway. He smelt of coffee, books and something musky. It was a nice smell, not something she expected.

"Thank you, Valkyrie. Skulduggery was my closest friend. He was everything for me. He supported me in learning Necromancy, helped me when I had nothing to eat, kept me company. It wasn't for many years that I accidentally pushed him away. I thought I was trying to protect him, pay him back for helping me our whole lives… I just hurt him. He's heard my reasons a thousand times. It was the same reasoning that made me hide Serpine. I wanted Skulduggery to make a decision concerning Serpine when he was less angry, was in control. Instead, I pushed him further away, maybe forever. I should have supported him, picked him up when he broke. Not held him back."

"It's done now," she said, looking up at him. They were still hugging. He was holding her tightly, like a man desperate for any type of comfort. She wondered when his last hug, any embrace, had been. "I'll see if I can make him think about what he's doing. It might be he needs someone to blame rather than actually hate you. He does that sometimes."

Solomon nodded. "There’s a good chance of that. I like to imagine he still likes me underneath it all, but it’s been two hundred and fifty years since Serpine. It’s easy to forget the positive in favour of the most prominent emotion. I hope I haven’t caused you problems by you staying to talk with me."

Valkyrie sighed and pulled away. "Don't worry, I can handle his idiocy."

He nodded and gave her his business card. His number, name and address was on it. "If you need to call, a place to go or need someone to be with, don't hesitate to call or come to my house."

"Thank you," she said, putting the card away. "I'll call you if anything happens."

He nodded. "Go. I'll wait for you."

Valkyrie went to leave, turned, hugged him quickly and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "See you again, Raven."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From chapter 30 onwards, we'll start going into our slower pace. I had the first two books be fairly fast-paced, but now we can start getting more details. Hope you're all enjoying :)
> 
> Love some comments if anyone as any!


	31. Crow is mad

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

* * *

**Chapter 31**

Valkyrie left the building where they met Wreath and felt a lot better than when she went it. Calmer. Wreath had that effect on her she supposed, not like Crow who made her either want to bounce around and start doing something or like she needed a nap. It was a nice difference.

Crow was sitting on the van, obviously angry and Panda was sitting looking at her with a frown. She supposed Crow hadn't wanted to talk about it. He looked concerned.

She opened the back door and got in. It was silent. Even Fletcher looked a bit worried over whatever was happening.

"Why are you so quiet?" She asked, trying to seem nonchalant, taking her seat.

No one answered but they started driving smoothly away from the house. They drove for almost two hours, taking what must have been country roads the whole way back to the mansion. Valkyrie closed her eyes to hide her sadness. It seemed Wreath was right. Skulduggery didn't seem as if he was going be holding his anger back.

Crow was out the van and inside before anyone could say anything. Panda sighed, got out and opened the back for them. He smiled tiredly at her but said nothing. Was he on Crow's side? Had she alienated herself? They were her family. She'd been gone for less than ten minutes alone with Wreath, surely this wasn't that big of a betrayal to them?

Fletcher got out after the sisters and looked up at the house. He admired it out loud, but Valkyrie didn't respond, just went to Tanith and took her hand. Tanith squeezed it and kept her close, supporting her even if Crow was angry and Panda was on the fence about it all. Fletcher caught up to them.

"Come on," she said before he could say anything stupid. "I'll show you your room."

The three of them went upstairs to the second floor, finding a room at the very back that would be away from both Peregrine and the Dead Men plus Tanith. It was for the best, perhaps, that they didn't annoy each other. It was why Crow and Panda still had their houses, and Dexter his Dublin apartment; it gave them a place to go away from other people. The other Dead Men could and did stay there on occasion too.

"I hope you like it," Valkyrie said quietly. There was a crash downstairs somewhere and Tanith kissed her cheek and went to see who had broken what. She waited for Tanith to go and sat at the desk. "It's been a confusing day I bet."

He chuckled and sat on the ottoman at the end of the bed. "Yeah, a little. It's nice to have a place to sleep without moving as soon as I wake up though."

"Yeah, the others like that too. Saracen, Erskine, Tanith, and Dexter that it. The others were settled but those guys hadn't really bothered. They still go away a lot, for weeks or months at a time sometimes. But they can always come back to their bed and their stuff, you know? It's nice. It's why my Uncle Gordon left me this place," she rattled on. "So, I wouldn't have to keep moving. With my parent's dead, Skulduggery got guardianship of me, and then adopted me so none of my other family could petition it and have me taken away. When he died I got the mansion and the others moved in so I could stay too. I wouldn't have cared but thinking about it, it's really good."

He nodded slowly. "When my Mum died last summer, I started moving around a lot. It's nice at first, I guess, having the freedom to just go anywhere without stuff. Then you start missing the security."

"Why not get a job and your own home?"

"I don't want to work," he shrugged. "I mean, not many people do, do they?"

"I love my work. I love my family and they always try and make everything fun. But if I had a boring job I don't think I'd want it."

"Is that how you got your job then? You were taken by Skulduggery and he made you his partner?" Fletcher asked, stretching his legs. He looked tired beneath the arrogance.

"Kind of. I wanted it since I was a kid. I knew about them for ages like I said, so I knew they were soldiers or secret service or something like that and wanted in. Luckily, this isn't the same sort of government as the mortal world and doesn't have the same type of laws, and I could do it. They're a part of the Sanctuary but like a separate unit, like permanently hired help if you get me. They were told off a lot for me at first but then I started taking down criminals and me and Crow got through loads of cases way faster than by himself and the Elders changed their tune. I've even done some solo cases, and they weren't small."

Fletcher laughed lowly. "Any chance of me getting any of that?"

She shrugged. "There are only two Teleporters in the world right now. I'll be honest, until you really train and learn more about your magic you're not much use in terms of doing things other people can't," she explained bluntly. "But if you learn to go anywhere, learn to transport lots of people or things, you'd be invaluable to the Sanctuary. You could get a good job, live anywhere in the world, maybe even do your own hours. If someone had something really big they want in their house, you just teleport it in and get paid loads of money for ten minutes work. Sounds good to me and lots of free time too."

He nodded, considering it. "I'm not sure if I like the sound of 'pack-mule' though."

She shrugged. "You can do something else, it's just an idea. Anyway, do you want dinner? We never got lunch."

He shrugged, and they went downstairs. No one was about, off doing their thing, but Valkyrie started up dinner for them all, making Fletcher help even if he did complain. He got to chop onions.

It took almost an hour and a half to make the two lasagnes of the proportions they needed. They had eight people that night, only Wolf was away, and Crow couldn't eat, the rest of them had made it back for an early but welcome dinner. They had made three massive dishes as well as four garlic breads and Valkyrie had gotten out the chocolate chip biscuit mix she and Bear had made a few weeks ago and froze, recently defrosted, and put it on a big sheet and made enough biscuits for them to all have two later. Fletcher looked like he was salivating badly.

The others set the table and they brought everything over to the dining table. Peregrine was sitting there also, glaring at Fletcher, but they otherwise ignored each other after Valkyrie smacked Fletcher's arm in warning.

"Is Crow coming?" Valkyrie asked, already knowing the answer.

"I don't think so," Tanith said darkly. She didn't look happy.

"What happened?" Valkyrie asked, taking her usual seat next to the woman. Fletcher took the other seat which was normally Wolf's.

She shook her head. "He's being overdramatic. Don't worry, he'll come around and apologise."

Valkyrie nodded and decided to ignore the subject, instead instructing they began eating and forcing her friends and glaring guest to thank Fletcher too for the meal, making him grin stupidly. It was very good food, Bear's recipe, but with more cheese thanks to Valkyrie having someone else to grate to her heart's content, and the biscuits were still warm.

"When I imagined dinner time with the Dead Men," Peregrine said when he had sat back with his cup of coffee, "I really didn't expect light conversation, happy faces and jokes."

"Neither did I," Tanith admitted. "Turns out, more than one can cook and the others wash up."

Valkyrie laughed. "Yeah, have fun with the kitchen by the way."

They rolled their eyes with grace, Snake, Weasel and Tanith deciding to go clean up the place. She was pretty sure she heard someone start praising their Lord and Saviour for the invention of dishwashers before they were out of earshot.

Peregrine sighed. "Renn," he said.

"Hi," he said. "Where's your friend?"

"Dead."

Fletcher deflated a little. "Oh. Sorry?"

Peregrine shook his head and Valkyrie wanted to hit him. Hard. "I think I'm going to call Nadia."

The others nodded, and they split off, Fletcher following Valkyrie like a lost puppy. She got to the top of the stairs and turned on him. "If you follow me any further you'll be in my bedroom. _Don't_ think they won't kill you for being there. Circumstances don't matter."

Fletcher nodded, looking a little put out.

"Just don't leave, yeah? It's so you'll live to do something more than teleport from place to place without ever doing anything, alright? The people after you are the sickest, darkest people you can imagine. You'll be safe here. There's a room at the top of the stairs, with an arch door, it has games and a telly. You can do whatever in there."

She turned and left him to decide what to do, going to her room to talk to her girlfriend, something she had barely done that day. She called for a long while, almost went to voicemail, and then she picked up.

"Valkyrie," Nadia said softly.

"Nadia. God, I've missed you today," Valkyrie admitted, the things of the last two days pushing down on her with the sound of Nadia's voice. "What do you think is the chance of you and your family leaving the country tonight?"

"What do you mean?" She asked. "Is something happening?"

"Yeah. You know of the Diablerie?"

She didn't, so Valkyrie explained who they were, what was happening, about the sea hag and the corpse and teleporters. Nadia let out a few deep breaths down the other side but then seemed to come to her decision. "I'm not leaving. If you get hurt, send me a message and I'll visit you. You have to finish this and not die, baby. I need you. I love you."

Valkyrie sighed and tried to not fight the issue. It had to be Nadia's choice. They had argued, without anger surprisingly, about Nadia leaving at Valkyrie's say so before and every time Valkyrie had backed down at Nadia's strong-willed confidence that she had to trust Valkyrie to sort it and that she was safe to support her from school and home. There was no sense really fighting when she would give in anyway. "I love you too. God, I hope they don't come to you. I'll get you back if they do, don't worry."

"I bet they just want to deal with their mission, not mess around with me," Nadia said confidently. "Don't you worry. Now tell me more about this young man in your house."

Valkyrie snorted. "More like boy. He's alright I guess. A little arrogant, definitely annoying and puts his foot in it and stomps around in all the wrong places at the wrong times. But he's not too bad if you get him alone I suppose."

"So, you got him alone, did you?" Nadia teased.

"Yes, I was in his bedroom alone and everything. When we went to collect him, me and Tanith got in bed with him too."

She laughed. "I bet he freaked out. Or got a boner. Or both."

Valkyrie shook her head. "I really hope not. Like, me and Tanith are pretty hot, but no thank you. I think he was more freaked out by Crow. Oh, I made Crow mad too."

She explained the situation and her fear of having really upset the man to her girlfriend.

"Don't worry," she said comfortingly. "He'll come around. He's like my mum, he'll stuff it all up until he explodes, run off, think about it and come back begging for forgiveness. It might take a few days, but he'll sort through it."

Valkyrie nodded, and they spoke about Nadia's school, her friend that may or may not be pregnant by her much older boyfriend because apparently some teens couldn't keep it together long enough to fight the stigma being forced on the youth of today, and a few more little things for the best part of three hours before she finally said goodbye and got herself ready for bed.


	32. The punishment

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon - Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 32**

Unable to sleep, she tidied up her room, going so far as to pick up things from under her bed which was mostly old clothes she put in the bin since she knew they would never fit again, and sorted out her wardrobe after sitting in bed for an hour bored as hell. It took an hour in itself to tidy it up.

Still tired, Valkyrie sorted through her newly filled hamper of clothes that had sat on the floor for perhaps months and made a dark pile and hauled it downstairs. At least she wasn't going to be sleeping with partly damp hair now. She hadn’t quite mastered drying her hair yet. Soon though.

The laundry went in the washing machine and she went to the kitchen for some warm milk.

Weasel and Bear were sitting at the kitchen table nursing cups of coffee. They'd been placed on watch apparently. From the blink of the security system in the hallway, the alarms were all activated too. Preparation for an attack from the Diablerie. Taking a deep breath, Valkyrie felt almost relieved. At least they wouldn't be taking on Nadia or anyone else as leverage if they were attacking her house. Even if the idea of them made her extremely nervous.

"What are you doing awake?" Bear asked her, looking up at her from his hunched position on the table. He looked knackered.

She shrugged. "Can't sleep. Figured I'd make myself useful."

Weasel snored and put his chin on his fists, leaning over the table to watch her get the milk carton out. "Since when did you like making yourself useful?"

She didn't answer that, her tiredness making the statement feel more like an insult than a tease and she didn't particularly feel like overreacting. She had made enough people hate her for one day. She could get Weasel back in a week or two.

She took a sip of her milk, considered, and put it in the microwave. When it was warm, she sat at the table with Bear and Weasel.

"So," Bear said, putting an arm over her chair and squeezing her shoulder. She smiled and leaned into him. "What happened with Crow?"

She sighed and explained, in few and censored words, his protectiveness over her when they got Fletcher and then the dramatic visit to Finbar's where he had seen his friend possessed by the Faceless, and then their meeting with Solomon Wreath.

They nodded and took her seriously when she explained that she saw genuine sorrow in Solomon and didn't get angry when she explained she hugged a random man Crow hated, or that he said she could call him any time. Instead, they treated her as a young woman whose opinion they valued and trusted. She was often right in these situations. While her social skills sometimes lacked due to her hot-headedness, she was always reliable when she said if someone was guilty or innocent, remorseful or merciless.

Solomon, she said, was guilty of what he did but did it for innocent reasons, making him a twisted good guy, someone who had realised his twistedness and was trying to fix it. They believed her and didn't question it. Perhaps they had already known.

The three of them sat silently for a moment, thinking of Solomon's actions and Crow's anger, not just at her but also at Solomon, though Valkyrie knew she didn't know the whole story. She couldn't be certain if Bear or Weasel did either.

"Problem is, Skul is secretive," Weasel said finally. "I know he had a long history with Wreath, he told us before it went sour, but it went bad before anything with Serpine went up. A few years before he had even met his wife, when they were eighty or something. I don't think it's a lover's feud."

Bear snored and rubbed his eyes. "I wish it was."

Valkyrie frowned. "What do you mean?"

"If it was as simple as a long, messed up fight between lovers, we could help Skulduggery move on, get someone new in his life," Weasel explained. "He's been alone since his wife died, and while I heard he was almost as bad as me and Dexter in his youth, that only lasted till he was maybe fifty and then he just went cold for whatever reason. I'm sure he dated someone, I'm not judging, but as far as we know, he stopped, met his wife, his wife died and other than a few little flings and a handful of dates, it's been nothing."

Valkyrie looked down. "Isn't he lonely?" He had a lot of family, and she was sure he loved his family, but it's not as if he could hug and kiss Bear or Panda if he had a bad day.

She almost wished he did though because that _would_ be funny to see.

“I doubt it,” Bear said after a moment, surprising her. “People can live very happy and fulfilling lives without romantic love, Valkyrie. Not everybody needs that. If Skulduggery wished to date, he would. I think it’s more likely he either likes someone who can never like him back, or he is actively going out of his way to avoid romantically liking anyone. So he can focus on everything else in his life.”

The silence lasted for a long while, letting Valkyrie listen to the sound of the washing machine churn, lulling her eyelids lower. "Does he hate me?" She asked quietly.

"Of course not," Bear said immediately. "You're his pride and joy."

"He hasn't looked at me since he left the meeting with Solomon."

"He's just angry. Not with you," Weasel said, but Valkyrie didn't hear much certainty in his voice. "Give him time."

She sighed and sat up, finishing her drink. "Anything I can do to fix it?"

They looked at each other and turned back to her. "Just wait."

She scoffed. "That's rubbish."

Weasel shrugged. "It's what we do when he's mad."

"Men," she sighed, getting up and opening the dishwasher. It was just finished cleaning, so she sighed again and unloaded it, then filled it with the few dirty things they had left, wiped over the counters, and refilled her brothers cups with coffee before kissing them both on the cheek and getting her things out of the washing machine. She sorted what she could into the dryer, turned it on and hung the rest up on the rack.

Finally feeling tired enough to sleep, she went up to bed.

**.*****.**

Morning came early to Valkyrie, indicating immediately her stress over the situation with Crow. She sighed and got herself ready regardless, hoping the night had brought rationalisation to her guardian and they could be friends again.

She got her breakfast before the others were out of bed and made some pancake batter for their guests seeing as she had nothing else to do. When she was done she flopped down in front of the television.

After a show and a bit of Judge Judy, Fletcher popped into the room dressed and hair pushed right up to stand on end. He grinned at her. She waved at him.

"What are you doing up so early?" He asked.

She shrugged. "Headache. You?"

"I'm in another person's house, I don't think I could sleep in if I tried," he explained. "Anything for breakfast?"

She pulled herself up just as Peregrine popped into the room too, making both Fletcher and herself jump, and she instructed them both to set the table for the morning, complete with paper at the head for Crow, and made them pancakes. By the time she had made theirs, the other Dead Men and Tanith were trailing downstairs for food.

Dexter took over the efforts halfway, letting Valkyrie gratefully escape to brush her teeth. She texted Nadia, which helped take some of it off her mind.

Leaving the bathroom she and Tanith shared, Crow was waiting with his arms crossed for her in the hall.

"Hi," she said, shoulders slumping and feeling a little sick. He still looked upset.

"Good morning. Thank you for making breakfast," he said formally.

Her heart almost jumped up her throat. Alongside her breakfast. "It's fine."

He nodded once and indicated she go into her room. She did, and he followed behind. She sat at the desk chair, grateful for her lack of sleep now because she thought he might have been glad the room was tidy – he didn't like messy things and anything making him more antsy when he was about to start telling her off was a bad thing. Points to her.

He stood looking out the window for a long moment and Valkyrie watched him quietly. He sighed suddenly and got a small key out his pocket. Slowly trailing over the wall, he locked the large window in her wardrobe, the two floor to ceiling windows in her room and the large balcony doors. He pocketed the key and turned to her. Her phone buzzed in her pocket.

"Please give me your phone," he said quietly, coming closer and holding out his hand.

"What?" She asked quietly.

"Valkyrie, please give me your phone."

Valkyrie felt tears rush to her eyes and shook her head. "No, you can't take my phone. It's not even safe, you always tell me to have my phone. How–"

"Give me the phone, now, or I'll take it from you by force."

Valkyrie ground her teeth and gave him the phone, slapping it harshly into his hand. He put it in his pocket without further comment. Reaching behind her, he took her keys to the house, the emergency keys to the cars, and, with no hesitation whatsoever, turned the plug off on her computer, removed the monitor, and took both that and her very old and battered laptop away.

She sat there, waiting, and felt herself get sicker. She hunched over in the chair. There was no way this was fair.

He came back and crossed his arms again. "Valkyrie, I am grounding you for twelve weeks, a week per minute you were in that house with Solomon Wreath alone. You will not have any electronic privileges in that time, will not leave the property grounds and will begin to catch up on the school work you haven't been doing during that time. You will not be able to see any friends, cannot ask the others to let you see them or allow friends over, cannot go on any cases, and if you break any one of those rules I will remove more privileges. Do you understand?"

She didn't look up from glaring at the floor. She said nothing, breathing deeply to stop herself raging.

"Valkyrie, don't think I won't put your nose in the corner." He said in a lower voice. "You are my responsibility and what you did was irresponsible and dangerous. You know not to stay with criminals and people we cannot trust."

"Then why did you leave?" She growled out.

"Because you were meant to follow me, as you know. That's why you are still my apprentice, regardless of what the Sanctuary or Elders say. You have a mountain of things to learn still. Obviously, listening to instruction and keeping yourself safe is a part of that. As such, I cannot trust you–"

"What?!"

"–and you are being grounded. We will review the situation in twelve weeks."

She pressed her nails into her palm, feeling the anger taking over. She grit her teeth. "Fine."

He might have nodded or flipped her off, but she refused to look at him for even a moment and he left the room. He closed it softly behind him.


	33. Tanith's on the case!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 33**

**_Tanith's POV_ **

Tanith, Skulduggery, Anton, Ghastly, Saracen and Erskine pulled up in the van at Aranmore Farm, the place Finbar had indicated having the weakness in the dimension or whatever it was – Tanith hadn't really understood, didn't want to and didn't care. What she knew was the sickos that were the Diablerie wanted to use a kid to open the world up to the Faceless One's which would end in everyone dying. So, she wanted to catch and imprison the Diablerie and this Batu guy once and for all.

Hopefully as easy as it was said.

She sighed, looking at the spot Valkyrie usually sat in. She was at home with a headache. Skulduggery hadn't spoken about her at all, not even spoken when Tanith had asked him why she wasn't coming, so Tanith had simply _assumed_ it was from the headache she had complained of earlier.

Saracen had said she couldn't sleep last night and Fletcher had told her, from a distance since she had been sitting with Ghastly at the time, that she had woken early and told him also that she had a headache. Hopefully, she would get some sleep even if she did miss out on all this.

Though it definitely wasn't like her to not just take a numbing leaf and come along.

They pulled up at the farm but only she and Skulduggery got out, posing as a couple of some strange combination, and went to the small farm cottage some way down the dirt path. It was a pretty cottage to be fair. Something she'd have enjoyed in another life.

Tanith knocked on the door, but no answer came. Carefully, she jumped over a dying bush and looked in the window. "Doesn't look like anyone's in."

Skulduggery looked around and shook his head. "This is a farm, he's likely working. We'll wait for him to turn up."

"Do you know him?" Tanith asked.

He shook his head. "I don't have a number to call ahead. I just figured we'd turn up. By the looks of it, this is a single man, with no kids, in his seventies or later sixties. No wife. He probably lives and always lived completely alone."

"That sounds sad," Tanith remarked, looking at Skulduggery. He glanced at her and looked away just as a man of that description came around the side of the house.

"Well, what's this?" The old man said. "Are you trespassing my property? I have signs saying no cold callers so if you're selling something, don't bother."

Skulduggery shook his head and took his hat off. "No, we're not trying to sell anything. Actually, we're investigators. We're looking into a series of murders that have been happening in the area and hoped to talk with yourself. My name is Skulduggery Pleasant and this is my associate, Tanith Low."

He grunted and stabbed his spade in the dirt. "Patrick Hanratty. Did they give you a prize for your stupid names?"

"Mr Hanratty–"

"Paddy."

"Paddy–"

"No, actually call me Mr Hanratty."

Tanith saw Skulduggery's temper rising and took over. "Look, we would like to ask you a few questions. Have you seen anything suspicious in the area recently?"

"Suspicious how?" He asked, leaning on the spade.

"People or things acting weird around your property," she said.

"Other than you two? No."

She sighed internally and decided it was a lost cause. She couldn't deal with him. "Alright, Mr Hanratty. Here's our number," she gave him a note with Skulduggery's number, "and if you see anyone trespassing on your property or strange things happening, please give us a ring."

"Sure thing lady," he said, putting it in his breast pocket.

They left quickly and drove away it was after a few minutes driving that Skulduggery spoke from the driver's seat. "Did you get a picture of him?"

"Yes," Ghastly said, holding his phone up. "It should be enough."

They got back to the mansion in good shape and the mansion was also standing, a feat Tanith was sometimes overpowered with thanks for. It was, truly, good to have a permanent home, even if she was technically not a permanent member. She knew Valkyrie considered her a sister, and she considered Valkyrie her sister, but realistically she couldn't be sure she'd be here forever. Life didn't always work that way after all, and a part of her missed the uncertainty, the travel. Despite those feelings, she loved this place and likely always would.

By Christmas her visa should be processed as well, and she wouldn't have to leave again if she wanted.

She needed to see Valkyrie, but seeing her curtains closed from where she was standing, Tanith decided to leave her for now and followed the others to see Peregrine and Fletcher in the large living room, all furniture gone, and working on Fletcher's teleporting.

"You two are getting on better then," she said, grinning at them. Fletcher blushed and looked away, but Peregrine grinned at her, leaning against the sofa. He looked a lot better than yesterday, had even shaved.

"Fletcher and I have spoken and have agreed that I should begin to teach him the basics," he explained. "How are you Miss Low, I didn't see you this morning?"

She smiled at him. "I'm well, thank you. You're looking a lot better. Could we quickly ask you a few questions about the case?"

He nodded and teleported to her side, putting a hand on her elbow somewhat flirtatiously. "Lead the way."

She smirked and led him to the downstairs meeting room. The others were already sitting, and a large picture of Patrick Hanratty had been projected onto the wall from Ghastly's phone.

"Is this the Paddy you mentioned yesterday?" Skulduggery asked as soon as they closed the door.

"Yes," he said, removing his hand and acting seriously. It wasn't as good a look as happy on him. "How on earth did you find him?"

"He lives at the same location as the weak point to allow the Faceless in is. It seems he's been preparing," Ghastly said, inspecting the picture. "I need a better camera."

"It's a good enough photo," Skulduggery reassured him. It was a little fuzzy. "It would make a lot of sense for him, a mortal, to have committed these murders. He's old enough to have committed the Kessel murder too."

"Wait, you think he's Batu?" Tanith asked, frowning at the picture too. "But he's just a cute old man."

Some of the Dead Men snorted, obviously being far, far older than Paddy, or Batu, or whoever he was. _She_ was older than him. Skulduggery spoke. "Yes, I do. He is not only known by all the victims, as far as we know, he also fits the age description, he tried to redirect the conversation and was unhelpful when we saw him, and the fact he is a mortal coincides with the murder scenes. I believe he's working with the Diablerie."

They all nodded. Peregrine looked shaken. "I can't believe it's him."

"I'm sorry. He was a friend of yours," Tanith said after an awkward moment.

"I had dinner with him last summer. We all did. It was nice," he said. He looked out the window, swore and teleported away.

"I really hope he's not seeing Batu-Paddy," Tanith muttered.

Skulduggery started at her. "He knows the risks."

She nodded once, sharply, and waited for the meeting to finish, suddenly really wanting to see Valkyrie.

"I'll inform the Sanctuary, and, in a few hours, we will stage an attack to capture Batu and the Diablerie. Hopefully they'll be in the same place but if not, we may have to act fast to catch them."

They split up to prepare and Tanith went straight up to Valkyrie.

She loved the girls' room, was even a little jealous of all the cool things she had been given over the years. It was what her little sister deserved though. She had had enough hardship. And having a lovely young woman like Nadia to support her was the cherry on top for Tanith. Someone like Valkyrie needed a girl to calm her down and help her through hard cases and traumatic incidents, and the fact she was funny, sweet and good looking was probably nice for Valkyrie too.

She just hoped the older girl didn't push Valkyrie into something too soon or she'd have to kill her. Anything else and she wouldn't have killed at all but… Valkyrie still had baby fat on her cheeks! It was hard not to get at least a little protective.

If it was Valkyrie's idea, then she honestly couldn't care less and was even a little excited for the gossip of it all.

As it was, she had expected Valkyrie to be sleeping, on her phone, or lying in bed bored. Instead, when she knocked, got no response and peeked in to see her sister lying in an uncomfortable position in the dark, she was left confused.

"Val? What are you doing?" Valkyrie was on her bed with her arms around her head. She didn't make a sound but surely couldn't be sleeping like that? "Val?"

"Tanith?" She said in a hoarse voice. "What happened?"

"We just saw the farm, its owned by the Teleporters mortal friend Paddy who is actually Batu. I thought you were ill. Why aren't you asleep?"

"I'm not ill. Or I wasn't. I'm just grounded. _Skulduggery_ grounded me until December."

Tanith didn't like the anger she said his name with. "Why did he do that?"

"A week for every minute I spent alone with Solomon. The fact he walked out and didn't tell me to follow means nothing. Apparently I'm so well trained I should just follow him out blindly. He said he can't trust me."

Tanith sighed and held Valkyrie tightly. "Talk to Nadia and I'll talk to Skulduggery and try to sort thing out, alright?"

"I can't," she said, glaring at her hands. She flipped her pillow over suddenly, but Tanith still saw a few tear marks on it. "He took away my 'electronic privileges'. He's forgotten he's _not_ my father apparently. Said if I broke any of his rules he'd do worse."

"What?" Tanith said, frowning. "You have him wrapped around your finger, this doesn't sound like him at all."

"I don't want to see him at the moment," Valkyrie said, pouting. Tanith could understand - she had hated being punished as a kid and this was not exactly a well thought out punishment on Skulduggery's behalf.

"I'll go speak to him," Tanith reassured her.

"Don't bother," she said hatefully. Tanith knew it was directed at herself, not Tanith. "Let him do it. See how far it gets him."

Tanith didn't do anything, just looked at the girl, and pulled out her phone. Finding Nadia's number, she called it and Nadia picked up after a moment. "Hello? Who is this please?"

"It's Tanith."

"I haven't been able to get through to Valkyrie," she said immediately. "Is she alright? I know about the Diablerie, I was so worried."

"She's fine, Skulduggery overreacted and took her phone away. Here," she said, passing the phone to Valkyrie.

She grabbed it and held it to her face. "Hello?" She said timidly. Nadia said something, and a look of relieved sorrow passed over her sister's face. "Nadia, I'm so sorry."

Tanith stood with a sigh and left the room, so they could talk, pausing only to tell Valkyrie they were going to arrest Batu and she loved her.

She had to focus on the mission right now, then smack some sense into Skulduggery. She was certain the rest of the Dead Men would be on her side.


	34. The Diablerie

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 34**

Valkyrie spoke for hours with Nadia on Tanith's phone, all through the time her friends were going to arrest Batu and the Diablerie. Finally, Nadia's parents requested she join them for dinner and Valkyrie realised how hungry she was, so they let each other go with an 'I love you' and overly cutesy air kisses because they were quickly descending into _that_ type of couple. Valkyrie went in search of food.

She made herself some pizza, putting on a large one since she was pretty sure she had to feed Peregrine and Fletcher too. They were still practising and getting along a lot better. She hoped they stayed that way. It made her life easier.

Smelling the food, they both teleported into the kitchen, almost giving her a heart attack.

She was silent but they talked about small things, commenting on how many hours the Dead Men had been gone and when Wolf would be back from his own trip in the Arctic. Looking at the clock, Valkyrie was sort of concerned herself but without a phone to call on, or rather, when she wasn't meant to have a phone to call on, she didn't have any way of contacting them.

A small part of her, the nasty, bitchy part, really hoped something bad had happened and Crow was wishing desperately he could contact her. It was his fault after all. She mentally smacked herself after as it would be the rest of her family that suffered, but it didn't take away the hope of him regretting his actions. She placated her conscience with the fact she was fourteen, she was allowed to be mean and bitchy for at least a few more months. That’s what everyone said about fourteen year olds anyway.

Sighing, she sat back in her chair and rubbed her eyes.

"You look tired," Peregrine said after a moment. Both of them were looking at her. "I assume Pleasant is still mad about whatever happened yesterday?"

"Yeah," she said after a moment. "He's overstepping the line. _Grounded_ me. He said he can't trust me because I spoke to someone he doesn't like."

Peregrine laughed grimly. "I never liked Pleasant. Always thought he was too hot-headed, too vindictive, too quick to judge and always too certain he's right. I had hoped he wouldn't do that to you when I heard he got himself a kid to raise. Too much power for a man like him."

"He's never done it before," she suddenly defended. "He's usually great. I think he's mad at the person I talked to and was afraid they would hurt me. But his fear and anger got mixed up and he’s overreacting to teach me a lesson. Doesn't make me less mad but I think that's where his head is. Idiot."

Peregrine didn't look convinced, but Fletcher nodded agreeably.

There was a buzz from the alarm and Valkyrie let out a sigh – they were back. The door was closed, and the alarm shut off. Standing, Valkyrie put her plate in the sink and went to greet her friends, intending to ignore Crow.

But it wasn't the Dead Men standing in her hall.

She threw herself back into the kitchen before they saw her, knowing immediately it was Rose, Gallow and Krav. The two males sat up and looked at her with alarm.

"It's them," she whispered. "You need to leave."

Peregrine didn't need telling twice and attempted to leave only to give a strangled cry they surely heard and shook his head. "They put up a ward. I can't teleport out."

Valkyrie sucked in a breath and knew what to do. Gesturing, she got them to follow her and they did, quietly walking around the kitchen and out to a hall, moving on to the side where the garage was. She quietly shut the door behind them, noticing they hadn't been followed, and if they had, it was very well.

Almost shivering with fear, she pulled the spare key off the door frame and opened up the side door.

"Drive?" Fletcher whispered stupidly, looking at the many cars, quad bikes and Tanith's motorcycle stored in the garage. It was useless though because not only had Crow taken away her phone to contact him, he had also taken away their escape.

Idiot. She was going to take away his jaw when he got back. Take away his talking privileges.

They left the room and Valkyrie shut that door too and then carefully moved around the house, going over to the front of the building. Carefully and quietly, she looked around the house. Hollow men were standing there, surrounding two cars. Fletcher couldn't fight, and the thin arms of Peregrine showed he barely could either. She couldn't take them all on. She needed to get them into the woods.

Looking around, she made her decision. She pulled the two in to tell them the plan.

"When I say, you two need to make a run for it. Get into the trees. Keep running until you can teleport away, far away. Stick together and go to another country. If anyone is still alive, they'll find you. Okay?"

Peregrine didn't look happy with that plan, but Fletcher was ready to bolt. "I can't leave a little kid–"

"Shut the fuck up and get ready to move. Get Fletcher to another country and keep him safe, it's him they want. Listen - do that and then come back and find Skulduggery and punch him and tell him he got me murdered and it’s all his fault. Okay?"

He looked less happy than before, but Valkyrie turned away from him and looked out on the front again. She wished she had taken Tanith's phone down with her now. Idiot. Idiot. _Idiot_.

Taking a deep breath, Valkyrie stood and pulled opened the office window that was ajar. Getting inside, she heard immediately footsteps walking around outside and very, very quietly, went over to the cabinet. She quickly got it open and grabbed the large gun within, pocketing the magazines. Popping one in, she aimed the gun at the door. She waited, one, two, three, four steps and then a pause… the door opened and Krav stepped in.

Valkyrie opened fire, killing him instantly with at least twenty bullets all over.

The noise got the other two murders shouting and they could be heard running so Valkyrie jumped back out the window. "Run!" She said. "Send the Sanctuary!"

They were both pale and started running for the trees just as Murder Rose came through office door, looking at Valkyrie outside the window. She screamed at her and Valkyrie ran for the hollow men outside her front door, making them all turn and look at her.

Valkyrie shot at them, watching as several fell with each bullet, one going through the window of a car. She tripped and rolled to her feet, miraculously dodging the energy Rose had vomited at her.

Turning, Valkyrie shot blindly at her, missing several times but getting the window which set off the house alarm with red lights and a painful screech.

Rose stalked closer to her. "You little bitch," she said, reaching for a knife just under her breast. "I'll rip your eyes out and shove them through your ears."

"Is that even possible?" Valkyrie frowned at her. Rose rolled her eyes, dropping her guard at Valkyrie's stupid question, forgetting with the sight of Valkyrie's somewhat childish face and question that she had just killed her friend. Valkyrie opened fire on her, getting her in the leg but she was too bad a shot to do anything else and Rose got away. Gallow came out of the front door then and Valkyrie shot at him, and he jumped back into the house.

Reloading the gun before Rose got back up, she shot down a few more hollow men that had been about to get her.

"Fuck," she said. Fletcher and Peregrine probably wouldn't out of the warding yet, let alone calling for help, getting her back up. "Fuck."

Rose jumped on top of the car and threw a knife at her then, and it struck her chest, grazing her hand. She screamed in freight, the coat stopping the killing blow but not saving her hand from bleeding profusely.

Backing up quickly at the sight of Rose's manic smile, Valkyrie raised the gun and shot at her but she had started to shake and every bullet hit something other than Rose, taking out the wing mirror, windows, hollow men, she was sure she had even heard Gallow cry out but never once did Rose stop walking towards her or look any less confident.

The gun suddenly stopped spitting bullets and Valkyrie knew the magazine had run out. Almost panicking, she turned tail and ran, throwing herself through the broken house window and kept running without stopping. She ran through the house with Rose on her heels, quickly formed a ball of purple energy and threw it behind her, hitting Rose but only enough to make her fall and pull herself up immediately, nothing more.

It gave Valkyrie the precious seconds to change magazines and burst through the once locked, now broken, back door.

She felt Rose's hand brush over her shoulder and put on a burst of speed, but it was nothing to the laughing Rose and she suddenly grabbed her shoulder. Valkyrie jolted but gritted her teeth and slammed the butt of the gun into Rose's face two times and got herself free. She kicked the woman down and went to shoot her, only to be confronted with Gallow punching her in the face.

She went flying back, already knowing her nose was broken before she hit the ground, but thanks to her intense training, she was ready and bounced back to her feet. She needed to give Fletcher and Peregrine enough time to escape. She doubted they had been gone even five minutes, and they were probably awful runners. They would need at least fifteen minutes she guessed, maybe twenty considering they were so out of shape. It was hopeless.

Swallowing back bile, she raised the gun again and shot at Gallow, only to miss and get Rose in the knee. She screamed in agony and Gallow began to cackle. He got a gun out of the back of his trousers and pointed it at Valkyrie.

They both stood still, pointing a gun at each other. She could have cried.

"Drop the gun, sweetheart," he said, aiming unwaveringly at her head. She didn't know where she was pointing. "We just want the boy teleporter. You can go free."

"He's not here," she shouted without meaning to. "He left this morning. Teleported away. I don't know were. The man, Emmett Peregrine, he's searching for him now."

"I think you're being a liar. Are you telling a fib, little girly? Perhaps you need some incentive to give them over. Maybe I should get your little girlfriend over here–"

Valkyrie roared and let the gun loose, thankfully shooting Gallow in the head before he could shoot at her more than once. The bullet was deflected by her clothes - it hit her collarbone and it surely broke but she was alive by a miracle - and he fell to the floor spasming.

Rose was sitting up by them, staring at her with wide, insane eyes. "I'll kill you," she said, hopping backwards. The hollow men were standing around, stilled by her hand command to wait. "I'll kill you, your girlfriend and all your family."

Valkyrie waited and opened fire one bullet at a time at the hollow men, carefully shooting down row after row, and they suddenly leaned forwards and ran for her. She was so shocked and scared from the other attacks and her collarbone she didn't move, just kept shooting them down – it went against her training, she knew she should move, but she was glued in place.

By the time she had finally shot down the last one, Rose was gone and she was one shot away from genuinely peeing herself in fear. Her knees were shaking so much her legs were bowing together.

She took a few seconds to breathe with her eyes shut and forced herself to stand straight. She ran clumsily to the front of the house, almost choking on the toxic air, and watched as one of the two cars Valkyrie had somehow not shot the life out of drove out the grounds. Valkyrie cursed and ran into the house, getting the house phone from the living room, the place she couldn't get before that. Quickly, she dialled the Sanctuary.

The Administrator answered.

"Irish Sanctuary, state your business," he said.

"It's Valkyrie Cain," she said quickly. "I was just attacked by the Diablerie. You need to send people quickly, I'm alone."

"Miss Cain!" He said in alarm. "Are you alright? Are they still there?"

"No, Murder Rose got away, but I shot her in the leg. Krav is dead in the house and Gallow outside. I shot on sight as per requirement," she said too loudly, too panicked. "I'm alone."

"I'll send someone right away, and a clean-up crew. Can you get a hold of the Dead Men?"

"I'll try. Just be quick, I need to find the Teleporters, I told them to run but now they might end up crossing paths with Rose."

She hung up and threw the phone on the sofa, taking the razor she had once stolen from the dead Texan Sanguine and running out the house. She had to be quick.

She grabbed one of the quads, remembering now she wasn't panicking so much that there was a key for it on the shelf. Using the wind, she manipulated it into her hand and got it going. A moment later she was out on the road and diving in the direction Rose and the Teleporters had gone. Hopefully they weren't in the same place right now.


	35. One girl stand

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 35**

Valkyrie rode the quad bike down the quiet road at dangerous speeds, taking sharp turns to avoid potholes and finally seeing Rose's car in the distance. Rose turned right and left the area suddenly, probably to get away from her, and Valkyrie slowed the bike down. She needed to find Fletcher and Peregrine.

With her Elemental magic, it didn't take long. She located them just before they crossed the property line and got out of what she assumed must be the anti-teleportation radius. After a moment to go over what had happened, Peregrine grabbed them all on the side of the road and teleported them to the Sanctuary.

She almost threw up upon arrival.

Taking deep, heaving breaths, she forced herself back upright and looked around. The Administrator was watching her with exasperation and when she nodded she was alright, he came over.

"Detective Cain, I thought you were at your house?" He asked.

"I was. You need to take these two men into protective custody," she demanded, taking Fletcher by the elbow. "Could we put them in Utility Room C?"

The Administrator nodded and some of the Cleavers came forward and took the Teleporters away to the protected custody room. Meritorious came around the corner and frowned at her.

"Detective Cain, what are you doing alone?" He asked.

"The Dead Men left me alone, grounded and without a phone because I spoke with Solomon Wreath when Skulduggery took me to meet and _speak_ with him. They all left me with no way to leave the house, taking my keys to the house and cars as well as, again, my phone, to meet and take down Batu, or Patrick Hanratty, and the Diablerie which they hoped and assumed to be in the same place. I do not know what happened to them. I don't even know if they are alive. They've been gone for at least six hours without checking in with me now," she explained before rubbing her forehead. "Has a team been sent to my house?"

"Yes," the Administrator nodded. "And a clean-up crew."

She nodded. "That's good. That's grand. Good. Has anyone phoned the Dead Men?"

Meritorious had someone try to ring them but no one picked up their phones until the very last person was tried – Weasel.

The person, on the law enforcement team, had a chat with him and nodded to Meritorious, giving the positive news, or at least that they were alive. There was an instruction left to come straight to the Sanctuary when they were done.

Valkyrie left to sit down somewhere as she was forgotten and people started making arrangements and collecting paperwork.

.*****.

"Valkyrie?" Tanith said softly, shaking her arm. Valkyrie woke up and sat up quickly. Tanith has sad eyes. "I'm sorry Valkyrie. I should have said something earlier."

Valkyrie shrugged groggily. "It's fine. I don't care."

"It's not though. It's not. I'm so sorry," she reiterated, pulling her into a hug. Valkyrie held her tightly.

There was a slow clap behind them. Letting each other go, looking to find Crux in the doorway. Valkyrie wanted to punch him already.

"Look at that," he said, leaning against the doorframe in a bad act of being casual. "The child detective hugging the woman she just blamed for everything."

Valkyrie frowned. "One, I didn't blame her, two I'm allowed to hug her, and three, I'm fourteen, not a child. What are you doing here anyway?"

He stood up properly and glared at her. "I just got back from your house."

 _Bloody hell_ , she thought. _Nosy idiot_. "Meritorious is already aware of what happened. It has nothing to do with you."

"I think it does."

"It really doesn't."

"Crux, go away," Tanith said. She glared at him and he tried to glare back, wavered, and then snarled and went away.

"That's really useful," Valkyrie commented before standing up and stretching. "You haven't said anything about your phone, have you?"

"No."

"Good, it never happened," she said. "I left it in my room. Oh, and Fletcher and Peregrine are here too."

"You did really well. I'm sorry we left you like that," she said again, looking remorseful.

"Tanith, stop. It's fine. I promise. Really. Come on, it's Skulduggery I need to talk to. Damn idiot."

"I don't like hearing you say his name like that," she said, following her out the door. "It's weird."

"You're weird," she smirked.

They wandered around the Sanctuary for a while, looking around for any of the Dead Men, and found them standing around in the Medical Wing getting checks for small scrapes and scratches where the van had flipped, throwing half of them around, and crushing the other half standing around it. When Valkyrie came in, they were all up and trying to apologise.

"Stop it, stop it!" She said, pushing them all back. They all went quiet and stood back a little. "You're being ridiculous."

"We should have said something," Panda said, his arm in a cast. "We should have asked why you weren't coming with us, we all knew something was wrong."

Valkyrie shrugged and tried to forget about it. She could barely think about it when she was still numb from killing Krav and Gallow. Crow was standing at the back of the room, his hat in his hand and looking somewhat upset, but not coming close to her. She ignored his stupidity and with that, the whole of him.

"What happened with all you then?" She asked, trying to seem as if she were over it, sitting on the end of Bear's bed.

"We went up to Paddy's farm," Tanith said, sitting beside her. Valkyrie could tell she was upset as she would never have followed her around like a remorseful child unless she was seeking the sort of comfort Tanith loved – jokes, hugs and happiness. Valkyrie put her arm around Tanith's waist. "Paddy was there, as well as the Diablerie and maybe three hundred hollow men. They had machine guns, knives and grenades. They had us surrounded and at their mercy from the get go."

"We tried to fight back," Weasel said. "But we couldn't get through the hollow men. They started throwing grenades and there wasn't much we could do."

"We escaped to the woods, but it took hours to work out a plan and try to make an escape," Tanith said. "We fought through the hollow men but when we got to the house, Paddy and the Diablerie were gone. We tried to leave in the car, but it was blown up and we found Paddy trying to kill us."

"It was a suicide mission," Crow said darkly from the back of the room. "He didn't want to be held responsible."

There was a brief silence and then Tanith took back up the story. "We couldn't get out without the van," she said slowly. "And Paddy brought out another hundred or so hollow men. It took us hours, but we did eventually get through to him. We tried to arrest him, but he turned the gun on himself. We thought he did it because the Diablerie abandoned him and he realised it was a fool's mission."

"We were wrong though," Bear said from behind them. "It almost got you killed."

"There's only Rose left," Valkyrie said numbly. "I heard the alarm system go off when they came through the front door, but I thought it was just you, so I went to greet you and saw them. They didn't see me, and I don't think they really cared I was there because they weren't trying in the least. I got out the garage door but didn't have a key to drive away with, so I sent Fletcher and Peregrine away through the woods – they put up the anti-teleportation signals – and got back in the house through the meeting room window someone left open. I got the gun out the cabinet and Gallow came through the door and I shot him down. Murder Rose came running, I had to run off, and they had dozens of hollow men with them, so I couldn't get passed. I got around the back of the house and Rose cut my hand but other than that I got away fine. I shot down Krav and got Rose in the leg, but I was out of bullets and she left with the hollow men. I remembered the spare quad bike key afterwards and went to meet Fletcher and Peregrine, and they nearly ran into each other, but she turned the corner just as I got there. They took me here and we got in contact with you."

The Dead Men and Tanith shook their heads, upset she had had to go through that, had to kill two people to protect herself and protect the Teleporters. She was still numb.

"I'm hungry," she frowned. "Can we get food soon?"

Bear stood up immediately and put an arm around her shoulder. "What do you want?"

She rolled her eyes and smiled. "Fish and chips."

They ordered in, Weasel and Bear going to go collect it from a street further away and went to find Fletcher and Peregrine who were sitting away from each other.

"What's up with you?" Valkyrie asked when she sat down. Peregrine stuck his nose in the air and said nothing. She frowned at him and looked at Fletcher.

"Nothing. He's being negative," Fletcher said, trying to be casual.

"Err, sure," she said slowly, seeing the problem with them – too damn up themselves. "Anyway, we ordered food."

Food came almost half an hour later and they all sat around eating quietly, no one getting up or saying anything when Meritorious came in and took a seat beside them on the only seat available, the one next to Valkyrie.

She offered him a chip.

"No thank you," he said quietly. "I came to tell you, the clean-up crew is finished and have also replaced all damaged items in the house."

"Thanks," she shrugged. "It was fine."

He cleared his throat and avoided eye contact. "Well, we didn't realise the extent of the damage. We just received the pictures. Gallow had a gun in his hand and enough ammunition to blow your house up. The found several bombs in your house, we think they were going to be detonated with you in there."

"That would explain why they weren't fussed about me," she said, thinking it over. "I thought they were going to try and use me as leverage."

Meritorious nodded. "That was our assumption too, but it seems they were trying to draw you out, or rather, Mr Peregrine and Mr Renn."

"Hi," Fletcher said.

Meritorious ignored him. "At any rate, it's clear for you to return. Detective Pleasant," he said, standing up, "may I have a word in my office."

They waited for Crow to come back, hat on and just as quiet, before having Peregrine teleport them all back to the house. They only had one of the Diablerie left to deal with. The threat and case of the Teleporter murders just about completed. She could relax, for the most part.

Sighing, Valkyrie looked around the house – they had been teleported into the street where Valkyrie had left the quad bike and had to walk back, Tanith going ahead on the bike to give the all clear.

She really wanted to call Nadia and fall asleep.

She was tired.


	36. Fletcher gets The Talk!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 36**

It was three days later Valkyrie finally felt rested and well-adjusted from her fight with the Diablerie and being punished by Crow. They hadn't spoken, mostly because Crow was on a lot of cases following leads on small crimes, and at the same time trying to use his international contacts to get Rose now she was alone, meaning Valkyrie was left at home as promised.

With six friends that all wanted to make it up to her for being inconsiderate. Plus a twit that always wanted attention.

"Hey Fletcher," Valkyrie said, sitting beside him.

Peregrine had left them the morning after the fight and was grateful to her, giving her his number in case she needed him for anything, and then teleported away. She still wasn't sure she liked him but had decided he was nice enough. To be fair, she was too upset with other things whilst he'd been there for them to warm to each other.

Fletcher had stayed on the orders of Meritorious. As he was seventeen, he was a minor, and it had either been him willingly staying with the Dead Men or forcefully staying in a group home with his magic bound.

"Hi," he said, sitting down with a heaving sigh and looking completely despondent.

"Oh, it won't be that bad," Valkyrie laughed, gathering her things together. "You'll like it more than you think. It's not like normal school."

Tanith and Weasel came in then for their morning work.

"Right," Tanith smiled. "We'll start with maths and work our way into practical magic, then have lunch, some outdoor activities we found, English, then Irish for Valkyrie and cooking for Fletcher. We'll have dinner. Then I thought we'd talk about a topic over dessert for an hour or so or whenever we feel like and watch a movie."

Weasel nodded along. "I'm glad one of us is organised."

Tanith placed a stack of books she was carrying on the table and, with their help, they split the tables up into 'desks'. The tables were large, square office desks pressed together usually to make a very large second meeting room next to Gordon's old office. Valkyrie used to play under the desks in hide and seek as a kid. With them split up, it was meant to prevent getting too distracted with the other persons work.

Valkyrie set her stuff up – pen on top of her books, a different one per subject, all her revision and work books they were using to assist teaching her, a large book with all Shakespeare's works, a novel Gordon wrote right after she was born and then a cup with all her highlighters, gel pens, pencils, ruler, rubber and other random things she had collected to make the process as easy as possible. She had collected some things for Fletcher too, but he had put it all in a pile and shoved it into the middle of his desk, leant back on his chair and looked like he'd rather die.

Tanith sat with Valkyrie to go over her maths.

She was in fake year nine, fake because there were no years now she’d convinced her family to home school her following the swimming ‘incident’, and that meant she was doing advanced algebra. Valkyrie liked algebra – it was fractions that stressed her.

She listened to Tanith's explanation, then did some practice questions with Tanith's notes beside her, then it was taken away and she did harder questions without it, working her way up as she went. It was a quick sense of achievement when she worked with Tanith. She focused unlike she, or her reflection, did in school and there was no one to distract or compete with her for the teacher's attention. Easy. It helped that she had a good mind for maths. She tried to treat it like a mystery, and as long as it wasn’t too complicated, she would learn it really fast.

They worked on math for nearly two hours in which Valkyrie made "impressive progress for someone who refused to do their homework last year because it was 'too bloody hard'" and moved to practical magic.

Glancing over, she wasn't sure who was more relieved – Fletcher or Saracen.

She grinned, and they switched teachers, Valkyrie going with Weasel outside to work on her Elemental work while Tanith had Fletcher retrieve items around the house at top speed.

"Alright," Weasel said, grinning at her and rubbing his hands. "I want to continue your last lesson with Skulduggery, manipulating the air so you move through it, like how you'd get to a roof. Just show me what you can do."

Turned out, Weasel was as intense and good at teaching Elemental magic as he was combat skills which they ended up doing to make the lesson more fun. With Weasel's ability to know what she was going to do and him being in very good athletic shape, she was put through her paces and was able to get a better control of her magic in the process.

She did sort of prefer Crow's magic lessons though. There was less fear involved, as she didn’t have to worry about catching herself if she messed up.

After lunch, it was some outside skills aimed at Valkyrie. They had to make themselves a fire without magic, climb trees, get water, set up a rabbit trap and finally chop wood with an axe. Valkyrie loved the last one and could have gone for ages, but Fletcher could barely make it through five swings, getting through two logs, before he complained of arm ache and couldn't continue.

"I sort of like having him here," Valkyrie whispered to Tanith as they watched Fletcher and Weasel talk it over.

"Yeah, until he gets annoying again."

Valkyrie snored and enjoyed the fair weather until they had to go back in for their English lesson. They went over essay skills, reading, had a spelling test, looked up stupid and overly long words to use against Crow, analysed a little more Shakespeare and finished it all off when Valkyrie threw her massive Shakespeare book at Fletcher.

After laughing themselves silly at him, Fletcher was banished to the kitchen to cook dinner with a glaring, towering Bear – he'd caught Fletcher trying to flirt with Valkyrie after she told him to go away several times and decided he hated the boy with more hate than his gist could possibly be made of – while Valkyrie sat down with Ghastly for her Irish.

It went smoothly despite how much she didn’t enjoy it, and he was just teaching her some clever insults when they were called to dinner. They had a nice dinner to be fair, but the growl Bear gave every time Fletcher spoke was the best. Something had really got him annoyed with the boy.

"So," Valkyrie said when she, Fletcher, Bear and Tanith were sitting in one of the living rooms with pink fairy cakes Fletcher had made. "What are we going to talk about."

Tanith ate the jelly tot off the top of her cake and pondered it. "How about… how about – actually no. Not that. Um…"

"How about how to take 'no' as an answer," Bear said in an evil calm, staring into the top of Fletcher's spiky head.

Tanith clicked her fingers. "Perfect. You're good at this," she grinned. "Fletcher, spell 'no'."

He glared at him, but they all stared at him and he eventually sighed and said "N. O."

"What does that spell?"

He closed his eyes. "No."

"No, what?" Tanith grinned.

"No, Miss Low," he said.

"Good boy!" She cheered. "Valkyrie, when is it appropriate to tell someone 'no'? In the subject of like, flirting and sex and stuff. Not eating vegetables."

Valkyrie snorted – she'd been about to mentioned sprouts. "When someone is doing, saying or acting in a way that makes you uncomfortable." She was good at this one. It had been repeated so many times.

"Perfect. And when is it not appropriate to say 'no'?" Tanith asked her.

She went to answer, then thought it over for a hidden circumstance and went with her original. "There isn't a time it isn't alright."

"It's almost as if this is basic knowledge!" She laughed. "What if someone says yes and then no? Fletcher?"

"It's no," he said, looking uncomfortable.

"Right. People change their mind," Tanith said, then her smile vanished, and she sat up. "So, with all we've learnt, what if someone says no to you, not just once, but several times over several days and you continuously try to force a yes out of them?"

Fletcher looked a little pale. "It's wrong?"

"Yes," she snarled at him, then paused, smiled and settled back into her seat. "And Valkyrie, what do we do with inconsiderate little gits that don't take no for an answer?"

She shrugged. "Punch them?"

"Good."

They spoke a little more, or rather, tortured Fletcher with some more obvious questions and then let him go upstairs. He teleported out immediately.

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "I think that conversation had ulterior motives."

Bear wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her into his side tightly, kissing the top of her head. "He needs to understand he can't force you into dating him."

Valkyrie smiled at him. "He might need to learn that for himself instead of having it forced down his throat," she said gently, knowing this subject was difficult for the man. She was a little girl in a way, the one he protected had met as an infant and vowed to protect. "I'd rather he decided for himself to leave me alone than get scared. At least I can punch him, better me than someone else."

Bear shook his head and Tanith came over and sat on her other side, hugging her and leaning her head on Valkyrie's. "You shouldn't have to though. I know it's just a little flirting, but you’re barely fourteen and he's about to be eighteen. Four years is a lot when you're this young. I know it'll be nothing in ten years or so, but right now, it's a lot."

Valkyrie wrapped an arm around her sister's shoulders. "It's alright Tanith. I'm not that little, remember. It's okay."

She sighed but gave in, and they let each other go. It would be nice for Fletcher to stop flirting with her, but at least if he tried anything with her, she could beat him up. Letting him learn through her was safe, she figured, but another girl such as Nadia wouldn't be able to fight someone off the way she could.

Although, Nadia would probably slap and shout at him… she grinned at the thought. Angry Nadia was hilarious. Like a little angry chipmunk.


	37. Confused Fletcher almost dies

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 37**

"Wolf!" Valkyrie shouted, running out the house and hugging him. "I missed you!"

Wolf squeezed her tightly and kissed her cheek. "I missed you too Cub. I heard there's been some trouble for my baby girl?"

She wrapped her legs around him and he carried her, his two bags, a large gun and himself into the house. He threw down the baggage and sat on the sofa, letting her remain on his lap.

"Crow's just being an idiot," she said, rolling her eyes. A while ago she had come to accept it – now it was mid-November, three weeks since then, and she was bored of studying, so was Tanith, and Fletcher was really, really getting on her nerves because he was bored too. Saracen wasn’t even turning up in the mornings for them, Bear had taken over the Irish lessons to give Panda a break. Her family loved her and all, but even she could imagine how her childish complaining over schoolwork was getting old. Tanith was mostly just sliding worksheets to her and reading Gordon’s books again, or else they analysed his work. They had substituted geography for talking about Tanith’s dating escapades across the world just so they could laugh about it, and they’d switched chemistry for making a bomb they set off in the back garden. That had been fun.

And although she and Crow had shared several short and polite conversations, they had not made up even a little. She explained everything that had happened to Dexter, and he nodded along until she finished and brought her in for a hug.

"You know what we should do?" He asked after a minute. "We should see Nadia."

Valkyrie grinned and shook her head. "I'm not allowed."

"Have you spoken to her at all since you were 'punished'?"

"Yeah," she whispered. "Tanith lets me use her phone before bed."

"And Skulduggery hasn't noticed?" Wolf asked.

She shrugged. "If he has, he's not done anything. I would imagine he knows but he was pretty angry with me, so I sort of thought he would have done something if he knew. Maybe he doesn't want to get in trouble with Tanith."

Wolf thought about it, then shrugged and grinned. "Let's see Nadia."

"Wolf, if I get caught, I might be in even worse trouble," she explained. "I'd rather just do the punishment and then go on cases again. I just want to go back to normal, but I won't let Crow's anger at the situation upset me or make me do anything. If I do, I'll just prove I can't be trusted to take orders."

"Val, I never take orders, I do what I want and I'm still here. Don't worry, I'll say I forced you to go. I am very big and very evil after all. Now do you want to see a lovely, beautiful girl or not?"

"What's happening?" Fletcher asked, coming into the room with wide, hope-filled eyes. "You're seeing friends? Can I come?"

"Ahh, why not?" Wolf said, not yet knowing that Valkyrie hadn't told him about Nadia – she hadn't wanted Wolf's protective side to show itself at Valkyrie's caution but now he was being too kind. Darn. "The more the merrier."

They got themselves ready in secret. Only Tanith was at home with them that day so it easy to leave the house with her and Wolf. They took a taxi out to Nadia's house, since they had Fletcher, while Valkyrie called her. Soon enough, they were there and got out the car. It drove off.

"Here we are," Wolf said, stretching. "Go knock on the door then."

Valkyrie nodded and walked up to the door, ignoring the excited Fletcher on her heels. She stopped at the front door and then, after a moment to flatten her hair and take a deep breath, she knocked in a proper, loud, confident way. Or that what she hoped was heard on the other side. She was just nervous and excited.

"Why are your hands shaking?" Fletcher asked. "Wait, does your friend have a brother? Do you like him?"

"She doesn't have a brother so no. Please just, like, don't start flirting with me or Nadia, okay?" She asked him, not looking at him. "This is not for you, you are just making friends and that is _it_. If you do flirt with her, I'm going to punch you into next year and back again."

He shrugged. "Sure, sure. But you know, you have been talking to me more, getting on with me more. I think you're starting to like me, just a teeny-weeny bit."

"I don't think so," she sighed, closing her eyes.

"Alright, maybe you don't like it, or you don't want to admit it, and that's okay, but you do," he said, doing 'the grin' and leaning against a white marble pillar holding up the porch.

Valkyrie grabbed him and forced him away from it. "Stop it!" She growled at him under her breath, just loud enough for him to hear. "Just, shut up, be nice and don't embarrass me in front of Nadia's parents!"

She turned back to the door just as it was opened by Nadia's family butler. He opened it wide and looked down at her with hooded lids. "Miss Cain," he said in a slow, wispy voice. "Please, come in."

Valkyrie did, followed with embarrassing enthusiasm by Fletcher and at a more controlled pace, Tanith and Wolf who were pretending they were making sure no one did anything 'naughty'.

They went to the greeting parlour, as Mrs Keena liked to call it, and waiting for them was Nadia and Mrs Keena standing beside each other, and Mr Vinay stood a little further away and smiling kindly at her. Valkyrie held the present she had ordered a week ago - thank god it was as nice as it was in the pictures - out to Nadia.

She came forward at a proper, nice lady pace at first, took the wrapped present with a soft thank you and put in on the table. She then turned back to her, rushed forwards and leapt into Valkyrie's arms.

Valkyrie laughed and twirled her around before setting her down. No kisses allowed in front of her parents, and Valkyrie nearly, nearly did. Nadia, being more confident, kissed Valkyrie lightly on the cheek. "It's nice to see you again."

"It's nice to see you too," Nadia said. She hugged Tanith and Wolf happily, smiling widely, before standing in front of Fletcher. "It's a pleasure to meet you. My name is Nadia Robin."

He shook her hand and looked at her with awe, happiness and something that might have been longing. "Fletcher Renn. You have a lovely home."

"I do," she said. She gave Valkyrie a sneaky wink, them having already planned a few things about their own secret future 'home'. Less marble pillars and more cushions, dark wood floors, a big fish tank. A big picture of their wedding, assuming they got that far, which they didn’t want to talk about too much in case it was jinxed but at the same time enjoying being overly mushy all the same. "My parents also have a nice home."

Mr Vinay snorted and got glared at by his wife and the stuffy atmosphere began to shrink away. "Come in and sit down, please," he said, putting a hand on his wife's back. "Valkyrie, it's lovely to see you again, it's been a long time."

She nodded. "I've been focusing on my training and home schooling recently. Tanith and the Dead Men are surprisingly good teachers. How have you been?"

She sat next to Nadia on the love seat, forcing Fletcher to sit between Tanith and Wolf. He stared at Valkyrie and Nadia openly.

"Oh, I've been fine, just closed a business deal with a cousin in Chennai, and I got news of a niece who is now pregnant. She lives over in America," he said. "How have you been? Nadia mentioned you and Skulduggery Pleasant had a falling out?"

She shrugged. "Not so much a falling out than him acting like a baby. I was allowed to do what I did, he just hates that it involved a person we were working with that he particularly hates. He’ll see the light and apologise eventually."

Mrs Keena tilted her head just slightly at Valkyrie. "And what are you doing in the meantime?"

"Focusing on my studies, training, attempting to learn more advanced Irish although the last one isn't going so well," she grinned. "I'm not just sitting around doing nothing if that's what you're asking. I would get too bored."

Nadia nodded and put a hand on Valkyrie's. "Me and Valkyrie were talking about some of her work, and she's actually closer to the level of learning I'm on than that of her age."

Mrs Keena brightened and smiled at Valkyrie. "Oh, that is good news. Peter, could you get us some tea?"

The meeting with Nadia's family was easy and fun after that and Fletcher restrained himself from embarrassing himself or Valkyrie the whole time. At the very end, Valkyrie turned to Mrs Keena and Mr Vinay hopefully, scrunching one hand in her skirt just a little to make it seem like she was very nervous. She was so it wasn't too hard. "Mrs Keena, Mr Vinay, would it be alright if Nadia came with us for a few hours to get something to eat? I may not be able to see her around her birthday and would like to go out with her now."

The parents looked at each other for a moment and Mrs Keena smiled encouragingly at her husband who was already happy to let his girl go with them. "Of course, Valkyrie," he told her. "Just make sure she's back before eight."

Valkyrie grinned and thanked them before taking Nadia's hand and they all left the house, waving at Nadia's parents as they left the security gate at the front of their garden.

"That went well," Valkyrie said, grinning at Nadia.

"I'm sort of surprised."

"Same. Tanith, do you think we could get dinner?"

She shrugged. "Sure. Do you want us to drop you off somewhere?"

"What?" Fletcher asked. He turned to Valkyrie. "Aren't we getting dinner? I thought I was meant to be making friends with your friends?"

Nadia grinned evilly at Valkyrie and Valkyrie knew exactly what was going to come. "Sure thing, Fletcher," Nadia said, sickly sweet. "I'm sure it'll be fine for you to all come to dinner for my birthday."

Tanith snorted. "Yeah, we can come too, right?"

Valkyrie sighed.

Wolf piped up with: "Come on, surely being with your family and friends it better than anything else? I mean, what else could you want to give Nadia for her birthday?"

Valkyrie looked to the sky but only got a raindrop in her eyes and took the sign as it was before Fletcher got to work that out. "Fine," she said. "But we have to get Pizza Hut."

They all laughed and agreed – Fletcher practically whooped – and they got a taxi there as they very specifically wanted to go to the one nearby as it was a favourite date spot of theirs.

It was a little cold for the girls, Valkyrie was in a skirt and Nadia had a dress on. Pizza Hut was warm and smelt oh so good though, and as it was only four on a Saturday, it wasn't too packed either. They ordered some large drinks, copious amounts of garlic bread pizza, actual pizzas and a plate of pasta they could all share. Grinning, Valkyrie sat back in her chair, putting an arm around Nadia's shoulders.

Nadia turned to her, looked her up and down in the chair and glared at her. "You've grown."

Valkyrie nodded. "I think I'm having a growth spurt. My mum was five eight so it's sort of to be expected."

"It's offensive."

"How?"

"Because I'm small. I was this height when I was eleven and I haven't moved since. Why do you get to keep growing?" She whined, looking at Valkyrie with big eyes. Valkyrie heart jumped, and she had to stay very, very still to not just kiss her girlfriend and end up on the floor or table with her. Okay, maybe she wasn't that bad, but she felt such an intense pull to do it that it hurt to restrain herself.

"Well, fuck you, that's why," she said instead.

Nadia laughed, and, being completely anti-social to the other three with them, they waited for their food, sitting increasingly closer to each other and talking about some things that were happening at Nadia's school.

"Here we go," the waitress said, coming over to them. She set down some food and Valkyrie reluctantly pulled herself away from Nadia's side. More was piled on the table until it was full of pizza's, garlic bread, plates and wonderful smells.

Valkyrie breathed deeply and said "Yummy!" Nadia snorted and started giggling, trying to muffle the sound. "Oh, and what is so funny about pizza Nadia? What is it?"

She ended up laughing out loud but never admitted what was going on in her head. Instead, they all got food while she laughed and when she finally finished, switched her clear plate with Valkyrie's one and Valkyrie had to just sigh and get more food, knowing she would be teased for it later. Love affected her mind, obviously.

"You two are awfully close," Fletcher observed after a few slices. "Like, really, really close. How long have you known each other?"

Wolf almost said something, but Tanith elbowed him harshly and he shut up. "A year and a month, ish," Nadia said. "And of course we are, we speak for hours every day."

He frowned at them. "But you don't have a phone."

"I borrow Tanith's," she said, rolling her eyes. "But don't tell Skulduggery or you can consider my home too dangerous for occupation."

He rolled his eyes. "I won't say anything. But what could you _possibly_ talk about for hours every day?"

Valkyrie shrugged. "We find stuff. We're not brain dead you know."

They finished their meal and ended it with getting ice cream. Valkyrie snuck a kiss at the ice cream station without anyone noticing – well, except a three-year-old who laughed and jumped up and down watching them, so they kissed again, and he started rolling around laughing, finding it great for whatever reason. His parents just smiled at him and only saw them waving, sticking their tongues out and grinning at him.

"He's a cute one," Valkyrie said when they sat back down.

"Who?" Fletcher asked immediately.

"A baby," Nadia said, looking over at him. He was eating dinner now. "Aww, I just want to steal him and love him forever. Valkyrie, I want a baby."

"No."

"But it's my birthday."

"Ask your parents."

She tutted. "Some use you are."

"Nadia, if you wanted a baby," Valkyrie said, staring her in the eye, "you should have made better choices."

She nodded. "This is true. In my defence, I didn't know any better."

Fletcher was looking between them as if he was confused why he didn't understand more of what they were talking about. God forbid he didn't know everything about Valkyrie and Nadia. It was almost as if he was missing the most relevant information.

Valkyrie paid for their meal and they left with smiles, Wolf taking Fletcher by the shoulder and pushing him ahead of the girls, Tanith winking at them and running to catch up. Looking around, Valkyrie grabbed Nadia's hand and rushed into an alleyway.

"Happy birthday," she said quickly and captured Nadia's lips in her own.

It was a short, soft kiss but it lit Valkyrie up from the inside. She didn't know where the intense feeling was suddenly coming from, but she loved it and soon she was pressing the shorter girl against the wall, holding her hips tightly and kissing her roughly.

They only had a few moments together but they both loved them. "I want summer back," Nadia panted. "I want to kiss you every night and every morning. I want to make dinner with you and make you get me glasses of water whenever I ask, and I want to get you coffee in the morning. I want to have a life with you right now."

"We do have a life together," Valkyrie said softly, sadly. "It's just away from each other right now. I'll find an excuse to see you over Christmas. I'll sneak through your window if I have to, cuddle you all night."

Nadia giggled, pecking her lips. "I didn't realise you were a cuddlier."

"Neither did I," she grinned. "You do weird things to me. Come on. Fletcher's not stupid enough to think we got lost."

Nadia sighed but they brushed themselves off and ran down the street to the other three. Fletcher was frowning hard and Valkyrie knew she'd be interrogated by him and Wolf later.

Staying casual though, she looked at Fletcher. "Could you teleport us to Nadia's door?"

"Sure," he shrugged and took their hands – obviously trying to force them to hold his hand – and they were suddenly in front of the mini-mansion.

Nadia swayed slightly, going pale. "Oh, that wasn't nice."

Valkyrie knocked on the door and took Nadia's hand as she breathed through it. It took a moment, but when the door was opened by Peter the butler, she looked a lot better and gave her a sneaky kiss on the lips while Fletcher was waving at Mrs Keena and Mr Vinay inside.

She went into the house quickly and the butler shut the door in their faces, as expected, and she turned to Fletcher.

"Thank you," she said, trying to sound it. "For not being annoying."

He shrugged. "I do try. Let's go home."

Fletcher teleported them into the house.

She frowned at him. "What about the others?"

"They can get a cab. I need to talk to you Val, I need to know what's going on."

"What do you mean?"

"You and Nadia," he said, touching his hair nervously. "What are you?"

"Me and Nadia have nothing to do with you," she said. "What are you even asking me?"

"I'm asking if I even have a hope of convincing you to go out with me!" He shouted before sighing and falling back on the sofa. Valkyrie sat on the one opposite.

"Fletcher, I keep telling you no. I keep telling you to stop. I have constantly told you the same answer. And I've also continuously told you we won't be getting together. You need to get that in your head. It doesn't matter about Nadia–"

"So you're dating her?"

"I didn't–"

"You're not," he said, more certainly. "Okay."

"Fletcher, you need to listen to me. I have made my decision. There is nothing you can do or say to convince me. I don't need to give you a person or reason why I won't accept you, I just don't want to."

"What sort of reason is that?" He asked grumpily.

"It's my decision, and you have to accept it. I'm trying to be nice Fletcher, but this is my house and I'm getting tired of listening to your more and more extreme attempts to get me to go out with you. Please just stop."

"Alright, alright," he said, sitting up. "How about, you give me one date, _one_ date, and regardless of how well it goes, I'll never mention anything about this ever again to you. We don’t have to kiss, just hang out and test the waters."

"No."

"Valkyrie, how can you even know you don't want to date me if we haven't been on a date?" He asked despondently.

"Fletcher, have you ever seen a raw piece of chicken?"

He stared at her. "Yeah, sure."

"Have you ever looked at a raw piece of chicken and thought you wanted to eat it?"

"No."

"Even though you are allowed and no one told you not to?"

"No, raw meat looks gross."

" _Exactly_. I haven't been told not to date you, I just don't want to because when I see you, I know I don't want to. It's not you, just the same as it isn't the chicken's fault you don't want to eat it raw. It's just how it is. I know it’s a weird analogy, but it’s the same thing. So you need to stop trying to make me do something I don't want to. I cannot force myself to like you any more than someone can force themselves to eat raw meat. Okay?"

He looked at the rug and didn’t look up again. Valkyrie left him there and went to the other room to call Tanith on with house phone, explained what happened and sat back. Half an hour later, the front door slammed open and Tanith and Wolf came storming through, finding herself and Fletcher watching television silently in the living room. Before Fletcher had even turned to greet them, Dexter was on top of him.

"How dare you teleport away with her!?" He shouted in Fletcher's face. "How are you try and take away my sister?!"

Fletcher made a grunt, moan type sound, his eyes bulging from the pressure of Wolf's hands around his neck.

"You listen to me, boy," he growled in Fletcher's face. "Don't you ever try and take my sister away from me again or I'll rip your kidneys out. Do you understand me?"

Fletcher's face went purple. Valkyrie stood and put a hand on Wolf's shoulder. He sighed and got off Fletcher. By an inch.

Fletcher sucked in lungful’s of air and got his breathing back in order right in time for Tanith to lean over him from behind the sofa. He went pale pretty.

"Don't worry Fletcher," she said, smiling. He smiled back timidly. "It's not as if everyone that loves Valkyrie is highly trained death machines or anything."

He went paler.

"Don't ever take her away like that," she said sweetly. "Next time I'll kill you without asking questions first."

She took Valkyrie's hand and they left the room, and Wolf and Fletcher, and went to the 'girl' room. "Tanith?"

"Yes?" She asked.

"What part of that was you asking questions?"


	38. Crow apologises

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 38**

"Valkyrie?" Fletcher asked.

Valkyrie sighed and looked over at him. "What do you need?"

He glanced at the floor and back to her. "I just wanted to say I'm sorry. For teleporting you somewhere different to what I said, and for keep asking you out and saying stuff when you said not to."

She smiled at him, relieved he wasn't trying to annoy her again. "Thank you. I appreciate that."

He smiled back lightly. "I didn't mean to upset you. I was talking to Saracen last night – he said that I might have scared or upset you doing that. I mean, I don't think you were scared, nothing seems to scare you, but I sort of saw that you could have been." He shrugged embarrassedly. "I'm just sorry. I wasn't thinking it through."

Valkyrie put her book down and smiled at him properly. "And this has nothing to do with the shouts and screams I heard yesterday?"

"Err," he laughed nervously. "You heard that?"

"Yep. So did most of Asia."

"Oh. Err, well, Dexter told me to tell Skulduggery what I did. Since he's in charge of me or whatever now."

"Oh. I didn't know he was home last night."

"Um, yeah, that's what I was asked to come over here to tell you. Skulduggery wants to see you downstairs."

"Oh," Valkyrie said, taking a deep breath. Taking Tanith's phone, she sent a quick text to Nadia explaining what she was doing and hid it under the pillow. "Where is he?"

Valkyrie was sent to the dining room where everyone but Fletcher and herself was sat. Fletcher wasn't invited, but Valkyrie took her usual seat.

"Hi," she said, looking around the faces. They were all serious. Finally, she looked up at Crow. In front of him was her phone but she avoided looking at it. "What's happening?"

He cleared his throat. "Valkyrie, we had a talk last night."

"I might have heard some of that."

"And this morning we resumed. Our family have asked–" Valkyrie noticed Tanith smile a little at the casual inclusion of herself in their family "–that I lift your punishment. As it is, you have done roughly two months punishment of the four I gave you. I do know you've been using the house phone as well as Tanith's. I also know you have left the property on one visit to Nadia. And that you have been watching television in the day and evening. But, despite the fact you were left with relatively little supervision and what you were left with was more immature than yourself–"

"Hey!" Weasel frowned at him.

"Despite that, you have acted responsibly and better than I have."

Valkyrie nodded. She wasn't going to pretend it wasn't true.

"You're academic learning, which I thought was going to the wayside, has gotten so much better in some subjects you are up to a year ahead of the material you would be doing in regular school. Although you have left your dance and swimming clubs, you have kept up with your dance and all other physical training despite having no reason to do it. You have helped around the house. You have been gracious. You have been almost entirely obedient to your punishment. I really expected you to be out the doors immediately. You proved me wrong."

"I know."

He nodded and slid Valkyrie's phone over the table to her. She pulled it to her but left it on the table in front of her.

"I think you've had enough punishment. But I understand that you might not want to return to work with me. I have not acted… I have been intentionally ignoring you for weeks because I was upset, and you did not deserve my anger or upset over something so insignificant. You did nothing wrong, it was me who had trust issues, not you who could not be trusted. I apologise."

Valkyrie grinned. "It's okay."

He tilted his head. "It is okay?"

"Yes."

He hesitated. "Okay."

"So how are you?"

"I'm fine… I'm wonderful. I just completed a case on child kidnaps. No children were harmed."

"Not even mentally?"

He hesitated some more. "No?"

"Emotionally?"

"...No?"

"Unlike me when you punished me and didn't speak to me for weeks? Like when I was attacked by the Diablerie all by myself and you never said a single fucking word to me?"

He slumped. "I really am sorry Valkyrie. I thought I was doing the right thing."

"Of course you do."

"I did. I don't think that now."

"You can prove you mean it if you want." He went to agree but hesitated and asked her to continue. "You need to work out whatever's going on with… this. You need to not only stop treating me differently but also work out the source of the problem. You need to work out what is going on with Solomon. You need to make yourself better. Even if it takes years of trying and a lot of heartache, you need to do this. I don't know the full story, and I'm not asking for it. I'm just asking you move on or work it out or whatever. Make this a non-issue."

He sighed and rubbed a hand over his skull. "I know," he said quietly, obviously a bit embarrassed to talk about it in front of others. "Every time I think about it I get… very angry. Betrayed. I don't know where facing it will lead me."

"Perhaps it isn't the about Solomon or the situation," Valkyrie suggested. "Maybe you're angry at yourself. And that makes you not want to face these problems."

He stood, and they went in for a hug. They held each other tightly and Valkyrie felt her life just get _better_. It always was with Skulduggery in it.

"Come on," he said, standing back. "I found a case I thought you might like."

"What is it?"

"You'll see," he said.

.*****.

"'It'll be fun,' he said," Valkyrie panted out. "It's fucking not."

She threw herself on the floor and the vampire shot overhead, using its claws to throw itself around to face her. She scrambled up and summoned a fireball, throwing it immediately into its face, but it just shook the fire off. It gave Valkyrie just a moment to start running though, and when the vampire was on her trail she used the air to push herself onto the top of the building again.

The vampire jumped after her, but she was ready, shooting it back with purple electricity. _That_ shook it but simply not enough. She rushed forwards and punched its nose, making it roar, and then kicked its chest, pushing it off the edge of the building.

She looked over at Crow. He had a vampire problem of his own, one was shot dead at his feet but the other one was rushing to attack him every few moments and Crow was casually pushing it back with wind every time. It looked really, really angry. Crow was on a database, trying to find out what an escaped convict had been trying to find. It was taking a really, really long time.

Before the vampire had even touched the ground below, Valkyrie set off in the other direction, jumping from small-town roof to roof, listening to the vampire run alongside her on the ground. She cursed in her head, hoping none of the little houses had security cameras.

She almost screamed in frustration when she saw the sea – it was way further away than she thought. She used her air manipulation skills to launch herself as far as she could, and she flew through the air onto the road ahead, putting several metres between herself and the monster behind her.

There were just the rocks now.

She pushed herself despite her badly burning legs, jumping from rock to rock, the vampire getting more and more dangerously close.

It got her then. Its claw hooked her coat and she was pulled to a halt. It took a moment to lick its lips and Valkyrie put her hands on its chest and _pushed_.

It cried out as it hit the sea below them and Valkyrie let out a sigh of relief. She jogged back to Crow and found he had killed the second vampire and was reading something on the computer. He wasn't on the roof itself – there was a roof extension, a box with double doors they had broken into. Three vampires had shown up, but they had yet to find out why.

"What did you find?" Valkyrie asked, stepping into the office.

"I think he was looking at the information of his daughter," Crow said quietly, reading the screen. "This database is illegal in itself, so we'll need to find the source. It's the same as the records in the Sanctuary, but on a database like this it is obviously more dangerous. Already a criminal has found it and read it through, so obviously more people have for him to know about it, and who knows what they know that should be top security. Every safehouse, every shelter, every victim update we've ever collected."

"Do you think he's going to visit his daughter then?"

Crow shook his head and turned off the database, yanking some important looking wires apart. "In the seventies, Boris Morgans was a drug dealer. He got high on his stock one day with friends and they all abused his then seventeen-year-old. When he came to, he found all his friends had left him messages telling how much they enjoyed the party and his daughter black, blue and tied to the radiator. He hid her in the basement for three days before her mother blasted the door down and got her free. They came to us, the Dead Men. They stayed with us for a week while we tracked him down. He killed a few people on the way to escaping so he was put in for a hundred and sixty years or so."

"That's horrible," Valkyrie said, looking over at the ocean. "And now he's escaped. Is he seeking revenge then?"

He sighed. "To be honest, I have no idea." He jumped off the side of the building and Valkyrie followed. They got in the Bentley some streets away and then he spoke again. "He could be trying to apologise. His therapist, who handed his files over to the Sanctuary when it was reported he had escaped, claimed he had days where he was lucid and regretful and spent hours crying he hurt his child, that he begged and fitted he wanted to see her and make it right. And other days he was taken over by anger and wanted to punish her. So he could have escaped in either mood and be spending the time after in the other. We just can't know."

"So, not only is he likely on drugs that turn him into a psychopath right now, he's additionally insane without them. Sounds like a great time," Valkyrie said, sighing. "Does the daughter live close?"

"No, she moved to France to help her grandparents some years ago," Crow recalled. "She kept us updated. She was a nice girl, I remember. Her mother wasn't the best lady either, but she did try. Last I heard, she was dating a nice man down the street from her so with any hope, we can capture her father without her ever knowing and not put her on any type of setback."

Valkyrie nodded determinedly.

They set off to France immediately, trying to get ahead of Morgans who they believed to be on a boat. They had already contacted some other detectives at the Sanctuary and Valkyrie had got to speak to them. They had been sent away from the docks – Crow got the tip-off from a kind-of-criminal he wouldn't talk about, not the same detectives watching the docks – to begin looking into the database leak.

They arrived in France with time to spare thanks to Fletcher and ran immediately to get a cab over to Roche-sur-Yon where the daughter lived.

They bunked down in the main street they expected Morgans travel through, picking up a drink for Valkyrie on the way.

"I hate this," Valkyrie complained, before gasping and getting her phone out.

'How are you? Guess where I am?' She sent to Nadia.

"I know. But at least it's pretty here. And you can talk to Nadia. How is she by the way? You saw her recently," he stated.

Valkyrie nodded. "We got dinner with Wolf, Tanith and Fletcher. He still hasn't got that I'm dating her, but he apologised this morning. And yeah, she's good. Very happy to see me. I think she's looking forward to the Sanctuary party. Have you got a date for that by the way?"

Crow looked at her. "Valkyrie, I don't date."

"You could date."

"Maybe I don't want to."

"But maybe you should."

"But maybe I don't like anybody."

"But maybe you're not looking hard enough."

"But maybe I just hate everyone."

"But maybe you need to let it go."

"But maybe I don't want to."

Valkyrie looked at him and he put his head in his hands. Valkyrie looked over the street while he tried not to think about it and thought it over for herself. "Crow, I want to be just like you when I'm older."

He groaned. "What?"

"I mean it. I want to be as strong and as loyal and as smart as you are. But you need to get rid of this anger because you are hurting yourself and holding yourself back. I would appreciate that. I sort of have life plans and that sort of anger will mess them up, so you know," she shrugged. "Tick tock."

He didn't say anything back, they just looked out the car until they saw a terrified man in a van speed past them. They drove after it in their rental car and Crow sped past it, slowing down and forcing the van to a stop. Inside, the man was shouting and screaming, and there was a bang.

"Shit," Valkyrie swore and jumped out the car before they had come to a complete halt.

She saw the man was looking in horror at his stomach, blood seeping from it where he had been shot from behind. A man came out of his house across the street. "Call the police, he's been shot!" She shouted. He nodded frightfully. Thank goodness he could speak English.

She went to pull open the back and the doors were thrown open in her face. She fell back on her arse, holding her suddenly bleeding nose.

Valkyrie heard Crow begin running down the street after the escapee and she pulled herself to her feet and looked in the back of the van. There was a gun he had dropped, a bottle filled with pee and a sandwich wrapper.

Valkyrie jumped in, grabbed the gun, put it in the back of her trousers and ran off after Crow and Morgans. She found them brawling in an alleyway and got the gun out and pointed it at Morgans. "Put your hands on the ground!"

Morgans growled and fought with Crow harder to get away. "Shut the fuck up!"

At least she knew he was in angry mode. "Put your hands on the ground or I'll shoot!"

The man threw himself off Crow and they squared off. "Tell your bitch to fuck off," Morgans said.

Crow crooked his head. "I'll ask you kindly not to talk about my partner like that to her face. She's like a daughter to me."

Morgans, a thin, dark-skinned man with dreadlocks and a lot of tattoos, gave Crow an incredulous look, only selectively hearing what Skulduggery had said with all the drugs he was on. "Really? Daughter? I might not be the best dad but what the fuck dude? How'd _that_ ," he said, pointing a slack finger at Crow, "make all _that_?!"

Crow sighed and used the wind to knock the man back into the wall. He hit it with a thud and fell to his hands and knees. Valkyrie and Crow blocked the man in.

"Boris Morgans, you are under arrest for holding a mortal hostage, illegally going over the border, attempted murder and breaking out of prison," Crow said. "Now, are we going to do this the nice way or the hard way?"

He let out a hollow laugh. "Is that what you asked her Mama?"

Crow kicked him in the face and he blacked out.

"He was a nice man," Valkyrie grinned, putting the safe on and the gun in the back of her trousers again.

"You're only meant to do that when you have a shirt to cover it," Crow said, referring to the gun and hauling a handcuffed Morgans over his shoulder. Sirens wailed in the distance.

"I don't have anywhere else for it."

"You're not meant to have one, that's the point. Now hurry up."


	39. Sanctuary party

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 39**

The thirteenth of December crept up on them and before Valkyrie even knew it, she was getting ready for the ball with Tanith.

"I still can't believe he hasn't asked," Valkyrie said, helping tie Tanith into her dress.

"Me either," she said, standing straight and looking in the mirror. "I figured he'd do it when he gave me the dress."

"Me too." She tied it in a loose bow at the bottom and tucked the excess in the dress, then took the sash that went around the middle and tied that in a more elaborate, pretty bow over the little hole the corset ribbons had just gone into.

Tanith's dress was beautiful, and they had already decided it was something Panda very specifically wanted to see Tanith in. It was deep blue, with a corset top and sash, and had hand sewn sparkles and silver thread making vines from the floor right up to the sweetheart neckline. The royal blue was perfect with Tanith's blonde hair, which was still in curlers.

Taking the large shawl they were using to protect the dresses from makeup, Valkyrie threw it over Tanith. Then it was her turn. She had a black dress this time, with pink heals below, though she doubted anyone would see. The dress was a ballgown, like Tanith's, and the skirt had a layer of netting over the top with sparkles over just like stars in the night sky. She had helped design and make it in her free time.

Hers was easy to get in and after the corset had been done up, she wrapped up in her own shawl in hopes of not getting any hairspray or makeup on the black as night dress and went to putting on her makeup.

They had planned on nails and hair and everything, but they had ended up watching a movie, and then they had a nap, and then they were attacked and had to get a shower and now they only had a little while left. Tanith had woken up and immediately put her hair in rollers, so she would look a lot more done up than Valkyrie would.

After a thin layer of makeup, Tanith put Valkyrie's hair up in pin rolls and Valkyrie only had a little bit she had to use the hair curlers on. She helped with Tanith's hair, which just needed taking out of rollers and curling one or two loose bits, and they were done. Only half an hour late.

They ran in their bare feet downstairs and jumped into the car they were using – Gordon's old one – and Tanith drove them to the Sanctuary Ball, which was being held in an old, large building they had rented. Unknown to the other guests, it was also a trial run to see if people liked the building and area, so they could buy it as the new Sanctuary. In the car, Valkyrie and Tanith put their shoes on, hopped out, nodded to each other with as much dignity and elegance they had, and with arms hooked, walked to the door.

"Co-Head Detective Valkyrie Cain and Miss Tanith Low," Valkyrie said to the man at the door. He was very posh looking, and Reapers stood on either side of him personally.

He started searching through his notes for their names, which was stupid because they were personally invited, but they waited none the less. Finally, he found their names and ticked them off. "There – have a nice night ladies."

He bowed to them, and they curtsied just slightly for the fun of it. Valkyrie then nodded to the two Reapers and they bowed to her.

The man looked shocked.

"Have a safe night," she murmured to them, and they walked into the entrance, following the signs into the ballroom.

"What was that?" Tanith asked incredulously.

"I'll explain later," Valkyrie muttered. "Something I found in Gordon's study." It was actually something Gordon had told her via the Echo stone, but what's the difference really? "Can you see anyone?"

"Detective Cain," Meritorious said, sidling up next to her.

She smiled. "Hello Grand Mage. How are you?"

"I'm fine, thank you. You look lovely this evening, by the way, certainly older than you are."

Valkyrie laughed and noticed a group of ladies had suddenly appeared behind them. She leaned in and whispered. "You're not using me to run away, are you, sir?"

He cleared his throat. "Of course not."

"Of course, I just wanted to make sure." She stood straight. "Have you seen my family?"

"The Dead Men are scattered around. They asked me to bring you two to them when you arrived."

"And why are you on collection duty?" Tanith asked, taking one of his elbows and Valkyrie the other.

He sighed and lowered his voice further. "I don't like the crowds. I don't like all these women following me. I am happy with my work and I do not want a wife. Apparently, six hundred years avoiding people means nothing to them."

Valkyrie grinned. "Just pawn them off on Dexter and Saracen, they won't mind. Or Anton and Erskine if you start getting desperate."

"You could probably throw the easier ones at Fletcher too," Tanith said snidely.

Meritorious laughed, or rumbled was probably more appropriate. "That young man. I can't believe how much confidence children have these days. I know you have always been outspoken, Detective, but I put that down to Mr Edgley and the Dead Men. But he is something else."

"He's annoying. He doesn't know I'm dating Nadia," she admitted, still looking around for her as they slowly walked. "He wouldn't leave me alone for ages, and there was a bit of a fight because he thought I was 'leading him on'. But now he's apologised and been really nice."

"Detective," Meritorious said slowly. "You are a minor, and a Sanctuary official. If he has a tantrum, send him to me and I'll put him in his place. This is my government, my Sanctuary, my country and my party. You are allowed to do whatever you want, including openly dating your girlfriend despite him being here."

"Even send desperate women at you?"

"Not that. I'll tell Mr Renn you want to date him if you do that."

They had found Crow and Panda by then and Meritorious let them go. "What's this threatening about?" Crow asked.

"Just a little joke," Valkyrie grinned.

Meritorious gave her a wink and bowed to the two girls. "Have a lovely nice ladies. Both of you must save me a dance."

They said their goodbyes and after a curtsy, he was gone into another crowd, the hoard of women running and then stilling like some strange game of 'What time is it, Mr Wolf'.

"You are late," Crow said, putting a hand on Valkyrie's shoulder.

She moved it off. "I'm fourteen, please stop doing that. I look small and childish when you do that."

"You don't mind it normally," he said, tilting his head.

"I'm normally not at a Ball searching out my girlfriend who is constantly and annoyingly older than me."

"It's a year, that's nothing," Crow said, but didn't push. "I think she was dragged off to see some businessmen in the other room by her mother. Her father is at the bar."

"I saw. I'll find her in a moment then."

There was a moments silence and Panda coughed, gaining their attention. He looked at Tanith with a deep blush and clasped his hands in front of him. "You look lovely Miss Low."

She grinned and curtsied to him. "Thank you, it's all thanks to you after all. You look quite dashing yourself."

He went redder and held his hand out. "Would you let me get you a drink?"

She took his hand and they wandered off to get a drink together. Valkyrie grinned. "I mean, he didn't ask her out but that was still pretty close."

Crow shook his head. "I'm hoping someone else tries to tonight, so he might begin to think about it."

They left their 'place' in the hall and Valkyrie asked him if he had a date.

"Of course not," Crow said quickly, looking around himself.

"Did you even try to invite anyone?" She asked.

"No. I have no interest in dating, Valkyrie."

"What if they were really nice?"

"Perhaps, I suppose," he conceded.

"What if they wanted to date you too?"

"We'd have to see."

"Did you want to ask anyone but just didn't?"

He sighed. "I'd rather not talk about this."

"Okay." He so wanted to invite someone, she was sure of it.

They found Nadia standing with her mother and well-known businessmen. Valkyrie knew most of them by face. After her meeting with Echo-Gordon, she would have to get to know about a third of those men well, and of the some of the others, she was the anonymous benefactor of, and an investor in some of the rest. She had large favours, help and stocks in every man Nadia was talking to. Not that any of them knew it was her. They had known Gordon if it wasn't anonymous, and it seemed as if Gordon had only spoken about her at the Sanctuary and to his friends. Obviously, no one had spread rumours of her as a kid, since that wasn't boring and there was nothing to talk about, so not many people knew about her being related to Gordon.

It would be fun to play with them.

"Good evening," she said, taking Nadia's hand. "And happy birthday."

"Thank you," she said quietly back. "Valkyrie, this is Mr Holiday, Mr Harjun, Mr Green, Mr Swift, Mr Random, Mr Brink, Mr Apúrate, and Mr Bagh. Sirs, this is Co-Head and Second Detective to the Irish Sanctuary, Valkyrie Cain. This is her adopted father, Co-Head and First Detective Skulduggery Pleasant."

The men all said their hello's and were very interested in the two of them, practically ignoring Nadia and Mrs Keena despite Crow and herself standing on either side of the pair.

"Detective Cain," Mr Holiday said. Gordon had known his father, but Mr Holiday had taken over the company only four years ago after his father had a back injury. Gordon didn't like Mr Holiday. Neither man knew Gordon was an investor. "I hear you're dating Miss Robin."

Valkyrie nodded simply. "I am. We met at Mr Gifre's party last year."

He nodded and smiled at her without smiling – a movement of the lips and no more. "I also hear you quite like to antagonise Mr Bliss. I have never heard of someone who dared do that."

She smiled. "Yes, well, he gives back as much as he gets. With less emotion. I hear you just signed a deal with Mr Swift."

Mr Swift nodded and jumped into the conversation with more excitement. "Yes, oh yes, we are launching a new line of products together. With my herbal remedies and magic, and Mr Holiday's beauty lines, we have perfected the most amazing products. We predict them to be a huge success."

"I hope they are," Valkyrie said, then turned to Nadia. "Sweet, would you like to get a drink?"

She accepted and after saying their goodbyes, they escaped with Mrs Keena and Crow off to the bar. They kept ahead of Mrs Keena by seconds, forcing her politeness to make her want to talk to Crow who was standing beside her. It worked and Nadia and herself got to the bar ahead of them. Valkyrie bought them cranberry juices like they had at their last event.

"To the birthday girl," Valkyrie grinned.

"It's not my birthday anymore," Nadia said, rolling her eyes. "But thank you. Why were you so late?"

"I got messed up and lost track of time. It's all good now though. Oh, look! Tanith and Ghastly!"

They both watched Tanith and Panda who were dancing together between the other couples. Both were grinning, and they were talking about something or other that clearly amused them. Or maybe they were just lovestruck.

"They're actually so cute!" Nadia whispered. "We should dance soon."

"We will, but not yet. I don't want to risk falling in these shoes too early, you know?"

"I do. I got away with flats though," Nadia said, grinning maniacally. "My heals got in a fire somehow. No idea how that happened."

"Tragic. Hello Mrs Keena," she said quickly, seeing she had suddenly reappeared beside them with a drink.

"Valkyrie, dear, it's lovely to see you again. I love your dress," she smiled. Valkyrie's previous efforts to get her happy with her had obviously faded in the month and a bit they hadn't seen each other. It was a constant task to keep Nadia's parents happy with her. "How have you been?"

"I'm grand, I've been able to work on a few cases. The Grand Mage spoke to me on the way in and I think he's really beginning to like me. Certainly more than Skulduggery."

Crow grunted. "Yes, that _is_ strange."

"You know the Elders well, hum?" Mrs Keena asked, sipping her drink and pretending she was being casual. It didn't work well.

"Quite well, yeah," Valkyrie said. "Like I said, Meritorious gets on with me very well, and I get on with Elder Crow when I see her, but she is naturally quiet I think, so I don't exactly talk to her much and it's not the same. Now, I know a lot about Guild, but I hate him and he hates me more. He has a, er, superiority complex."

"I didn't realise. I assumed they would have all gotten on with you," she said mildly.

Valkyrie smiled tightly, hoping she wasn't going to suddenly decide she hated Valkyrie the same way she sometimes suddenly praised her. "I don't believe many people get on with him. His biggest achievements are getting married and his daughter I believe. Everything else is pure arrogance."

"You can say that again," Crow muttered. "But, this is a Sanctuary party I suppose, so let's not inflate the man's ego too much."

"Sure, sure. Hey, Nadia, do you want to dance?"

She did and they did – for almost an hour, they danced to every song on that dancefloor, giggling, smiling and talking the night away, long past when they were tired, they just wanted to talk alone and be in each other's arms. It was a lot of fun. When it was time for speeches, they joined the Dead Men near the front, holding hands.

Meritorious looked at her and he might have given her a shadow of a wink, but he also might not have, she couldn't tell. Elder Crow was in a beautiful, elegant navy dress, something different as she never wore anything other than black as far as Valkyrie had seen, something she shared with her Necromancer brethren. Guild was wearing a suit and his wife stood behind him. She looked pretty but mostly bored.

"Welcome, all, to this Sanctuary Yule Ball," Meritorious said, smiling to the crowd. "It is an honour to work beside so many mages that stand here today. I hope you have enjoyed the wine, the music and the company. We have hours to go, so I encourage you to continue way into the night. Before we do that, I wanted to thank the organisers of this party, headed by Erskine Ravel, Dead Man and a friend of mine. He did a wonderful job, far better than I thought he would."

There was a spattering of laughter, mostly female. Erskine nodded and muttered that it was better than he thought he'd make too.

"Let us remind ourselves that although our work is for the betterment of our country, it is also fundamentally about keeping ourselves a tightknit workforce that can power through any obstacle, upset and change. I thank you all for attending tonight. I want you to meet each other, gain closer bonds to people within different departments, and to enjoy your time tonight. I don't want to drag this out, so please have fun. The buffet is now open."

Valkyrie smiled to herself. She liked short speeches.

Around midnight, right after fireworks, Nadia was dragged off by her father for a dance and Valkyrie went wondering for fun. She wasn't disappointed.

"Raven," she said happily, finding Mr Solomon Wreath standing in the corner observing the party. He smiled back at her.

"Valkyrie, it is nice to see you again," he said, holding her hand. It wasn't a shake, just a hold in mid-air for a moment, a hug on a minuscule level. "I heard you were punished for speaking with me last time."

"I was, but he's apparently over it. I suppose we'll find out tonight. How have you been?"

"I'm fine, I solved a few cases within the Temple and a few outside, so it's going well. I heard recently that Tenebrae, our High Priest, has come down with a sickness but that I should not worry about it. I found bloodied tissues in his bin though, so I'll be looking more closely into that another time. I hope you are well?"

"Very, I'm grand. I'm having a lovely time. Did you get your invitation on time?"

"Sometime today, so well enough. I assume you put me on the list?"

"As a plus one of Dexter's," Valkyrie grinned. "He doesn't know though so don't say anything. It just amused me."

"Skulduggery's coming up behind you."

"Is he?" She turned just as he reached them and put a hand on her shoulder. She pushed it off again and stood to the side of them, forcing the two men to face each other.

"Wreath," Crow said. It wasn't cold or mean though, and he even bowed his head. Progress.

"Skulduggery, it's nice to see you again," Raven said neutrally. "You'll be happy to hear my nose healed nicely."

"I can see that."

Valkyrie really wanted to hear what they would say but rushed away nonetheless. She had a girlfriend to see!

Unfortunately, that same girlfriend had to leave soon, and after a quick kiss and last dance, Valkyrie walked her to the door and saw her off with her parents. The party was boring and slow after that – everyone else had either a date or someone pawned onto them by Meritorious.

By the time three in the morning came and they were leaving, she was tired. She watched from the car as Crow talked to Raven in the dark, standing close together and in quiet, rushed tones. She had no idea what they said, and never asked, but when he was walking away, Raven watched him with a smiled and Crow even turned and waved to him goodbye. She smiled and the city lights drifted her to sleep.


	40. The Murder Skull

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 40**

For Christmas, there was only one real gift Valkyrie could think of for Crow. He had a lot of things, as did all the Dead Men, as they had had four hundred years each to acquire the objects of their dreams. She couldn't quite afford to buy them all Ferrari's – well, that might have been a lie, but she still wasn't wasting her money on Ferrari's in _Ireland_ – but she had found everyone something they wanted and would like. For Crow, it wasn't so easy.

It had taken weeks, several talks cross meetings with Echo-Gordon, consultations with Nadia and finally, a figurative slap to the back of the head to work it out.

_Two weeks prior to the Ball_

"Mr Pleasant?" Fletcher asked. Crow was in a bad mood with him, so he had told Fletcher to call him that. When he got bored of that name, he'd 'forgive' Fletcher and have him switch to Skulduggery again.

"Yes?" He asked from his place at the table, reading his newspaper while they ate lunch.

"Is it true that's _not_ your real skull?"

Crow slowly put his paper down and looked up at him. "What makes you think it is not my head? Is this head not good enough?"

"Err, I don't know, I was just told by someone that it isn't your real–"

"Who is your source?"

"It was one of Kenspeckle's assistants. I forget his name. But he said that it's not your real one."

Valkyrie watched as Crow sighed and nodded. "Unfortunately, yes, he is right. My real skull was stolen while I was sleeping, or meditating as some like to point out, and I never got around to tracking it down. I'm certain it's out there but this one works fine. I won it in a poker game in the late eighties right after the original was stolen. Gordon thought it was hilarious."

"Yeah, but, like, that's really weird to have someone else's skull on."

Crow sniffed and turned back to his newspaper. "It's a fine skull. Nothing beats the original, obviously, but it is fine. I'll get around to it when I don't have annoying teenagers pestering me every few moments."

And that was how Valkyrie knew what to get him.

Cut to two days _after_ the Ball, Valkyrie stood on the side of a rainy street, looking into the trees and waiting.

No cars were around, and the buildings had either no lights on or something to shut the light out from the outside, a curtain in some but usually just a blanket or clothes rack hung with clothes.

Caelan, the person she was meeting, walked slowly out the trees and headed straight for her. He was soaked through, unlike her as she had waterproof clothes on, her usual protective ones. Her hair and face were dripping wet to match him though. As he got closer, Valkyrie could see he had been maybe nineteen or twenty when he died, bitten by a vampire some hundred years ago, with dark hair and eyes, a fairly good-looking face and too pale skin.

It had taken her a while to track him down but after hitting a dead end, Raven had heard of her quest to find the vampire and gave her a few clues the morning after the Ball.

He too looked at her closely as he approached. They had spoken twice on the phone in the last thirty-six hours and hopefully, he had done what she needed.

"Caelan?" She asked when he stopped just a metre or so away.

He nodded. "Detective Valkyrie Cain," he said slowly. He had a pleasantly deep voice, more masculine than Fletcher's, but compared to her family it was still quite boyish. His face especially but not being able to grow a beard due to being dead didn't help. She supposed she couldn't blame him for that. "I have begun to make the arrangements."

"Begun?"

"He has not said what day or time, just that he is interested in selling the item. He asked why you wanted to buy it. I said I did not know, just that you were. He mentioned another buyer. I said you would pay more."

"How much more?" She asked immediately. She was buying it for over fifteen grand already, she didn't want to go much higher.

"He didn't say anything about prices, just that he had another bidder. The Murder Skull is popular apparently," he said, tilting his head at her in a predatory way but never smiling. "Why are you meeting me alone?"

"It's a secret," she said with a small smile of her own. She wasn't alone, Tanith was a few streets away and close enough to get to her if she gave the signal. Too far away for him to detect. "I need the skull on the twentieth of this month, no later. I'll top any offer, but I want it by then. Tell him that. I'll meet in Ireland, no other country, but he can decide the meeting place. That's all."

Cealan nodded and went to leave before Valkyrie quickly asked: "Why are you doing this?"

He stopped and looked back at her, rain dripping from his long eyelashes. "You helped kill a vampire named Dusk."

"He had it coming."

"He did. I am glad he's dead."

He had left and when he was almost out of view, she went back the way she came and found Tanith. It had taken the full four days before she got a text, at eight am on the twentieth of December, that Chabon wanted to meet with her.

She had to bail on Skulduggery to go meet him, claiming it was an emergency of the highest female proportions – she was pretty sure they thought she, Tanith or someone she and Tanith knew was pregnant – and met him at a café in Dublin. She had the money in an old briefcase she had found in their home and stuffed it full. All twenty-three thousand euros, way more than she wanted to pay for the skull. But it was less than a whole new wardrobe for him, she supposed.

"Cain," he said, sitting down. "Who's this?"

"This is my associate, Miss Low," Valkyrie said. "I'm too important to my family to come back harmed, so she agreed to act as security for your safety."

Chabon nodded once though he did look less happy with Tanith the more she talked. "You have the money?"

"Twenty-three thousand," she said lowly and Tanith brought it out and placed the case on the table. Chabon turned it over and rested his hand on the top. He checked the content, as she expected him too – she had checked Sanctuary files on him before coming out – and he nodded after a few moments.

"It is," he confirmed needlessly and brought out a box from under the table. It looked like a hat box and Valkyrie unzipped it and looked in. The skull was there.

Valkyrie zipped it up and held her hand out. He shook it and within moments he was gone, as was the money, and she had the skull.

"That was easy," Tanith said, beginning to relax a little. "I expected him to run off with the money."

"Don't be too quick," she said, standing and running to the door. He was almost at the end of the street. "It's a fake!" She screamed.

He glanced back and immediately took off running.

Valkyrie ran for him, throwing herself into oncoming traffic and just darting out the way of it before she got hit, getting to the other side of the street and making a beeline for the man. If only she could work out Weasel's magic, she would know exactly where he was! She chased him down the streets with Tanith at her heels, unable to trip him up with _any_ of the magic she knew because of the pedestrians around them, and they were all too in the way for Tanith to really run at him!

He got to the end of an alley, looked back at her, cursed, and kept going.

They got onto a long stretch of road not too long after though and he obviously didn't factor in that Tanith Low was one of the fastest runners around – in moments, she covered the metres between them, and there had been a lot, and tackled him to the floor.

Valkyrie reached them, grabbed the briefcase and knelt down beside him. Some people looked on but mostly it was older ladies keeping their heads down and moving on.

"Where's the real Murder Skull?" She asked lowly.

"I had it!" He shouted in pain. "I had it on the phone, I had it this morning! But when you have an item someone wants, usually someone else does too! So I sold it to someone that paid triple!"

"Fuck," Valkyrie said, wetting her lips. It was Christmas, damnit. "Who to?"

"I don't know, it was a pair," he said. "A woman and a man, both in suits, they were really happy to get it. They didn't speak much."

"Tell us something we can use to find them or else."

He glared at her, but Tanith moved the arm she had behind his back and he shrieked before she let it relax a little and he started to sweat in pain. "The man was practically a maniac. I said I wouldn't work with him again, all he wanted to know was about you. His partner had that two-eye thing, one blue one green."

"Heterochromia," Tanith said. "Davina Marr."

"Aww, shoot," Valkyrie said, standing up.

Tanith got up and pulled the man to his feet. He took a few breaths and tried to get the briefcase, but Valkyrie held it back. "Give me my money," he said, looking frazzled.

"You got your money from Crux and Marr," Valkyrie shrugged. "I paid for the Murder Skull, I didn't get it. You don't get anything for nothing."

They left and didn't bother going home or doing anything else, they just got on Tanith's motorcycle and she drove them to the Sanctuary, stopping only to call Fletcher and ask him to take the briefcase back which he did but only because he thought it was full of tampon or pregnancy tests and didn't want to know any more information than they gave. When he was gone, they went into the Waxworks museum where the Sanctuary was stationed until it moved sometime in the next few months.

The Administrator came to meet them when they came in. "Detective Cain, is there anything I can get you?"

"I need to speak to the Elders and Crux and Marr," she said. "Are any of them busy?"

"No, the detectives, Grand Mage and Elder Crow are in a meeting together, and Elder Guild is on a break at the moment, he may be up to half an hour," the Administrator said. "I can schedule you in for after their meeting?"

"Don't worry, they're expecting me."

Tanith popped off to the toilet and to get a drink as she was not a Sanctuary employee nor a Dead Man or Dead Man apprentice, so didn't get the privileges Valkyrie did. She knocked on the Grand Mages door alone.

"Come in," Meritorious said. She opened it and found Marr sat in one seat before the Grand Mage's desk, Crux on his feet having just been stopped furiously saying something, and Elder Crow sitting in a chair beside Meritorious. He smiled at her. "Head Detective Cain," he smiled, making the peasant detectives glare at her. "I was just having a meeting with our newest recruit, Detective Marr, and Detective Crux. We teamed them up as partners as that works so well for yourself and Detective Pleasant."

"Yes, it is a good system," she said, keeping her face blank and refusing to look at the skull on the table. "If one of us dies, the other can call for backup."

He looked as if he might smile but didn't.

"Sir," Crux said loudly. "Sir, this is what I am telling you about. She is too young, too immature and is running around on a fools' mission. I doubt the Dead Men know she is here."

"They don't," Valkyrie agreed.

"See?" He snarled, or maybe smiled, or maybe stated, she couldn't tell, it was a bit of all. "She cannot be trusted."

"Detective Crux, we have been over your views on Detective Cain, but I am certain in my decision. She is a good detective and I believe we must invest in the future. Valkyrie, as a young mage, is our future and we cannot cut the younger generation out. Now, if you truly have nothing new–"

"Grand Mage, if I may," Marr said, standing and putting her hand on top of the skull on the desk. Meritorious looked at her and said nothing. Elder Crow was silent as usual. "Miss Cain has been running around the country talking to criminals, lowlifes and vampires for weeks. I have heard she has made contact on several occasions, including at the Sanctuary Yule Ball, with Solomon Wreath, a _Temple_ Necromancer. All to get an item, this skull, which has nothing to do with any case she is on but using her status as a Sanctuary detective to track. For one, it is inappropriate behaviour, but it is also concerning to see in one so young. It is troubling me that she wants _this_ skull, the Murder Skull. It is a known artefact to bring the owner death."

Meritorious nodded, considering what she said. He waved his hand down and she sat, hand never leaving the skull. "Detective Cain, could you please tell me your own side of the story?"

"Twenty years ago, Skulduggery Pleasant went to a small town in the Irish countryside to deal with complaints of a poltergeist haunting a local Church. He found there was no poltergeist but there were goblins, and he camped out to catch the culprits who wanted a solid gold cross in the building and went into his usual meditative sleep. However, he went too deep and remained asleep as the goblins went into his camp and took his head off. He got a new head in a poker game."

"And?" Marr asked, confused after Valkyrie gave a pause.

"That skull, the Murder Skull, is Skulduggery Pleasant real head. The one he wears is someone else's," she said simply, smirking when Marr snatched her hand back from the skull. "I tracked it down as a Christmas present, but you accused me of horrible things and bought it this morning so that I wouldn't be able to. Using Sanctuary money. He said you paid triple, but when he tried to fool me, I paid twenty-three thousand euro. I wonder, Grand Mage, did they tell you they spent almost seventy-thousand on Skulduggery's head?"

Elder Crow shook her head and Meritorious put his thumb and finger on his nose and leant his head forwards. Leading on his elbows he said in his deep voice to the other detective party, "Detectives, you have continuously tried and failed to have me fire Detective Cain. She merely wanted the skull as a Christmas present for her partner."

Marr looked angry, but Crux was absolutely furious.

"Due to your inability to keep orders, Detective Crux, I will be putting you on probation for the next three months–"

"Sir–"

"No!" He boomed. Crux almost cried. "Both of you will be paying off the excess cost this skull was bought with, making a total of twenty-nine thousand each, to be worked off or paid in a lump sum, talk to the Administrator for more details. Detective Crux, you are on probation for inappropriately invading someone else's privacy. If you truly believed Detective Cain was buying something inappropriate, you should have made a meeting with ourselves and the Dead Men to discuss the event, not bought an item, close to Christmas mind you, with a Sanctuary card you are not allowed to spend above ten thousand on at any time regardless of the item. That is all, I will see you and review the situation in March."

He looked as if he would fight it, but then bowed and left the room.

"Detective Marr, you are being placed on paperwork for the next three weeks and will return to active duty after that. Do not allow Detective Crux's shortcomings to affect your own work. See this as a second chance. Take the rest of the day off. Good day."

Detective Marr, a very new employee, nodded and left without even looking at Valkyrie. Finally, it was just her and the two Elders. "Am I allowed the skull?" She asked hopefully.

He sighed. "It was bought by the Sanctuary – officially – for ten thousand. Can you pay for that?"

"Do you take card?"


	41. Fletcher finds out on Christmas

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 41**

Christmas day was lovely, starting with a call to Nadia and going on to everyone being delivered tea to their bedrooms by Skulduggery, letting them wake up slowly. That was ruined for Valkyrie when Snake came running into her room when she was halfway through her cup and jumped on her bed.

"It's Christmas!" He shouted, bouncing on the bed animatedly. "Come on, I want to do presents!"

Valkyrie laughed, finished her tea quickly and jumped onto him. They rolled around, fighting and trying to grab the other but Snake was simply far stronger than her and he rolled them up and she was over his shoulder, looking at his arse. He laughed like a maniac and ran down the hall banging on the walls, Valkyrie's laughing screams accompanying him.

Snake ran them downstairs, the others coming at a slower rate behind them.

They went to the big living room they always ended up at, where they had lovingly put up their tree. Just a few days earlier they had all gone out and have fun choosing one, cutting it down and trying to make it stand up straight. Then had been the fun of decorating it. They had normal baubles and a little angel, but the angel had been put upside down with her little pipe cleaner legs bent open to securely hang on two branches and an enthusiastic reindeer had been placed above her. She hadn't found out who did that yet, but she was almost certain it was Tanith.

There was toilet roll where someone had tepeed it at night, also unknown as to who, and they had put one of Skulduggery's hats at the top as a star, alongside cut out pictures of them all stabbed ominously onto the branches which were enhanced by the dagger, toothbrush, tinsel, way too many lights and a bunch of tea bags. It was a beautiful sight, and to make it better Valkyrie had already taken a picture, framed it and hung it on the tree for all to see.

Under it, though, was the best part.

The presents!

Valkyrie and Snake jumped at them and sat between their feet looking at it excitedly, waiting for the others to sit around. Fletcher popped in in a Santa hat and Valkyrie pushed him with her excitement, making him fall over to everyone's amusement. They had all placed the presents they had wrapped in a pile, leaving the separating for the day of – Valkyrie and Snake helped speed up the process by pushing the piles to the owners.

"Do we want to do person by person or all at once?" Crow asked, sitting on a sofa next to Bear. Panda would have sat like an adult too, but Tanith was on the floor and if Tanith were on the floor, Panda surely followed.

"All at once!" Tanith, Dexter, Erskine, Fletcher and Valkyrie demanded at once and started separating their presents, throwing or passing them to the person they were for depending on who they were for. It had taken some convincing to get Fletcher to participate after the Ball – he had left right near the start after a little argument with Crow, but it was settled now, mostly because Valkyrie forced them to talk.

When all the passing had been done, they sat with their piles of presents, each with nine. Under the tree were a few more from friends. Crow was the odd one out with just eight as Valkyrie planned a grand unveiling for his.

They did a little countdown and tore the paper apart. Valkyrie didn't look who each one was from, she could tell just by what it was. Wolf's happened to be first, and she got a set of shawls, headscarves and several outfits that certainly wouldn't look out of place or stupid if and when we went to India with Nadia as they wanted to, and would keep her skin protected from the sun, primarily her scalp that always tried to blister if it burnt, and she'd be able to visit some famous places she'd need headscarves for. She'd have to ask how to wear them though. All the colours he picked for her were just amazing!

Moving on to a smaller sized gift, she opened it to find a little charm, a hand-crafted heart made of wood. It was from Bear of course. She had six now, all for her bracelet and all hearts made of different materials. She hadn't noticed the pattern for a long time, and she placed this new one carefully on the clothes for later.

Weasel came next and had gotten her tickets for the final of the All-Irish football that coming summer which she was really excited for, as well as a new football shirt she could wear, and she slipped it on over the top of her pyjamas which was just an old top of one of her brothers.

Crow had gotten her a card, in which it stated he had gotten her a new set of weights already in the gym for her.

Tanith had gotten Valkyrie her own helmet for riding her bike with her, and inside it was a lipstick she had mentioned wanting and a matching nail varnish.

Panda got her a new pair of work shoes and tops for going into summer that were lighter but just as effective, as well as some gorgeous looking normal trousers she could wear on the everyday. She was beginning to struggle to find clothes that properly fit now she was gaining so much muscle on her legs, plus she was having a lot of growth spurs that were making her legs miles long. Not bad to look at, but if she wasn't careful, she'd have to wear shorts forever. Not that Nadia would complain. But clothes that fit was sort of nice.

Fletcher had just got her chocolates, not knowing what she liked most likely, and Snake, finally, had gotten her a pink phone case, book she wanted, stationary in camo colours, and a nice padlock that only opened to her magical signature and was a really good one because it would work even if anti-magic wards came up, so she could put it in the Sanctuary and her locker was finally secure! She had been a little worried.

She grinned around the room, looking at the other's piles, noting who got more or less. Surprisingly, Fletcher had gotten the same size as her, the Dead Men putting away their annoyance for the day by getting him thoughtful gifts. It was really sweet because Fletcher looked genuinely touched and happy that they had thought about him. He had thought, like Valkyrie, they wouldn't have bothered. She felt bad for thinking that of them. They really were some of the kindest people in the world.

"Crow," she said, stopping the thanking and talking that was going between their group. He looked over and took the offered gift.

"I wonder," he said, looking at the box warily, "what you possibly thought is so incredible you made an announcement for it."

She frowned. "I didn't announce it."

"As good as."

"Just open the damn thing. I worked hard on it and you'll bloody enjoy it."

He laughed and opened the box, seeing his head within. He stared at it for a moment and then said, "Oh."

There was a moment of silence and Crow picked up the Murder Skull. They all stared at it.

"It's the Murder Skull," Valkyrie explained. "The same one stolen from you twenty years ago. I got it for you. And it was the biggest hassle I've ever bothered with so don't you dare lose it again."

He smiled at her and, placing it in Panda's hands, reached for his current head and, twisting, pulled it off. Fletcher might have peed himself a little. They all watched him with wide eyes.

The new one was placed in Crow's hands and he carefully put it on his neck. After moving it left and right a few times, it clicked loudly.

"There we go," he said, tilting his head at Valkyrie. "How do I look?"

She shrugged. "The exact same."

He sagged. "No, these cheekbones are much higher."

"I don't see it."

"Me either," Fletcher chipped in.

Crow sighed.

They made a big cooked breakfast just like Valkyrie had always done for Christmas with her other family. When they had eaten and were stuffed, Bear and Panda began preparing the meat whilst Weasel, Fletcher and Wolf started peeling, chopping and otherwise preparing the vegetables.

Valkyrie and the others got to go get dressed.

When she was ready, she put on a little makeup and did her hair in a pretty plait – it took a few tries – and then finally she took a picture of herself and sent it to Nadia. She got a text back moments later saying how lovely she looked and congratulating her for finally mastering plaiting. She left her room and almost shrieked when Fletcher teleported right in front of her. Tanith came out of her room blushing about something at the same time.

"Who are you talking to?" Fletcher asked, trying to spy on Valkyrie's phone.

"Nadia," she frowned, looking at Tanith. "Who have _you_ been talking to?"

She grinned through the blush. "No one you need to know about. Have you opened Nadia's present yet?"

"No, I'm going to open it now," she said, beginning to walk down the hall. The blondes followed her.

"Why did you do presents? Is it another girl thing?" Fletcher grimaced.

"She got me presents because she wanted to," Valkyrie said. "I got her presents because I have to or she'd be very, very upset with me."

"You sound like an old, grumpy man," he commented as she sat down in front of the tree. He sat next to her. "That would make Nadia your wife."

Valkyrie nodded and ignored the joke. She really needed to tell him but not on Christmas day, just in case he did flip out… perhaps the assault at the swim competition had affected her more than she thought. Just thinking that made her feel nauseous so yeah, probably.

Shaking the dark thoughts away, she pulled all the remaining presents out and found what was for her. She had several from Nadia, one from Kenspeckle, Civet and Stentor, and several from various relatives but mostly there was a giant stack of cards just for her. Last year had been the same and all of them had had money as a present in them for her so she wasn't allowed to open her cards this year until Christmas day. Now was that time.

She started on those, knowing they would take the longest. The highlights included a card from China, from Kenspeckle and his staff (it had been posted instead of giving it to her), and one from Meritorious and Elder Crow. Guild hasn't signed it but that just made her and Tanith laugh. Valkyrie had actually sent all those people cards as well and she was impressed with her predictions. She also had some from maybe a dozen people she had helped in the past year.

The rest were relatives with the money gifts. She hadn't sent them cards.

She opened relatives presents next, all of which being things somehow to do with her parents or Gordon, or a book or a movie. It was nice, and she didn't want to criticise something they bought for her, but it was very samey and not very personalised for her as a person. Then again, she hadn't wanted to go see anyone since the reunion and so hadn't. They couldn't be blamed for not knowing someone that didn't want to see them.

She opened the one from the doctor and assistants' next, finding they had put together a little home medical care for her many little bruises and scrapes and cuts. It was a thoughtful gift, and it looked as if Civet and Stentor had snuck in a chocolate bar without Kenspeckle noticing. Or maybe he did know. She couldn't be sure behind those bushy eyebrows. They made him look grumpy all the time!

She was left with the ones from Nadia after that, three in total. She had gotten her some lovely things, a locket with a picture on one side and the words 'I love you, always' on the other. The outside was plain, but Valkyrie did see a very tiny signal Nadia had drawn into, making the metal practically indestructible. She could wear it out without ruining it, a necessity for Valkyrie. Next was a gift card for a milkshake place Valkyrie loved, enough for three big shakes that she was very excited about.

Finally, Nadia had gotten her a book, a scrapbook she had begun compiling with little bits of their relationship over the last year. Forgetting Fletcher, she opened it and saw the little pictures they had together and had sent to each other every few mornings, of letters they had written each other for fun, of some texts they had sent each other.

It had sketches Nadia had done of them, of their faces, of them together, of their dresses, of some random things that were just beautiful. Several were of Valkyrie dancing, and one of her in her swimming cozzy, a little note beside it Nadia had written that Valkyrie read, saying how brave and beautiful she thought Valkyrie was, relating to the attack but not directly saying it. Valkyrie had almost cried reading it.

Tanith read it over her shoulder and kissed her cheek in support.

"Oh," Fletcher said from beside her.


	42. Christmas, spoiled by Crux and Marr

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 42**

Tanith and Valkyrie looked at him. He was looking at the book, at the beautiful sketches Nadia had drawn over the double page spread they were on, the ones of Valkyrie's swimming competition.

This was not something she wanted to do today.

"Fletcher?" She said quietly. He stared a moment longer and then looked up at her, obviously trying not to look as disappointed as he obviously was.

"What happened?" He asked, looking back at the text Nadia had written in beautiful cursive.

Valkyrie swallowed. "I was attacked at a swimming competition a few months back, in June. It was a hate crime."

"Because you were, are, dating that girl," he said. "Your friend Nadia."

"My girlfriend, yes," she said quietly. She felt stupid now, wanting to cry. She barely knew the boy, what did it matter if he approved or not? She swallowed and held the emotions back. A moment later she felt better. "We started dating almost as soon as we met each other."

"A year ago," he remembered her saying. "And you didn't say anything."

"Well," she said, letting her temper take over, not wanting to deal with stroppy boys. "I kept telling you not to bother, that I didn't want to date you no matter what, so don't you dare start saying I was leading you along."

"I wasn't," he said seriously, looking her in the eye. She backed down a little, not used to seeing him look so upset and serious. "I was wondering why you didn't tell me."

"Because I didn't want to."

"Why?"

"Because I just didn't! It wasn't your business, then it wasn't the time, then I just didn't care if you knew or not, and then I felt like it was too late to say anything. I wanted you to stop annoying me because I said so, not because I was dating someone else," she finished lamely. Tanith put a hand on her back but said nothing.

Fletcher licked his lips. "No. You were scared."

Valkyrie started, feeling the emotions well up but not wanting to get into that on freaking _Christmas_ , so she turned to her aggression again. "I was _not,_ you dolt."

"I wouldn't have cared," he said. "I'm offended you think I would have. At least after everything else. You could have said in the last two weeks."

She shrugged. She didn't have anything to say. It was true, she could and should probably have mentioned something with the amount of time she spent talking about Nadia with absolutely everyone. Then again, she hadn't been entirely subtle about it.

"You didn't trust me to be a good person," he said, his upset coming through more. "Who cares if I was asking you out, you should have still said! You don't trust me."

She could only shrug again.

"I live with you," he pointed out incredulously. "I haven't done anything. I've annoyed you, but I haven't ever hurt you. I've never said anything that would make you not trust me. Why?"

"I just didn't know you well enough," she said, closing the book. "I didn't want to. Okay? There’s no reason I need to tell you, Fletcher, so don’t act so entitled."

Fletcher sighed and they all stood up as Valkyrie got all her stuff together to take to her room. They followed her up the stairs silently and, for the first time, Fletcher came into her room. She put it on her bed and noticed suddenly that the back of the locket, which has slid onto the bed when she put it down, and an engraving of an ice-cream cone on, a silly little tribute to their relationship and it almost made her cry again because she realised although Nadia had found it fun at the time, she might have been upset and offended that Valkyrie made her say nothing about their relationship when they’d gotten pizza with Fletcher.

She never even asked for her opinion, never get her a choice. Just told her they were pretending, and Nadia just took it.

She was an awful person.

Valkyrie was going to start storming around in place for crying when Fletcher pulled her in for a hug.

She fought it at first but when the tears came, she let herself be held. There were only a few tears, but it was nice to let the frustration out. After, she stepped back from him and he smiled at her.

"You're still my friend," he said. "You always were mine, even if I wasn't yours."

She gave him a wet smile and laughed a little. "Yeah, you were quite annoying. Thank you."

"It's nothing," he said, then glanced at Tanith. "But, err, maybe don't mention it to the others you cried, or I might be killed and stuff."

Both girls laughed properly then because it was probably true, and Fletcher disappeared from her room before someone turned up and found him, while Tanith helped fix her makeup. When they were ready, they joined their family for the meal making.

The day was fast, fun and good after that, they all were amused when Fletcher got a cream pie in Weasel's face and he was the star of the day to Wolf for it. The food was incredible and way more than the eight of them could eat, but Bear had packed it all away into meals for another day before they had even gotten over their food comas after the main meal.

They had snacks for the rest of the day. Weasel and Wolf had received several gifts of chocolates from people they wouldn't identify, so they all got to share the chocolates and sat around watching Father Christmas, then The Snowman, followed by The Snowman and the Snowdog. It was tradition to Valkyrie. After that was just blobbing around, nothing interesting happened, just naps, laughs and jokes within them all.

It was a good Christmas overall.

**.*****.**

The doorbell rang.

Valkyrie looked around the room at everyone lying around. No one made a single move to get up. She sighed and stood. "I guess I'll get it then."

There were grunts around the room. They were all lying on someone else – the most amusing being Panda who was lying with his head in Tanith's lap and legs sprawled over Wolf's in a weave of limbs. Wolf was lying with his head on a pillow, which was lying on Crow's legs. They were all so close none of them so much as questioned it. Bear got out of it by letting Valkyrie lay on him as she often did. He wasn’t a big fan of physical contact.

It was an effort to move, and she found she needed to pee too, and hoped whoever was at the door was quick. She didn't think there were any carol singers in their areas.

It was knocked again just as she got to it and she opened it before they finished.

"Oh," she said, seeing Crux and Marr on the other side. "You two."

"Hello, Cain," Crux said with a fake smile.

"What?"

"Miss Cain, may we come in?" Marr asked formally. "We wish to tell your friends a Merry Christmas."

Valkyrie threw her hands up and let them in. Their fault for making her answer the door. "Through there."

They looked around with great interest and Valkyrie knew they were looking around the place for exits, entrances, escapes and hiding places. Anything to hold against them.

They went straight to the main living area where her family was sprawled. Crow looked over.

"Oh," he said. "You two."

Marr sighed in a frustrated tone. This was already going well. "Detective Pleasant, Dead Men, we just wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas," she said in a bored tone.

Crux was looking at the tree, appalled. "What did you do?"

Valkyrie stepped further into the room, noting most of her friends had barely opened an eye to see their guests and had immediately closed them again. "We had fun with it," Valkyrie said shortly. "I'm not sure you know what that is though. You can borrow the dictionary if you want."

His lips raised into a snarl and Valkyrie had never seen him look so angry, insane or ugly.

"Just joking," she said, smiling and settling into Bears arms to continue texting Nadia. "You might break it. Is there anything you needed?"

"Detective Pleasant, how is your gift?" Marr asked, looking at him with a strained, fake smile.

He looked over at her from the book he was reading. "I am enjoying it immensely. This is my happy face. Can't you tell?"

Marr looked as if she was going to say something and then realised there was no point and just closed her mouth instead. She changed the subject. "Detective Pleasant, I'm going to be frank – there has been a startling amount of reports coming in recently about Miss Cain running riot in the area, as well as reports of abuse and neglect. We have permission to search your house, interview Miss Cain and you all to find out what has been happening."

Valkyrie and Crow looked at her. The others still didn't bother. "You realise you're being ridiculous right?" Crow said after a moment.

Valkyrie took over before they started arguing. "Look, there is no abuse happening and if it was, all of it is happening to them, not me. They beat each other up regularly. _I_ am happy and healthy. But more than that, what type of permission do you have to conduct any type of search on my home?"

Marr pulled a few sheets of paper out with a flourish and gave them to her, almost taking her eye out. She said nothing, and Valkyrie looked over the sheets.

They were not from the Elders but rather the department dealing with minors, orphans, abuse cases and domestic violence. It said that 'Officer Marr and Detective Crux' were entitled to lead the investigation. Unfortunately, that paperwork was official and legitimate. And as a Sanctuary official, she had to lead by example by allowing an investigation into this subject happen to encourage reporting abuse and allowing investigations on people in authority to take place. Even if it wasn't true and, honestly, quite offensive. She hated her job sometimes.

She stood up and gave the papers to Crow. Some of the others were waking up now. "You can interview us and search the grounds," she said, "but he can't."

"Now listen here–" Crux started.

"No, you can shut up. You are on probation for the next two months and a week at least. That is for all and any work. I will be reporting you for coming here at all, let alone trying to trick other departments into thinking you have authority still. Marr can stay but you have to leave. Now."

"Miss Cain, this type of investigation has to be handled in partnerships," she started trailing off when she noticed literally everyone in the room was glaring viciously at her.

"He's out. Call someone else if you have to."

It took more arguing but once Fletcher stood up and offered to teleport Crux away, he did go. He stayed in the car too, as Weasel said. Marr, however, ran around the house looking at everything. She was allowed the look in the basement where “ _stuff_ ” was, the cellar where wine and “more _stuff_ ” was, cooler where food and more alcohol was and finally the emergency underground cellar all the Christmas stuff was in but at one point had been converted to a bomb shelter, as well as the ground floor without accompaniment. It took hours and Panda really had fallen asleep by then, trapping Crow, Wolf and Tanith. Valkyrie followed her to the first floor.

It was awkward going around the bedrooms. She very, very rarely went into her brother's rooms just as they didn’t go into hers, it was just personal boundaries and respect they gave each other. To watch Marr rooting around their draws and under the bed wasn't fun, especially when she made tutting noises every time she found a packet of condoms and threw them to the floor with disgust. She made a note every time, and it was all a little too staged for Valkyrie. She went through Tanith's room more carefully, apparently thinking Tanith was somehow abusing Valkyrie more. 

_Then again_ , she thought to herself, _Tanith did technically punch me more. But with gloves and at the gym._ Tanith also had a surprising amount of condoms. Enough that it went past awkward and weird, and straight to the point of being hilarious. She must bulk buy, that was the only thing Valkyrie could imagine.

Her own room was checked even more rigorously, and she had to sit on the bed to avoid being embarrassed. Marr went in _every_ draw. She found the _sex_ gloves Tanith had got her but thank God Marr hadn't known what they were for as Valkyrie had sneakily put her medical supplies on top to make them look medical-ish. She'd never be able to touch them again.

The rest of the room was mostly embarrassment free, just a few pairs of dirty clothes under the bed and her wash basket overflowing. She followed her through the rest of the house, leaving Gordon's office, quite obviously, for last.

Crow came up the stairs and stood with her and she started rooting through his paperwork and other things. Valkyrie had never tidied it except to send his manuscript off.

It was when Marr dropped a box of awards on the floor that Valkyrie anger was beginning to get too much. She had spent almost all evening going through her house and now she was breaking things. And there was no evidence for any abuse or anything else she said. She barely thought it was worth it anymore. "Be more careful," she snapped.

"This is an investigation Miss Cain," Marr said silkily, inspecting a book with interest and taking evidence pictures. It was a book on cannibalistic tribes. "Do not attempted to interfere."

"No, it's a walkthrough to see if there is evidence suggesting an investigation is needed. You're meant to literally just walk around and talk to me. That's it. I've been very gracious but if you break anything or put a single other thing out of place, I swear I will get you fired."

She just smirked and went over to the opposite bookcase and started going through the books. She tried to hide it but Valkyrie did start getting nervous – that bookcase contained the leaver to the Echo stone and Marr was pulling every book without a name and there wasn't anything Valkyrie could do to stop it.

"Crow, could you get me a drink?" She asked.

He nodded. "Sure," and held up a glass of water he'd brought up for her.

 _Shit_. "Oh, thank you." That hadn't worked at all. Echo-Gordon didn't want anyone to know he existed!

There was ultimately nothing she could do, and Marr found the leaver. Valkyrie stood back as Marr opened the door and found Gordon, and Crow greeted him like the long-lost friend he was. Gordon thanked him for taking Valkyrie and looking after her so well, then insulted Marr.

She was forced to leave by the Dead Men after nearly an hour of her asking them pointless questions, such as, "Why do you all have condoms," and "How often do you sleep in this house." She had to leave as per the terms of the document as she had spent nearly four hours in the house doing as she wanted and hadn't found any reason to stay. Bear and Weasel watched them leave.

Valkyrie snuck away as Gordon and the Dead Men got to know each other, leaving Tanith to sleep so she could be surprised in the morning.

She felt bad for his secret to be out but now that it was, she thought Gordon was getting on better with his friends than he expected and didn't mind it so bad. She texted Nadia quickly, telling her a little of what happened and that she loved her and fell asleep on her bed. It had been a good, but tiring day. Even Marr and Crux couldn’t ruin it.


	43. Locked away

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 43**

Three days after Christmas and everything was going back to business. Valkyrie had made a meeting with the Elders, Crow and head department responsible for sending Marr and Crux to her home.

She arrived early and sat with Crow at the roundtable. Only Guild and Meritorious were going to be there as Elder Crow was working on other meetings with other people. Valkyrie had been impressed the three officials had made time for her meeting at all.

They sat in silence waiting for the others for a few minutes before Meritorious arrived early. He sighed and sat down opposite Valkyrie.

"Detectives," he said tiredly. "Can I ask what this meeting is about?"

"It is about Detectives Marr and Crux," Valkyrie said, then tapped the documents she had on the table in front of her. "Read this."

He did and by the time he was finished, everyone else was sitting around the table. Marr and Crux were absent as Valkyrie hadn't wanted them ruining her speaking time. Meritorious put the papers down and slid them over to the head of the department responsible for issuing it, Mr Lament, who looked them over blankly and gave them to Crow. He slid them back to Valkyrie who was heading the meeting.

"Thank you for agreeing to meet with me today on such short notice," she said formally. They nodded. "I don't want to take up all of our time today, so I'll be quick. Elder Guild, please read these papers while I address Mr Lament." He took them with a contentious look but read them because everyone else had. "Mr Lament, as you have read on those papers, your department issued for my property to be assessed by Detectives Crux and Marr as well as allow them to interview myself and the Dead Men for signs of abuse and neglect within the home. That is correct?"

He coughed slightly and nodded, staring at the table. He wasn't comfortable addressing her it seemed. "Yes, these papers were issued by my department. I also gave my permission for it to happen although it is not written there."

Valkyrie nodded to him, a polite thank you of sorts for making her life easier and being upfront about what happened. "And to get an issue at all, Detectives Marr and Crux would have presented evidence for such a warrant."

"Yes," he said. "I did not hear it from them personally, but it is written on the documents. Public questions and worries over a child being used for work, underfed, overworked, tired all of the time, not being allowed to do schoolwork, shouted at, beaten. It is all in the papers. I was only consulted as the assessor who wrote the issue wanted to be certain with me before they allowed the detectives to go to the Dead Men. I believe they were nervous."

"Yes," she said. Many people were nervous of them. "And according to that document, it was issued on the twenty-third. The Detectives, firstly, were meant to be in my house immediately as this is an estimated moderate to high violence case, correct? And I did not see them at my doorstep until the evening of Christmas day. Not only that, but they lied to get into my house and only after insulting my home did they present the documents. I'd also like the have the Elder's confirm that, firstly, Detective Marr is meant to just be on desk duty and secondly, Detective Crux is on probation. Why were they at my house and why did you send them?"

The man began to look a little flustered when Meritorious confirmed the punishments and also pointed out they had acted maliciously to Valkyrie before. "They were just doing their job," he said pathetically. "I didn't know they were not allowed to work; I had no staff to send out and they have the qualifications. I wanted it to be sorted as soon as possible, as with all cases."

"We are not suggesting," Crow said quickly, "that the case should not have been checked, as it was a serious accusation that needed investigating, but it was gone about inappropriately. Not only that, Marr went through the home for hours, more than she was allowed, and never found any evidence. She moved things, went through clothes, went through our kitchen, messed up our offices, and went into Valkyrie's deceased Uncle's office, broke sentimental items and when mementoes of his life were uncovered," he meant the Echo stone, "she insulted them in front of Valkyrie. We want her and Crux to be punished for their behaviour not only in targeting Valkyrie but also for Marr's actions within our home."

The meeting was fairly quick after that, just as Valkyrie predicted. Marr and Crux were banned from entering any department other than their own. Crux was given a further six months probations as well as giving up his Sanctuary equipment, and Marr was put on probation also. That was all they had come for. Except maybe getting them fired but as Meritorious had previously told them, they were understaffed and needed workers.

Guild shot out of his seat and the meeting room immediately, and Mr Lament left after apologising to Valkyrie. "That went well," she said. "And he seemed like a nice man."

"Yes," Meritorious said, looking at her. "You truly do live up to your name. If anything else happens, I might be able to fire Crux though, so keep an eye out."

Valkyrie smirked and Meritorious left with a reminder about a case he had given them.

.*****.

New Year's passed them in a flurry of snow and spring was on them before anyone knew it. Bear spent much of his time at his hotel with the surge of customers wanting to holiday, and Panda was constantly working on someone's dress or designer bikini, leaving discarded drawings of bras and skirts all over the house for the others to taunt him with.

As it was, most of the others were in and out of the house also. Tanith had her citizenship finally and Crow was always with her, but all the others had adventures to go on with the heat coming in.

Well, all in other countries. There was no heat in Ireland, not even in June, just rain and women stubbornly hearing shorts because it's spring, damnit!

Skipping to April, Valkyrie was eating bits of an Easter egg Snake had sent her in the post – it had arrived miraculously intact and almost as big as her arm – and doing paperwork in the joint office, Dead Man territory within the Sanctuary.

Her own desk, something that had appeared in the Dead Man office after she became co-Head, was near the front as much of the staff liked to dump things with her instead of sorting it or going too far into the room. It really annoyed Valkyrie, so she just left it there to pile up. Unfortunately, that backfired – Crow was making her do it all while he was healed in the Sanctuary of two broken legs. Having a criminal with them, Valkyrie had driven the Bentley to the Sanctuary. It had been fun for her!

Not for Crow.

Or the criminal who threw up as soon as they got him out, but he was a murder anyway.

So that was why she was all alone in the office when Crux walked in.

Valkyrie glanced up from her paperwork on a case weeks ago and sighed internally before getting back to her writing. "Is there something I can do for you?" She asked coldly.

He huffed and smacked something onto the desk making papers fly everywhere. "What the hell do you call this?"

Valkyrie glanced at it with her eyes. "It's the report for the Five-Faced Man," she said.

He growled and flipped it opened to the section she had written what had happened in it - he had been brought in from his probation much to everyone's disappointment because two other detectives had died in the line of duty and another was pregnant. He was only allowed to do paperwork and filing, only allowed in certain rooms. "And this?!"

She sighed and sat up. "It's what happened. I already know it. I ran the investigation and wrote that."

"It's utter bullshit," he snarled lowly. "Rubbish, all of it. What do you want me to do with it?"

"File it?" She said, giving him a mean look. "Like, now, because I'm busy."

He reached over and slapped her, and Valkyrie finally realised how close to the breaking point he was. If it had been different, she'd have shouted and hit him back. As it was, she took a not-so-calming breath and attempted to look at him blankly. "Detective Crux," she said slowly, looking at his crooked nose, "I'll ask you once, kindly, to leave this office or I'll call for the Cleavers."

"You shouldn't even have that power," he said, pushing forward so hard the desk moved several inches into her and his face was almost touching hers. "You're just a child."

"A child you smacked," she said without meaning to. "Get out of my face."

He laughed hollowly and spat on her. She took a breath and got out a cleaning rag from the top drawer of her desk and wiped her face clean. She pushed back on her chair and stood, moving around the room as he slowly stalked her. She had nowhere to go. He blocked her exit, not that she could have used it standing behind her own desk. Shit. "What are you doing Cain?" He asked.

She sniffed and got a pager out of a draw and turned it on. She typed on it quickly 'Need backup' and put it down. Crow would see it on his own as she had used Panda's, something he never used. She just hoped, considering no one else ever touched theirs, that Crow had the sense of mind to look at his own – her phone had been smashed so she didn't have many choices and he did carry his on him and was always on her back about carrying hers.

Crux growled impatiently and stalked over. She pulled purple energy into her hands and held them out, but he didn't care that she shocked him, just used one hand to pull her forwards regardless of the energy and punched her with the other.

She pushed herself back and grabbed a lamp, smashing it over his head. He gasped but continued forwards and pulled her over the desk, grabbed her hair and hit her head against the wood again and again and again until she was dizzy and felt sick.

Valkyrie had no idea how long it went on, him hitting her. But the next thing she knew, she was on the floor and he had pulled her protective jacket off her. Everything hurt. Had she been unconscious? Or was she just more lucid than before? Where was Crow? Why hadn't he seen her page? Or had it only been moments instead of the hours of pain it felt like it had been?

She sucked in a painful breath and saw through blurry eyes him look over at her. She couldn't hear him over the ringing in her ears, but he was talking about something.

She didn't feel him pick her up and throw her over his shoulder, but she did feel her nose hit his back and her legs swing as he carried her off somewhere. She had no idea where that somewhere was, her head got foggier as the blood rushed to it.

.*****.

Valkyrie opened her eyes next to see the top of a cell. She sat up quickly, feeling her head get dizzy and eyes blur. When it passed, she looked around.

She was on the floor of a Sanctuary cell and besides her was a man.

She almost screeched but stopped herself quickly, seeing he had fallen asleep. She breathed heavily, trying not to panic, and pushed herself into a crouch despite her painful head. She touched it tentatively and felt the swollen skin but pushed off the pain for that time. Her other hand was shackled to the base of the bedpost.

Breathing slowly, she checked what she had on. Nothing that would get her out. She almost swore and then looked at the guy. She had had a master key for the shackles in her tunic usually and she _was_ wearing the tunic but…

She looked at the man. Perhaps he had shackled her and taken the key.

She recognised him. She had arrested him with Crow two or three days earlier. She looked him over and saw he was in the Sanctuary provided overalls and gently reached out to put her hand in the pouch.

His hand wrapped around her wrist.


	44. Released

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 44**

**_Tanith's POV_ **

Tanith was at Valkyrie's mansion shaving her legs when her phone went off. Stilling the hand with the razor, she reached over and grabbed her phone. It was Skulduggery.

"Hello," she said, pressing the phone between her head and shoulder to continue her leg.

"She's missing," Skulduggery said immediately, emergency in his voice. "I can't find her anywhere."

Tanith knew he meant Valkyrie and threw the razor down. "When did you last see her?"

"This morning, in the Sanctuary medical ward, I had to stay. I sent her to the office," he explained. " _Valkyrie_?!" He shouted, and then there was the sound of a door slamming. "Damn. You need to get here now."

Tanith grabbed her trousers, looked at her foamy legs and nodded. "Be there in a moment."

After rinsing her legs and drying off in record time, she was dressed and at the Sanctuary as quickly as she could by bike after Fletcher didn't pick up his phone to take her.

Skulduggery was waiting for her. She'd been less than half an hour.

"You haven't found her yet?"

"No. I checked the CCTV, but there's nothing. All I know is that Crux wasn't meant to be here today but was. Guild gave him back power a few days ago strictly for paperwork to fill out the workforce, but he was meant to be off today. I think he wiped the cameras."

"What about witnesses, surely they saw her?" Tanith asked, following Skulduggery into the Sanctuary just as the sliding door was opened for them. It was in shambles, people looking all over, even under tables, for Valkyrie. There were boxes everywhere as they were preparing for the move to the new Sanctuary. It added problems though because although there were bare rooms, there was also a lot more hiding places between all the boxes.

"No one has come forward if they have," he said darkly, opening a door suddenly and making the occupants jump before moving on. "I believe they haven't seen anything, unfortunately. Valkyrie is well liked by everyone at the Sanctuary."

"She has that effect. What about Crux?"

"Hasn't been seen since he left Guilds office."

"What about Guild?"

"Doesn't care, still in his office. Elder Crow has done a sweep of the building and there are no recent deaths so I'm certain she's here. There's no way he could have gotten out with her, and she'd have never left with him," Skulduggery said. "We need to find Crux."

"Wait, how long has she been missing?"

"What time is it now?"

Tanith checked her phone. "Just after four."

"Then between four to six hours I estimate. I didn't know she was missing until two hours ago, she could be anywhere by now. I even checked the security cameras of the Museum and café opposite, I'm _certain_ she hasn't left unless he took her out a secret passage, and he shouldn't know about those."

"I don't understand," Tanith said as they walked to where Tanith was certain Meritorious' office was. "There are Cleavers, people, everywhere."

"There was a distraction," he said as the Grand Mage came out of his office with a thunderous expression. "A gas leak at the north side of the Sanctuary had everyone busy for a while searching it out, all the Cleavers went to help victims. I suspect Crux sent some of them away too."

"Guild overstepped his authority," Meritorious growled. Tanith was keenly aware of Meritorious' reputation. "I'll be having words with him. Crux is considered fired if and when you can get the evidence he responsible for this. I want this sorted and Crux in shackles within the hour. This has gone on for _too long_."

.*****.

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

Valkyrie heard the slider on the door open. The man, Jerald Vanes, stood in front of it already. There had been noise before that. What was happening again?

Her head thumped painfully. She groaned. She felt a pressure on her leg, then a pain, and realised he was stepping on her ankle. Why? He was facing away from her.

He was talking to someone outside.

"H…" she breathed, trying to make a word. Trying to ask for _help_. "H…"

Nothing came out. Her head hurt. She closed her eyes for a moment.

What felt like an age passed and she opened them again. What was happening? There was a big noise outside. A fight? No, why would there be a fight? She was at home… _no, I'm not_ , she made herself think. _I'm in a cell. With a man_. What was his name?

Her head was pounding so badly, everything hurt and felt wet. She was so gross. It was all her blood, and she was fairly certain she'd peed at some point too.

She groaned and tried to make out a word like she had before. Nothing came out but air. It was like her lungs had no force to them. She'd felt that before, like the time she'd fallen out a tree as a kid. Kids had called for someone to come help her and the florist, Mr Hagan, had called an ambulance. He'd put his hand on her body and made her uncomfortable. "H…" she tried again. "H… p… m," she tried, breathing the letters out. "H… p…"

She had no idea if anyone heard. Something dark flashed before her eyes and she closed them obligingly.

.*****.

Valkyrie woke again in a bed with a soft mattress. She groaned and breathed deeply, filling her lungs with the familiar scent of Kenspeckle's hospital ward.

She opened her eyes slowly and pulled her head up to look around. There was no one else around. She was in the normal ward, the one for watching over patients and minor injuries. No one else was about. She must have been there a while.

"Val?" Tanith asked, and Valkyrie noticed her suddenly standing by one of the doors. "Thank God you're awake! Kenspeckle!"

"Hey," she said weakly, her head falling back to the pillow. "God, what time is it?"

"It's three in the morning," Tanith said, standing next to her and stroking her hair. "You've been here three days."

"Three days?" She said unbelievingly. "What happened?"

Crow, Panda and Bear came in. Bear had several days of beard growth. The other two couldn't grow beards, but Panda and Tanith certainly still looked tired.

They explained that Crow had been released, or rather walked out of, the Sanctuary medic ward and not found her. After looking for her for half an hour, he'd checked the exits and the Cleavers on guard there and they reported she hadn't left. Then he'd found out about a gas leak on the other side of the Sanctuary and realised it had been a distraction. He'd called everyone to action and they searched for hours. By the time the man in charge of the cells had done a routine check, it was way past when it should have been due to the other searching. He'd heard sounds in a cell, checked it just in case she was in there and when the prisoner had turned on her to try and kill her while he had the chance, and they knew she was there.

"After questioning the prisoner, we found out you were in there for upwards of four hours," Crow said darkly.

"It would explain why I'm so achy," she said.

"You shouldn't be," Kenspeckle frowned, looking at a sheet. "I've given you more drugs than I ever have before. I thought you'd be high as a kite."

She shrugged. "I gained weight I guess."

He hmphed and wrote something down. "Do you want to know your injuries or not?"

She thought about what she remembered. "I think I hit my head a few times. He hit my head into the ground anyway. What happened?"

He put the notes down and crossed his arms. "You had multiple wounds to the head including a broken skull, and fractures in both cheekbones and the jaw, several broken ribs and shards of bones floating around and stuck in various muscles. Your leg was broken. Other than breaks, however, the damage was mostly bruising and popped veins which is, as you know, easily fixed by a genius like me."

She grinned at him. "Thanks for fixing me."

He gave her a rare smile. "You are a favourite."

He left to make some paste or another, and the five talked for a while about different things, mostly what had happened in the last few days, specifically Crux who was nowhere to be found.

Meritorious, who had personally helped pull Valkyrie from the cell when he walked passed the cell wing and saw Cleavers being thrown here and there after the prisoner overpowered the cell man, wanted to put Crow on the investigation to find Crux. Elder Crow didn't allow it, as he was too likely of killing the man and that wasn't Sanctuary policy. Crow had been honest and agreed, and others were put on the case.

He was still at large somewhere in the world.

"Why didn't you get my page?" Valkyrie asked when she was finished eating something gingerly. Having tubes pulled from her stomach through her nose had hurt.

"I did," he said from his place at the end of the bed. "But I didn't look at it. I never thought you'd page me, no one ever uses them. I didn't check it until you'd been found. I'm actually impressed you know how to use it."

"Oh," she said. "That's okay, I guess. I should get a spare phone for things like this. Oh, one of those old Nokia's. I had one as a kid. It was pink. I might still have it, I played Snake on it all the time."

"That's such a good game," Tanith commented.

"I know, right? I want a Nokia. And pain relief. Like, badly."

"I'm going to have to buy you something aren't I?" Crow said, sitting himself down. "To make up for the pager."

"I am not so materialistic, Crow," she sniffed. "You'll merely have to make me breakfast in bed for the rest of my life."

They had a relieved little laugh and Valkyrie was sent back to sleep.

Come midday, Valkyrie was awake and dressed for the day. She was off Sanctuary work for the next week while everything was sorted, and she recovered, but she didn't mind too much. When they returned home, there was another car in the driveway.

"That's Nadia's parent's car," Valkyrie said. "She didn't say she was coming."

"We informed her of what happened once you were stable at Kenspeckle's," Crow said beside her. "I assume you've spoken since?"

"Yeah, on Tanith's phone," she said. Panda was out getting her a new one at that moment. She'd search for her old Nokia later. "She was pretty worried."

"That's why she's here then," Crow said and they all got out the car.

They found Nadia and her mother in the living room with Fletcher. Nadia and Fletcher were talking awkwardly about her relationship with Valkyrie while Mrs Keena looked at him disdainfully. When Nadia saw she'd come in she jumped from her seat and practically flew at Valkyrie. "Valkyrie!" She almost shouted. "My God, I was so worried!"

Wolf jumped equally fast on Mrs Keena, distracting her with tea and lunch in the kitchen and the others made themselves disappear. Fletcher was bodily removed by Bear.

Valkyrie kissed Nadia deeply, holding her head between her two hands. Nadia kissed back desperately, and they only stopped when Valkyrie felt something wet on her cheeks and realised Nadia was crying.

"Nadia, no, don't cry," she whispered, holding her close. "I don't want you to cry."

Nadia laughed but that just opened up the way for her crying and gut-wrenching sobs escaped her. Valkyrie, having never really had to deal with people crying before, picked Nadia up and took her to the sofa. She pulled Nadia up to her hips and brought her knees up, wrapped her arms around her tightly and let her girlfriend cry on her shoulder. She whispered little things in her ear to help her calm and when the worst of it was over, she kissed her neck soothingly.

"It's alright now," Valkyrie said. "I'm fine. I will always make it back to you."

"You can't promise that," Nadia whispered.

Valkyrie sighed. "I guess not. But it means I will always try harder. I'll get stronger. I'll work harder. No one will ever hurt me that bad again, I swear."

Nadia squeezed her arm, so Valkyrie tensed it of course, which just started a round of giggling and kissing and Nadia touching Valkyrie through her clothes in the living room. She was so glad she had Nadia back in her arms again. It was almost worth the pain.


	45. Cake!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 45**

Nadia's mother agreed, after much charming by Tanith and Dexter, to leave Nadia with them for the afternoon. She didn't so much as see Nadia before leaving, which was good, because they were giggling and kissing each other's lips and being way too close physically for parental supervision. Or any type of other supervision.

Fletcher apparently didn't get that memo.

"This is the living room!" He almost shrieked, causing Wolf to jump through the door to check on them. He looked at them with narrow eyes and Valkyrie just sort of watched as Nadia turned in her lap and, causal as anything, stuck her middle finger up. He snorted a laugh.

"You two are going to kill me," he said, shaking his head. "That's my baby sister – we took a vow to look after her. And here, this girl is sitting on her!"

"I'm in no pain," Valkyrie smirked.

Nadia and Wolf laughed. Valkyrie did lay her legs out flat and Nadia turned so they were crossing each other on the L-shaped sofa, Nadia still sitting on her but a little less touchy. Fletcher got over his craziness and sat down, Wolf coming over and sitting down in a seat too. Crow came in from the kitchen and gave the girls hot chocolate each, made so amazingly with cream and real chocolate with whipped cream and powdered chocolate atop, before sitting in his usual armchair which had been removed for the Christmas tree but was now back in place.

He was glad about it and they all knew it.

He'd informed them all.

Several times.

"What are we doing then?" Fletcher asked with a grin.

Valkyrie and Nadia looked at each other and shrugged. "I don't know," Valkyrie said. "Maybe a movie? Or go out for dinner. Or both."

He grimaced. "But that's date stuff. I meant us as a whole."

Panda and Tanith joined them in the living room and sat around too, Tanith leaning into Panda just slightly. Valkyrie made no comment but did smile a little. She'd ask about it later.

"Maybe a game from the cupboard," Tanith suggested, sitting down. "You were meant to be training today, but you're probably all messed up still."

Valkyrie nodded quickly. "Kenspeckle gave me a week of rest."

"Well we shouldn't go out then should we," Tanith said sweetly. "Either we stay in, or your fit enough to train."

Valkyrie made a face. "So, I'm meant to just sit around and make cakes all day?"

"Cake!" Nadia said excitedly, sitting up. "Let's make cake!"

Valkyrie stared at her and sagged. "You mean it, don't you?"

"Yes. Come on, up."

Valkyrie did as commanded and they went to the kitchen without further discussion. Nadia seemed to have a recipe memorised and was raiding all the cupboards for the stuff she wanted. Bear and Wolf had long ago gone through all the stuff Gordon had been given and bought over his life and narrowed it down to the best things that could hold the largest quantities of food.

As it happened, what started out as baking a cake turned into them having a flour fight, which turned into kissing, which stopped abruptly by Nadia deciding to make several cakes. That led to more food throwing and laughing, a great big mess, five cakes of different types and a lot of icing, and then finally making dinner.

Nadia had decided they had to make an Indian dish, one of her and her father's favourites, which was nice to have but also scary because Valkyrie, despite loving the flavour of spices, could not stand too much heat. Much to her shame.

Nadia didn't care and took great joy in adding a lot of spices in great quantities. Just the smell made her nose tickle.

When it finally came to eat, they all sat around the table and shared out the meal, Mughlai Kadhai paneer Nadia told them, and it was certainly spicy and unpronounceable to Valkyrie’s Irish accent. They had some packet naan bread already which they ate it with and some rice Valkyrie had insisted wasn't to have anything spicy done to it or she'd die which had made Nadia laugh loudly.

"You will _not_ like dinner at my house Val," she had said. "You'll be crying from the heat." She did at least make coconut rice. It was really good.

As it was, Valkyrie loved the food, but she was right in thinking it would be too spicy. She suffered through just for the joy of watching Fletcher though. At least Gordon and the Dead Men had given her spicy food before, Fletcher looked as if he was about to have heat stroke. He was red and sweated furiously and had to give up and just had naan and rice after an admittedly good attempt. None of the others had a single problem with it and Valkyrie just knew that she'd have to learn to love the heat quickly because she knew Nadia would be giving her spicy food whether she liked it or not so long as she was cooking.

It was a nice thought though. Having Nadia look for her. Her already flushed face covered the blush.

Fletcher teleported away and got them ice cream for dessert which was a beauty in itself, and they all enjoyed it over a movie. Nadia and Valkyrie snuggled on the sofa in the corner while the others packed onto the other sofas to give them mock privacy. They didn't kiss more than a silent peck on the cheek and were content to just hold each other in the big throw blanket Valkyrie had gotten from her room. She'd caught Nadia smelling it deeply a few times and had grinned but made sure Nadia didn't know she'd been caught. It was just so cute to Valkyrie she could barely contain herself and had wrapped an arm around her waist.

By the end of the movie, Tanith had fallen asleep practically draped over Panda and Fletcher was looking between the sleeping Tanith and loved-up girlfriends. The answer of who to gawk at was given by Bear who made the move towards picking him up and physically moving him again, so Fletcher wisely teleported away.

It was getting dark by then and Nadia needed to be home. As Dexter had to be elsewhere for something 'important and business-like', he agreed to take Nadia home on his way. They kissed at the door and spoke briefly before she left for the car and Valkyrie waved them off. It had been a nice day.

**.*****.**

"Valkyrie?" Fletcher asked her.

They were in the study room, officially the study room now with a computer and projector and whiteboard and giant bookcase with all sorts of random and educational books on it – Valkyrie suspected Crow had been allowed to help with stocking it which was why there was so many 'For Dummies' books. They had been trusted to do their work while Tanith, who had been left to teach them while everyone was out, had gone off for some reason Valkyrie forgot.

She’d also found out Tanith was being paid to be their tutor and that was why she was so into being teacher. She had wondered, as she didn’t think this was really her gig, but being paid to do it made more sense. It was good, they got to spend time together, Valkyrie didn’t have to go to school, and Tanith made money spending time with Valkyrie.

She looked up from her maths book. "Yeah?"

"Um, I know you've been dating Nadia a while now…"

"Fletcher, if this is another question on if I have another friend who will date you, the answer is still no, and I will not ask Nadia if she will set you up–"

"No, no, no! No, not that. Um," he chuckled nervously. "Um, I was just curious I guess about what you've, you know, done."

"Done?"

"Yeah. I think."

"Fletcher, if this is for some sort of fantasy–"

"No!" He said quickly, then put a hand up and looked back at his work somewhat defeatedly. "Look, just forget I said anything. It was really stupid."

She looked at him and put her pencil down. He actually looked upset and they'd been getting on well that last week she decided, reluctantly, to give him a chance to not be stupid. "When you say how much, do you mean how far?"

He shrugged uncommittedly. "I s'pose."

She took a deep breath and thought about it. "It's not much. I mean, we kissed and stuff but nothing too big. But I was thirteen for most for the majority of our relationship so far."

He nodded, perking up a bit. "So nothing, like, serious?"

"Me and Nadia are in a serious relationship," she said quickly. "We're young but I am very certain about her. But no, none of the 'all the way' stuff."

He went a little red but nodded, looking just over her shoulder. "But you would know what to do if you did?"

She thought about it quickly. "I think so. But each person is different, so I guess I will have to learn some things…"

She trailed off and he nodded, trying to keep the conversation up despite the awkward, personal energy. "So," he continued, "how do you know it's the right thing? I mean, everyone knows the general stuff, but how would you actually know the other stuff?"

She looked out the window behind him. "You mean like – like what is the right thing at that moment? Rather than just general stuff?"

He nodded, beet-red.

She shrugged, deflating a little. "I don't know yet, do I? I might ask one day. Like, maybe Tanith, or maybe even Nadia. But not yet. I mean, I was taught about relationships and the science of it all, but not really the act itself. I'm pretty sure it's just along the lines of what I'm told though."

"Told?"

"At the time, I guess I'll be told what to do…"

"Oh." That led to a long, awkward silence and Valkyrie looked back at her questions, thinking over what Fletcher asked her. "Are you nervous?" He asked quietly after a long while.

She sighed heavily. "I don't know. I know I don't want anything to change yet so why worry? I like to think when I'm ready I won't be nervous. What do you think? You said you'd been in a few relationships."

He went even redder and mumbled something incoherent at the table. After a moment, Valkyrie decided to just let pass, and he fiddled with his pencil again. "What about if you don't know if you're ready?"

She and Tanith hadn't really talked about that. Just what happened once she was. "I don't know. Stop, I guess. Or not. I really don't know to be honest. It’s totally personal."

He nodded and started writing something down on his paper, effectively ending the conversation. Valkyrie wanted to ask him why, and maybe even a few questions of her own considering his larger experience, but decided she might not want to know because he was a guy and she didn’t want to know any of that heterosexual sex stuff. It was fine for other people, but it made her queasy sometimes.

She put her head down just in time for Tanith to come into the room again. Strange conversation. Strange boy.

Only a few more days until she was back at work at least.


	46. The Midnight Hotel

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 46**

It was some time into the summer that the new 'big thing' occurred. Or at least, that was what Valkyrie was told. She was hiding in her room.

"Raven?" She said quietly, talking into her phone.

"Valkyrie," he said pleasantly. "I have some information I thought you may be interested in."

"I'm sure I will be, but why aren't you calling Skulduggery?" She asked.

"It is because I wish to taunt him by calling you," he said bluntly, then ploughed on with the information. "I've heard Murder Rose and a man whose name I'm still trying to find out is making their way to the Midnight Hotel."

"Ah," she said, thinking quickly. The Midnight Hotel was Anton Shudder's territory. Even Crow didn't so much as ask Bear who came to and from that place, and he’d encouraged Valkyrie not to think of Bear and Anton Shudder as the same people. The person he was at the Hotel was strictly impersonal and doing his job. Valkyrie had only been once, and that had been strictly in the lobby, to a new place and exiting again. She'd been told Crow had tried taking someone down in there before and that was how it got such a good reputation. Bear had thrown Crow out and protected the criminal even though that same criminal had killed their friend in the war. It was policy. And Bear was as unmoveable as his policy. "That might not be enough. Do we know where they're going?"

"I do not. I wanted to know if you'd be able to find out."

"No can do," she said certainly. "I might be all cute and stuff, but he won't bite. He doesn't do mates rates."

"I had a feeling. But I suppose, you could maybe go there and simply… decided to exit at the same time?" Raven suggested.

Valkyrie nodded to herself. "I suppose but I don't really want to start something. I mean, I'll be forgiven, but Skul? Less likely. I can ask though. Is there any other information you have?"

"Only that they've been planning something. A lot of sneaking around together. I think it's a plan, but I couldn't say what for or even when for. I was thinking revenge, but I've heard all the Dead Men are home from their missions?"

"Yeah, several weeks ago. I doubt Rose would take us on directly, even with a team. She never has before. She made sure of it when she came to kill me. Unless she’d hoping to pick us off slowly and plans to start with Anton."

"My thinking exactly. I suggest seeing if she will speak at the Hotel though. Perhaps with a little persuasion she will try to fight you and Shudder can kill her?"

Valkyrie agreed and they hung up. She went to Crow and explained the situation.

"How did he get your number?" He asked neutrally after a moment.

"I gave it to him. We should go soon."

"Get a bag together and I'll start the car. Be quick."

Valkyrie did what he said and they drove to some place in the countryside. It took a while to reach the top of the mountain where the Midnight Hotel was and by the time it had materialised before their eyes, Valkyrie was very glad to step into its warm lobby.

Anton was sitting in his chair writing something but looked up when Skulduggery and Valkyrie came in. He stood to greet them.

"Skulduggery," he said. "Valkyrie. I think I know why you are here."

He led them to the back where his own rooms were behind the desk – his rooms spanned the middle of the building, all ground floor. He had told her when she had come that one time before it was because it gave him access to the whole ground floor without having to disturb guests who might feel uncomfortable in his constant presence moving from room to room.

He had a living room with a tiny kitchenette and table, a small bedroom and bathroom. It was all he needed, he had told her once. Inside, Valkyrie immediately had a look around – it was very, very masculine, certainly a bachelor pad and far from the so-called 'feminine' chores he did all day.

Valkyrie couldn't wait for Fletcher to say something like that around Bear, he would get so mad and force Fletcher to do all the ‘women’s work’ around the house like cleaning and cooking as punishment. It would give the rest of them a nice break from chores.

She sat on the sofa with Crow and Bear pulled up a chair from the table.

"Murder Rose and a man who didn't declare himself arrived this morning at the Hotel. They have not told me how long they are to stay," he said before Crow could question him. "You know the rules at this establishment. I expect you to abide by that. As per policy, you may not stay unless you are paying for a room for the night."

Crow nodded quickly. "We know. We do, we simply want to talk to them. And we will also be taking a room for the night."

Anton stared at them, knowing what they were up to. He nodded regardless after staring them out for a blink. "I suppose I'll check you in then."

They did just that and went to their new room to throw their stuff on the bed and after pocketing the key, they went off to the downstairs large table where they sat and waited. It didn’t take long for Rose to walk around the corner and glare at them. Valkyrie saw Anton stand from his desk chair as Rose stalked towards her. She stopped herself at the last moment it seemed.

Slowly, she drew a chair and sat opposite Valkyrie. Her friend was nowhere in sight.

"Hello," she said, an ugly smile on her face. Kindness couldn't show through on such an evil being. She was still stunning. "What brings you here?"

"We heard you were here," Crow answered.

"Oh, I am just so popular. Is China coming too? Or at least those men of yours, Rue or Vex? I wouldn’t mind trying them out."

Valkyrie nearly, nearly smirked but held it back. She was going to text them as soon as she could. She glared instead. "Why are you here?"

"That's for me to know," she said with an eviller grin, "and you to die finding out."

She got up and moved away from them to some unknown place after that and Anton was forced to stop them as he knew they were just going to harass and force an answer or fight out of the woman. He had to uphold the policy. They let her move on.

"I just don't get what she'd want here," Valkyrie said. "She's been here for a night already and hasn't left. She wouldn't, what’s in Ireland for her?"

Crow hummed to himself and thought about it. "Perhaps another person? I've checked the stops and I can't work out where else she would want to go. There's France, England, Wales, Mexico, Spain, the Atlantic," he said, trailing off. "There's more, but I just can't work out what she'd want in any of these places. Unless she plans to stay for months."

"Maybe it's in who she's with," Valkyrie suggested.

"I expect we’ll find out soon," he said, and they settled in to wait for them to turn up.

They waited for hours and even had dinner in the communal dining table and while Rose turned up, the man did not. They didn't see him at all that evening and Rose didn’t bring him any food.

Valkyrie went off for a sleep around nine but woke up at three in the morning, showered and dressed and went downstairs to stay with Crow again. She was walking through the lobby to him just as some mages came in.

"I don't think he will," one of them said with exasperation. "What's the point? What would he get out of it?"

"A leopard can't change its spots, boy," the second, older man said. "I'm telling you. They'll be straight to Ireland and I want to be further away than Europe when that happens!"

Valkyrie stopped and waited for Anton to check them in before taking her opportunity.

"Excuse me?" She said. The two men turned to look at her. "I couldn't help but hear you talk about someone – could I ask who that is?"

They frowned. "You haven't heard? Scarab was released from prison just hours ago. You make sure to stay away from him, kid, I know they say he's done his time, but he will turn back to his old ways as soon as he's out of sight."

The other shook his head but didn't refute it. Valkyrie thanked them and they left. She went back to Crow; Anton was already sitting with him.

"Whose Scarab?" She asked.

"He's a man who committed war crimes," Anton said. "He killed an innocent man."

"The man he killed was trying to talk both sides of the war out of fighting. A good man, a stronger man than many to stand up to two armies at a time and convince them to not fight. He stopped a whole battle once. And not long after, he was murdered," Crow explained.

"How long was he in prison for?" Valkyrie asked.

"Two-hundred years exactly," Crow said, rubbing his skull. "He was transported to an American prison some years ago, and their times and days are different to ours. It made me forget."

"You just forgot, no day differences involved," Bear grunted.

Valkyrie hesitated. "You said we were going to Mexico," Valkyrie pointed out. "Maybe he'll come here. Mexico wouldn’t be too hard for him to travel to."

"I didn't create this place until the beginning of the twentieth century," Anton said. "He shouldn't know of it."

"Or at least how to find it," Crow corrected.

"I have an idea," she said, sitting down. "What if Rose is working with a larger group? Maybe they're collecting Scarab and bringing him here? We go to Mexico before routing back to Ireland, right?"

Anton nodded.

"So, it's completely possible for them to pick him up in Mexico and do that. He should be here when?"

"We go to Mexico in two trips time, twenty-four hours," he said. "Then we go to Ireland twelve hours later."

"So I bet he'll be here tomorrow at midnight," Crow finished. "The question is, what attack do they have prepared to get away from the Dead Men once they're checked out?"


	47. Zombies!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 47**

Twenty-four hours later, Valkyrie, Crow, Anton and Murder Rose were standing around the lobby waiting, hoping to see what their plan was. Scarab didn't disappoint on one level – he strode into the Midnight Hotel without a care in the world, just looking at them mildly.

Valkyrie already didn't like him.

When they got to the desk, he and his companion, a stoic, dumb-looking man, checked themselves in. There was nothing Valkyrie and Crow were allowed to do. He wasn't a criminal anymore at any rate. It wasn't until he had signed his name and Anton had given him his key that he spoke again.

"You," he said levelly. "Shudder. I hear you killed my son."

Anton stared at him blankly. "Who was your son?"

"Billy-Ray Sanguine."

Valkyrie felt the flip-blade in her jacket pocket keenly.

"I did."

Scarab nodded shortly and left for his room, ignoring Crow and Valkyrie completely. Rose, the dumb man who hadn't given his name, which was also allowed by policy, and Scarab left for wherever they were going. The man Rose was staying with still hadn't shown his face.

"I didn't know he had a son," Crow said when they were gone.

"I don't think anyone did," Anton said, sorting his files out. "Just remember the policy. If he starts something, it is my business alone. Once he leaves, then he is yours."

Valkyrie and Crow waited around for the rest of the day to end and when it finally got to half eleven that night, the group they were after came down together. Rose, Scarab, the big, dumb one and the man they hadn't yet seen. They filed in and sat opposite Valkyrie and Crow at the communal table.

"Pleasant," Scarab greeted mildly.

Rose couldn't stay silent after being around them so long. She glared at Valkyrie. "You killed my team."

"I did," Valkyrie did, smiling at her without humour.

She gave her that evil grin again. "I have a new one now. Meet Foe and Obloquy."

Obloquy was the one who came with Scarab; Foe was the one they hadn't met up until then. He grinned at Valkyrie. She didn't like the way he looked at her.

"Nice to meet you both," she said. "I look forward to kicking your arses."

Rose gave a nasty laugh, but Foe was apparently done with her being spokeswoman. "You did us a favour, Cain," he said. "Now we have Rose to aid us in our mission. Krav and Gallow were nothing compared to us."

Rose didn't seem to care about her dead friends anymore. "The rest of my team will be meeting us in Ireland and we will make this world burn!" Rose said, laughing like a maniac.

Valkyrie and Crow just watched them without reacting. They could take them. Even if they didn't know these people, they could do it.

It was almost midnight, almost time to go to Ireland.

"What is your plan?" Crow asked.

"You think we'll tell you?" Rose cackled. "We'll destroy you and the rest of the Dead Men! We'll take down the world! We'll make it blow!"

Valkyrie's stomach twisted at the sight of her madness. She could feel herself get a headache.

"We're going to kill you, girly!" Rose said, pushing herself across the table to stare at Valkyrie, her nasty breath hitting Valkyrie's face, grinning wildly. "We're going murder you all!"

Valkyrie pushed back in her chair and put an arms-length between them. "Please don't come close to me," she said.

Rose hopped on the table and crawled closer. Crow put his hand on his gun but didn't take it out. Anton was standing silently in the doorway. "Aww, do you not like the big bad lady?" Rose laughed, crawling across the table and crouching on the edge. Valkyrie didn't have many places to go. Outside, the view was changing and the hotel moving. "Don't you want to die?"

Valkyrie took a deep breath and felt the headache worsen considerably.

"I'm going to kill you," Rose said with what seemed like clarity. "I'm going to kill you and your little bitch girlfriend."

Valkyrie went to punch her but suddenly fell down in pain, screaming. Crow drew his gun and shot at Rose, missing her one, two, three times, but when she jumped on Valkyrie instead of dancing around on the table, Crow finally shot her twice in the head. Valkyrie fell to the floor with Rose's body, the pain increased more and more. Crow threw the body off.

"Valkyrie?!" He shouted, looking her over.

She just kept screaming.

Anton stepped into the room and the pain suddenly vanished from Valkyrie. She sucked in a deep breath and pulled herself up, not looking at Rose's body. The other three men stood up.

"Well, would you look at that," Scarab said. "Just when I'm told she's on our side, she's dead. Tell me, what was the point in that, Pleasant?"

"She threatened and attacked Valkyrie Cain," he said deeply. "I am in my right to defend my partner."

Scarab just sighed and shrugged. Foe and Obloquy stood with him and they turned to see Anton in the doorway. "Gentlemen," Anton said. "Although you have not attacked these guests, your associate has. I have to ask you to leave."

Scarab nodded. "Of course."

And they did. They signed out. Valkyrie followed, and she and Crow signed out also, ready to leave at the same time, to start the real work.

Right before Scarab lead the two men through the door, he stopped and turned to Foe. "Is it ready?"

Foe didn't say anything, just looked at Obloquy. After a moment, he said, "Yes. It is done."

They opened the door and jumped back. Valkyrie sucked in a breath.

A horde of dead, rotting zombies fell through the doors, making horrid, slow sounds. Valkyrie jumped back and Crow put a hand on her shoulder.

"Scarab," Crow said. The man was standing close to them, just standing there without a single care of what was happening. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Revenge," he said blankly. "On the man that killed my son. The rest is nothing to do with me."

"What is the rest?" Valkyrie asked quickly. Obloquy had helped a woman and a vampire into the building over the zombies that kept on coming. Anton suddenly hit a failsafe button and a magic shield came down on the entrance of the door, slicing through some of the zombies and stopping more from coming in.

"Why didn't you already do that?!" Valkyrie shouted. He didn't answer.

Neither did Scarab.

They were still stuck with maybe two dozen zombies and a gang they had never met before. Valkyrie and Crow ran into the table room as the horde of zombies ran at them and ignored the others. Right before they turned the corner she noticed Anton starting to undo his shirt, but then she had bigger problems and started concentrating.

"Take off their legs!" Crow shouted over the sound.

"Will do! Shoot them in the head!"

"I'll try," he said, turning and starting to shoot.

Valkyrie ran through another door and found the kitchen – quickly, she opened a drawer and found a massive meat cleaver. With a somewhat sadistic grin, she picked it up and rushed back to the other room and hacked the head off the closest zombie, then the arm off another, using the air to push them back and get a good aim. She reasoned they were already dead – she might as well finish the job.

Maybe that was a bit psychotic of her.

Regardless, she used that meat cleaver to chop pieces off the decaying bodies until they couldn't get to her anymore and when she accidentally snapped the blade, she ran back to the kitchen and found another. Quickly, she returned and started stabbing with the sharp meat knife, almost taking off her own hand when she was pushed by one of them violently. She responded by growling and stabbing it in the brain. It didn't slow it down though and she was almost overpowered when Crow pushed forwards and pulled two of them back, giving Valkyrie enough room to stab and slice the others to the floor.

It took a long time to get through them. Crow was covered in just as many decaying human bits as her, stinking horribly.

"Bear?" She called. She heard nothing back and felt dread rise, realising she hadn't seen any whole, alive humans in all the time fighting. "Bear!?"

She jumped through the zombie parts into the lobby and found no people, just zombies, and looked around. She went into the hall and tried to open the door to his rooms, but it was locked. Crow came up behind her. "Upstairs," he said, feeling the air. Valkyrie ran to the stairs and up them, finding him on his hands and knees moaning in pain. Valkyrie and Crow crouched on the stairs and watched.

"Is he safe?" The lady asked, looking at Bear wearily. "I don't want to see that gist again."

Obloquy nodded. He was standing right next to the Dead Man, staring at him. He was doing something to Bear.

"Mercy, how long will this take?" Foe asked impatiently.

"I don't know, I need the key," she said harshly.

Valkyrie heard Crow breathe a curse.

"I know…" she said quietly and went over to Bear. She kneeled in front of him and a moment later, Valkyrie didn't see what she did, she moved away. Crow looked like he was about to jump out but stopped when she unlocked a door.

She stuck her hand in the room and pulled it back quickly, closing it again. She didn't lock the door, just dropped a key to the floor. Crow put a hand on her back, stopping her from moving. Or maybe himself from moving.

Bear slumped and hit the ground, unconscious. Quietly, Valkyrie and Crow watched Mercy and Foe bicker about whether Valkyrie and Crow were dead until, finally, the dumb on turned and looked right at Valkyrie.

That pain, the one she felt before, hit her like a freight train.

She could hear shots fired and shouting and God knows what else but she couldn't control the pain and fell down the stairs in a screaming, painful heap.

Crow must have come to the same conclusion about Obloquy doing whatever it was to her because she heard shouting and more gunshots, and the pain fell away suddenly. She groggily pulled herself up but even with the pain vanishing, she was still queasy from the experience. Knowing her friends needed her pushed her to her feet and up the stairs, finding Crow grappling with the man, Foe, and also right in time for Mercy, the vampire and Obloquy to get to the top of the staircase, covered in blood.

A foot connected with her nose.


	48. Possessed Kenspeckle

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 48**

**_Twenty-eight hours after Valkyrie was booted in the face_ **

**_Scarab's hideout_ **

Valkyrie woke up some long time later to a fuzzy head and no memories since passing out. It took her ages to work out what had happened. She knew she'd been in a fight, that she was uncomfortable and cold… she felt like that time she'd woken from a surgery all drugged up.

"You're awake," Kenspeckle said.

Valkyrie relaxed. "Skul'u'ggery?"

"He's not here, dear Valkyrie," Kenspeckle said. "No one is here but me and you."

Valkyrie felt something 'not right' about his voice. Slowly blinking in her foggy faze, she tried to look at him. Her neck creaked, and she realised she was in a chair and spent several dumb seconds wondering how she was in a chair, why, and how she hadn't realised. More importantly than the chair, why was she in just her bra and underwear?

Her brain remembered what she had opened her eyes for. Her head pounded, not painfully, but it made her vision blur each time.

Kenspeckle was sitting across from her with a desk between them. Her hands were tied to the chair painfully tight but his own were messing around with tools and little bits and pieces on the table. He was making something.

"Wha' ya doin'?" She croaked out.

He smiled lightly but didn't look at her. "I've been in many bodies, but never once have I found a mind as great as this one. So many thoughts, so much information. It's honestly a pleasure to be here."

Valkyrie frowned at him but nodded at what he said even though she didn't really understand.

"Do you know what it's like to be trapped in a room for centuries with no one to talk to, no one to play with or be in? You are so lonely and cold all the time. I hate it. I never want to see that room again."

Valkyrie nodded. "Wha's happ'n'in?"

"What is happening, my friend, is me repaying my debts," Kenspeckle grinned. "They released me from my hell and all they want is for me to build this little toy – so I am! Honestly, I can't wait for it to go off. And then I will get to you."

"Go off," she repeated slowly, her brain really, really trying to keep up. "Like a bomb? Kenspeckle, why're you making a bomb?"

He laughed in a way Valkyrie hadn't heard the man do before. "You don't know? You don't know. I am a Remnant. I am a Remnant possessing this man to make this bomb."

"So you're not Kenspeckle?" Valkyrie slurred.

"I am Kenspeckle Grouse. And I am also a Remnant. I am using his body and mind to make this bomb and then I will use his body and mind to torture you."

Valkyrie felt her head get lighter and heart beat faster. "What bomb is it?" She asked without thinking.

"It is the Desolation Engine," he said in a tight voice as he carefully screwed something together. "It'll take another hour or more to finish. Kenspeckle thought up the invention, he made it, he got scared of it and deactivated it. Funny, that such a smart man could not so much as think of the consequences of making such a thing. He didn't destroy it because he valued his work as a young man. He was ashamed of what it could do and did not think of it again. And now he is possessed by me and together, we are fixing it to destroy humanity."

"Oh."

"They raided the Sanctuary," possessed Kenspeckle continued. "The moving vans, really. All they had to do was cause a little traffic and open a few doors and when they found the right one, they just had to kill one man and drive away. So simple. I wonder if your great Skulduggery Pleasant has worked it out yet?"

Valkyrie groaned and wondered that too. How long would it take fix again? An hour? Could Crow be quick enough to save her?

Her thoughts turned to Nadia and she worried for the girl. She had been so upset when Valkyrie had been captured just two and a bit months ago. Hopefully, no one would tell her until Valkyrie had been found. Found healthy and whole would be nice…

Kenspeckle crooned on as Valkyrie's haze lifted and finally she was able to look around without her head spinning violently. He told her about all sorts of things Kenspeckle, the real man, had done, all sorts of inventions and other things he wanted to do and try but had not been allowed or decided to hide because they were controversial. He had wanted to prove Hitler and his scientists scientifically wrong in multiple areas in the early nineteen-hundreds but had been too scared to speak up. He had also wanted to prove men and women were able to achieve equal education and were equally able-bodied but in the fifteen-hundreds, he had been too nervous to suggest it within the mortal world. The Remnant told Valkyrie how many things in medicine and society Kenspeckle had known or theorised before anyone else but had done nothing. Valkyrie listened as her fear grew and the Desolation Engine looked more and more whole.

He told her a bit about Remnants too but that ended in talking about atom bombs and guns and torture methods. Soon, way too soon, he declared himself finished. With a strength Valkyrie knew the true Kenspeckle didn't have, he lifted with table, bomb, tools and all, and pushed it to the wall. He brought forwards a cart on wheels with medical things on it.

"And the fun begins," Kenspeckle grinned at her.

He forced her to look him in the eyes as he made the first cut.


	49. The Search

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Note - this is written as if before the last chapter, so keep an eye on the timings I have written for your ease of reading :)**

* * *

**Chapter 49**

**_Tanith's POV_ **

**_Fifteen hours since Valkyrie was kidnapped_ **

"What the hell happened?" She asked Skulduggery, slamming the door into the wall and likely leaving a dent. "She got kidnapped on your watch _again_!?"

Skulduggery stared at her but made no move. "I'm sorry."

Tanith ground her teeth and said nothing, just started pacing up and down the room. "Where is that damn man?"

She meant Guild and Skulduggery knew it. Elder Crow and Meritorious were at the new Sanctuary getting themselves settled and they didn't yet have internet, phones or any type of signal as it was being set up. Skulduggery told her on the phone he wasn't sure what they knew and didn't. So they were left waiting for Guild so Skulduggery could fill him and herself in.

It must have been ten minutes for the man to show up. Tanith was ready to slice him to itty-bitty stupid pieces. He came in with a frustrated expression and tone of annoyance.

"Pleasant, what do you want?" He asked.

"My partner is missing," he said slowly, standing up. "A fourteen-year-old girl is missing, and it takes you over twenty minutes for you to show your face."

Guild growled. "I am a busy man doing a lot of things. What do you need to get her back?"

"I need Cleavers–"

"No. There aren't enough," Guild said immediately. Tanith stood next to Skulduggery to see his face better. She wanted to see his eyes filled with pain when she stabbed the _ever-living_ _shit_ out of him. "A moving van has already been compromised, you cannot take an already depleted–"

"They took Kenspeckle Grouse also."

"What?" Tanith asked. "Why?"

"Who?" Guild asked quickly.

"A group of Americans raised by various peace groups in the war turned bad. They call themselves Foe's Gang, headed by Vincent Foe. There is also Mercy Charient, Obloquy, a vampire called Samuel and the now deceased Murder Rose was a recent member. Scarab is working with them but for how long I do not know. I do know that he seeks revenge. They stole not only that van but also a Remnant."

Guild was frowning with contempt. "And why, pray tell me, is it that you’re here and not sorting this out right this second? Then tell me how that has any relevance to each other?"

Skulduggery sighed in frustration. Tanith wished the others were there to help them, but they were still working out how to get back from England – they'd gone off when Skulduggery and Valkyrie went to Anton's hotel. "They have a massive importance to each other. The van number is registered to a checklist of items. Within that checklist is the Desolation Engine."

"How did they know it was there?" Tanith asked quickly.

"I don't know yet. I couldn't find the original, I had to get the backup. They stole it, I think. And I know that the Engine is disabled before you ask, but that is why they have Grouse," Skulduggery explained.

"Can he fix it?" Guild asked, looking a little more nervous now.

"Yes," Skulduggery said immediately. "I am certain he can, he's a genius, and I'm sure Saracen will back me up. The thing is, I don't think he would want to. Thus the joining of Foe's Gang and Scarab. Thus why they would smuggle him very openly into Ireland via the Midnight hotel. Thus why they got the Remnant to possess Kenspeckle."

There was a moment as they all thought about the catastrophic events that would be happening very shortly due to these events and people getting together. "You need to find them and stop them from making that Engine."

Tanith stamped her foot and turned to Skulduggery. "And Valkyrie?! Why do they need her? Bait?"

"Partly," Skulduggery admitted. "But I also think it is because they need more to bribe the Remnant with. They obviously won’t want us to find them, but to use her as a distraction and as a reward for a Remnant…"

Tanith felt herself get very pale. "So possessed Kenspeckle could be torturing Valkyrie right this second? Where are they?"

"I don't know, which is why I need Cleavers to scout out the locations they could be at and cover ground more quickly."

"I've already told you there are none available," Guild said with finality. Oh, she really wanted to stab him.

Skulduggery punched him in the face quicker than Tanith could follow. They left the room, Tanith feeling at least a little satisfied.

He gave her a set of files quickly and told her they were going to a possible location they could be at. Tanith didn't so much as hear the name, she was in some state of panic and fury, manic about finding her sister before she was tortured to death by a man she loved and respected. She'd barely been saved from her last kidnapping and torture and now this?! Tanith was ready to rip Foe's Gang and Kenspeckle apart to get to her baby sister.

**.*****.**

**_Five hours later –_ ** **_twenty hours total since Valkyrie was kidnapped_ **

"Tanith," Saracen said, coming up behind her. Tanith turned to see her friend and old flame. He looked too serious and too tired. "No luck up north?"

"Nothing," she said bitterly. "They've had her for nearly a full twenty-four hours and I don't know where else to go."

Saracen sighed and pulled her into a hug Tanith gratefully accepted. She was just too tired. Her baby sister was too young. She had thought all she had to worry about was Valkyrie having sex or maybe getting stupidly drunk, not torturous possessed doctors!

"Come on," he said gently, pulling back. "We'll find her. Now I'm here we might get there faster, right?"

Tanith wasn't too convinced, knowing how many things Saracen could miss, but nodded. "It's something," she said, and they drove down to meet the others. It was lucky Saracen was in good athletic shape because he probably wouldn't have stayed on her bike the way she was driving otherwise.

Shaking the thoughts away, they went directly to Skulduggery, who had the other Dead Men around him talking in quick, frustrated tones in the Sanctuary parking lot. Getting closer, Tanith realised the other person they were talking to wasn't Fletcher but actually Guild – the Dead Men's size had blocked the short, balding man from her view.

She sighed.

"Low, you better have news," Guild told her when he saw her walking to them.

"Nothing," she said. "And last I heard, you didn't care she was gone."

"I don't," he said scathingly. "I care that a bomb said to be big enough to blow up a fifth of this county is currently being fixed. I'm sorry if I put millions of lives in front of one girl who will be saved in the process."

Tanith nearly, nearly spat on him when he got up in her face, but Saracen put a hand on her arm and wisely took over. "I have a few ideas."

The idea was to look in a certain areas Saracen had an 'idea' about. He wasn't sure if they, that being all or one, were right or had something to do with Valkyrie or Kenspeckle at all but it was a feeling and all they had at the moment. Skulduggery had even called a contact to double check the Hibernian Cinema in case he had missed something and they were travelling to meet them at the place Saracen was having ideas about.

They left quickly.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

**_Six hours later – twenty-five hours since Valkyrie was kidnapped_ **

**_Three hours since the END of the of the previous chapter_ **

Valkyrie sucked in a long, stuttering breath, letting it go quickly and breathing in again, too tired and in too much pain to fill her lungs, to scream anymore.

Possessed Kenspeckle never stopped talking.

She stared at her legs, her head lolling down without meaning too. She couldn't hold it up.

Her skin was so white, almost corpse white. Other than the specks of fresh, red blood. Other than the splattered, dried, hours old blood. Other than the long, rusted nails.

She'd been sick too but that was on the floor. She could see the mess mixed with the blood. There were all shades of blood on the floor, the occasional flick of skin with it. Her hair too, slashed off in places.

"And what's this?" Possessed Kenspeckle said, his voice loud against the drip, drip, drip of the hose he'd just attached to a tap somewhere. There was the sound of fabric, then his laugh as he walked over to her, the hose dragging behind him. He picked her chin up and she looked at him.

He had the same blade she'd taken from Sanguine.

"Now what is a good girl like you doing with a cursed blade like this?"

**.*****.**

**_Tanith's POV_ **

**_Same time, elsewhere_ **

Skulduggery, Tanith, Ghastly and Dexter stopped outside the biggest and last place Saracen had an 'idea' about. Their last hope. Tanith was so tired she didn't even have the energy to panic about it.

"Out," Skulduggery said. They got out. They followed him. Even her sword was feeling too heavy on her hip, she had no chance of using it. The others had slept on the ride.

"Are we splitting up?" Tanith asked, using her foot to throw the old, half-broken door open.

"Yes," Skulduggery said.

"Pleasant!" Wreath said, coming up behind them. Tanith didn't turn to look at him, and neither did the others, just began searching with a single-minded ruthlessness. She saw his shadow as he came in and joined in their search without talking. Good.

She might just kill him for the point of it. She didn't give a fuck anymore. She'd fucking kill anyone standing in her way. She noticed she was feeling particularly violent and stopped herself from shoving Dexter out her way right before she did it. He wasn't even _in_ her way, she was just too angry.

"I don't feel any new deaths," Wreath said into the quiet. He did go through to another room with some sort of purpose though, and Tanith followed without comment, Skulduggery coming up behind her. He went over to a wall looked it over.

Tanith looked at him. She hadn't been to sleep in over thirty hours and didn't bother looking over the same wall he was, just looked blankly with her tired mind. He pointed his cane up and shadows whirled up, slamming into a glass thing in the wall and breaking it.

Skulduggery wrapped an arm around her and he used his magic to propel them up and into the hole. The other three came into the room and Ghastly got them to the same place several paces behind them, just as Scarab came around the corner with a tired expression of his own.

"Pleasant," he said with boredom. "You finally found us. But I'm afraid I'm the only one left."

"Where's Valkyrie and Kenspeckle?" Skulduggery asked, pointing his gun at the man’s head. "If she isn't alive I'll–"

"Quite frankly, skeleton, I don't care what you'd do to me," Scarab said, turning and walking away. "But I need to sit down for it."

Skulduggery kept his gun out but followed the man through the halls to wherever they were going. "Tell me where they are."

"I cannot remember," Scarab said. "And neither do I know if they are alive before you ask. As soon as the Desolation Engine was fixed by the good doctor, Foe's group of young ninny-narcissists left, bomb and all. We only had a short-term relationship you see. I merely trust them to cause damage from here on out. But I get too far ahead of myself," he said, sitting on a chair by a fire. Something or other had been welded or fixed in the room quite recently. There was flecks of metal and the smell of the process thick in the air. "See, if you put that gun down I might just tell you what they're doing. It's not like you can stop them after all."

Skulduggery didn't. Tanith felt herself wobble a little and leaned into Ghastly for support and felt a hand on her lower back, giving her little tingles. Tiredness did strange things to her.

"You'll tell us where Valkyrie is or else take us to her," Dexter growled.

"Now, now," Scarab said in his scratchy, elderly voice. "I've already said that part. See, once we got here, we made a deal with the Remnant, which you know about, and whom we had possess the doctor. In exchange for fixing the Engine, we gave him the girl. And in exchange for leaving him free, he wouldn't modify the bomb to blow up before our plan was complete. Once he did everything Foe asked, quite a few hours ago now, he was let free."

"Where to?" Ghastly asked quickly.

"I don't know," Scarab said, taking a glug from his drink on the table. "I don't care. I'm going to die soon, so what does it matter to me? He could still be there, or he could be long gone just like Foe and his band of idiots."

Skulduggery gave Dexter his gun and left the room. Tanith followed.

He stood with his hands out and checked the air. He was still for several, long, long minutes. There was a clicking somewhere suddenly and Tanith looked around distractedly. Not knowing what to do, she opened the door she was next to, where the sound was coming from. It was the boiler room, and the old water tank was clicking away as it was used.

"They're here," she declared and snapped back to reality a little. She slammed the door closed and heard a scuffle start with Scarab as they shackled him to a pipe or something. "The water's running so they're here."

Skulduggery took off at a run suddenly and the others took off after him. They ran all over the building and Tanith had no idea if the skeleton had any idea where they were going but they found staircase after staircase and they kept going down until finally, finally, they found a corridor he thought acceptable.

Stopping, Skulduggery picked up the soul catcher he’d taken from the Sanctuary. Tanith already knew the plan.

They crept agonisingly slowly to the door, crowding around it as they heard the sound of the water, previously off, turn back on. It sprayed on something, Valkyrie, and made an awful sound hitting her flesh. Skulduggery held up three fingers, but Tanith was done. She ripped the door open and ran in.

She threw up.


	50. Home again

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 50**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

Valkyrie felt the all too familiar feeling of coming around and groaned, feeling the aching in her body but too weak to move. She didn't want to so much as breath. She wondered when possessed Kenspeckle would be back.

She flinched violently when she felt something touch her arm, hearing her heart monitor start to go wild as her fear took over.

"Val, calm down," Tanith's voice said softly. "You're okay, you're safe now."

Valkyrie did calm down, enough that she started crying, but she could still feel that tension in her stomach, the anxiety and pain balled up inside.

"Valkyrie, you need to relax, you need to heal," Tanith said, stroking a thumb over her hand. "Do you want me to call Skulduggery for you?"

Valkyrie nodded, still refusing to open her eyes to the world.

"Alright." Tanith shuffled about and Valkyrie held her breath to force her tears away just a little. Her violent sobbing turned to heaving breaths and Tanith put her phone on speaker.

"Valkyrie?" Crow said through the phone. "How are you feeling?"

"Bad," she said in a small voice. "Where are you?"

"I'm returning the Remnant," he said. He hesitated and then said, "Solomon Wreath is with me. Would you like to speak with him?"

Valkyrie was so surprised it stopped her tears. She nodded pathetically and said, "Yes please." She felt like a little child. She needed a hug.

The phone was passed over and Valkyrie opened her eyes in the meantime, turning on her side carefully to face the phone. "Miss Cain? How are you feeling?"

"Not so good," she said in her hoarse voice. "How – what – how are you?"

"I am tired but otherwise healthy. The possessed doctor was taken by surprise and we were able to capture him and remove the Remnant without killing the man," he said. Valkyrie had no idea what to feel let alone say, so she said nothing at all. "He is expected to make a full physical recovery. Have you heard any news of your own health?"

"No," she said. "I haven't seen anyone yet."

"I believe you were taken to a different hospital to your usual, as was to be expected," Raven told her. "I could not tell you which though. I would put my money on a Doctor Synecdoche, a less skilled medic but still more than capable. I suppose I shouldn't compare her to a genius after all, it is too unfair a comparison. She specialises in battle wounds, and you certainly have a few of those."

Valkyrie wanted to laugh or at least smile at the attempt at humour, but she couldn't. "What happened to Kenspeckle?"

"He was taken to the Sanctuary medical ward for minor treatments," he said. He hesitated himself before continuing. "I understand he is awake and is suffering far more psychologically than physically. He remembers little of his time with the Remnant, but has been told what he did. I expect him to be spending a lot of his time with a therapist."

Valkyrie nodded, feeling a little sick. "Any other news?"

"Well, I know the teleporter boy is having a fit because he has not been included in your rescue. He took it upon himself to go to your young lady and tell her about your injuries. Skulduggery will be disciplining him, apparently, but wanted to talk to you first," Raven told her. "Miss Robin's mother has not allowed her to see you, likely as she was informed of the extent of your injuries. Neither Mr Renn nor Miss Robin knows the full truth of exactly what has happened to you, only that it is extensive."

"Mrs Keena does?"

"I don't think so," Raven said. "Merely that you were tortured and were on life or death status for several hours. Also, she is not family, so the information came from Skulduggery and he didn't want to break your privacy."

"Ok," she said in a small voice. "Anything else happened?"

"We captured Scarab," he said, "but he took a suicide pill while we were rescuing you. No one has missed him yet. We came from tracking Foe's Gang but they're good at evading us. Not as good as the Diablery though. We will find them before they set off the Engine."

Valkyrie nodded and the phone was passed back the Crow for a little while before Valkyrie felt like she was falling asleep and they said their goodbyes. She didn't even get to thank Tanith before she was asleep.

.*****.

"Well, I think that's about all," Doctor Synecdoche said, closing her clipboard. Valkyrie had been at the clinic for four days since she woke up, six days total since she was rescued and she felt a lot better, physically, mentally and emotionally. Perhaps not enough to visit Kenspeckle, but enough to be left alone. "I think you're free to go."

Valkyrie grinned at her sweetly. "Thanks."

"No problem. Try to keep out of trouble."

"Yeah," Valkyrie said, pulling on her coat. "That's not going to happen."

Skulduggery and Fletcher were waiting for her – Valkyrie had settled for slapping Fletcher really, really hard when he came to visit her as punishment and the incident was considered settled even by Fletcher who honestly admitted he made a serious mistake out of anger and panic – and they teleported without a word to the mansion.

"How has it been these last few days?" She asked. "It must have been pretty busy."

"Oh, it was," Fletcher said quickly. "I saved Guild and the world _myself_ with some pretty serious heroism."

"Oh really?" Valkyrie said mockingly. "And how did you do that?"

"Well, that bomb, right?" Fletcher said as they came to a stop at the door to finish the story. "Guild's family was taken hostage. He has a little girl, like, nine, and they told him to set the bomb off at the stadium in exchange for their safety."

"What? The Football Final? _Shit_ , I was meant to go there for my birthday! I had tickets. I was looking forward to it. How did you stop the bomb?"

"I teleported Guild to the ocean right before it went off. Other than a few thousand fish, there were no casualties."

Valkyrie sighed. "Does that mean Guild is alive?"

"Yes," Crow said. "And he'll remain Elder. Meritorious has put me in charge of making a catalogue of criminal charges to put against him while he tries to find a replacement though, so I don't expect he'll be in power much longer. I've already put 'Willing to murder eighty thousand plus mortals on live television' at the top. It goes perfectly with 'Willing to allow a minor to be tortured to stop a bomb.' Very hypocritical if you ask me."

"Great."

"My thoughts exactly."

"But it's all rounded up? And I can go in and get dinner now? Because I'm actually really hungry," Valkyrie pressed.

"Of course," Crow told her.

Valkyrie smiled and did just that – " _Surprise_!"

Valkyrie laughed, seeing her family had put together a dinner for her – Echo Gordon was standing there, her brothers and Tanith, all there to celebrate her recovery. And most importantly, they had not only got pizza and chips, but also sausage rolls, crisps and her other favourite party foods. "Aww, guys!" She grinned. "Stop blocking the food."

They all laughed and cleared the way to the buffet they'd made in the living room, letting her pile her plate high before getting their own, all knowing how hungry she would be. They put a movie on too, the new 'Beauty and the Beast'. The original had been a favourite as a child, likely Gordon's influence, but she never got to see the new version. It was definitely worth it to her and getting to lean on Bear's arm and have Snake's head in her lap again was bliss, all made better by Tanith practically lying all over Panda in the corner.

The afternoon was a quiet affair, but they shared stories from the Dead Men's missions hundreds of years ago as well as finishing off the evening with a Chinese takeaway because they hadn't consumed enough oil and sugar from the rest.

She even found, when she went upstairs to change into her pyjamas, a stack of cards and presents from friends and well-wishers. There was even one from China, a simple but elegant card wishing her a swift recovery. It smelt like wildflowers.

She had the usual ones just as she got at Christmas, one from Civet and Stentor, one from the Meritorious and Elder Crow combined – very business-like – and one from a few other Sanctuary employees. She had one from Marr that she wasn't sure of the legitimacy of but she had not so much as looked at her in months and had requested not to work with Crux any longer.

That said, she put it straight in the bin.

Finally, she delicately picked up a letter that clearly had Kenspeckle's writing on.

She wasn't scared looking at it, nor of thinking of him. But … she wasn't quite ready to read it. It made her feel sick. She put it in her desk drawer for another time.

She changed and went downstairs, finding the others sitting around just as casually as before but a little more naked. She paused on the stairs for a moment, taking in how wrong that sounded before continuing on to the room of genuinely half-naked men. Yeah, that didn't sound any better. They were all in their pyjamas, so the men were in sleeping trousers – for modesty as they all knew they slept in just shorts, but it was still ' _family time_ ' after all – while Fletcher had a top on and she had on winter pyjamas, unlike Tanith who'd found a very, very, very tiny pair of teeny-itty-bitty shorts…

Honestly, Tanith was more naked than literally anyone else and she was Valkyrie's sister. That wasn't okay even a little bit. She needed alone time and more Nadia it seemed.

It wasn't her fault her sister was literally gorgeous and not related to her and she could see all of her ass right now and she wasn't wearing a bra.

Shaking her head from the gutter it was rapidly sliding into, she joined her _family_ – she focused on that word – and sat beside Wolf. She nudged him and he gave her a smile and put an arm around her shoulders. "Are you not hot?" He asked quietly.

They had put the fire on a while ago and it was quite hot. "I'm a little chilly. Probably just the meds and stuff."

He didn't look convinced but nodded anyway and changed the conversation as everyone had gone silent to look at them. "What were you going to say about our plans Skul?"

"Ah, yes," Crow said, sitting up in importance. "We were going to discuss what to do while you are recovering Valkyrie."

"I have ten days, right?"

"Yes, but only four days of no activity, after that you can go back to training so long as you hit no walls or something along those lines," he said.

"Such stupid rules," Tanith said. Panda grunted. She was sitting on her knees on the floor by the coffee table nibbling on leftovers. Panda sat exactly behind her, staring directly at her arse. Everyone knew what she was doing of course. They were enjoying watching Panda's look of pain. And Tanith was one of those people that were more than happy for anyone to look at her body, although Valkyrie didn't want to imagine any of her brother's thoughts.

"Exactly. So after the four days of schoolwork, I was thinking of doing some very, very small cases as a means of working on your searching skills."

"But no fighting?" Valkyrie asked, screwing up her face. "That doesn't sound any fun."

"No, it doesn't," he agreed. "But it would be invaluable lessons for you unless, of course, you'd rather just do schoolwork?"

"On second thoughts, small cases sound fun," Valkyrie smiled sweetly.

Gordon sighed happily from the corner. "I'm so glad that you're all getting on. I got worried when Valkyrie was younger and struggled making friends, so I knew this would be the perfect combination, but I began to doubt when Valkyrie and yourself, Skulduggery, got in a fight. I hadn't factored in your stubbornness. I'm really glad you made up and pulled Valkyrie from school. You've just blossomed since."

"Yeah, I hated school so much," Valkyrie said. "And these guys are alright too."

Dexter grumbled under his breath, "I don't know where they hired some of those people. I remember when you were in Year Seven, Cub, and came home crying."

"Oh yes!" Gordon said, laughing. "I remember getting a call a few days later telling me to tell 'Miss Edgley's guardian' a sincere apology."

"You mean when my teacher said my parents would be ashamed of me?" She said, scowling. "What did you say to her? I was never put in her class again. She completely ignored me since."

"I sent her a friendly little letter outlining how I didn't appreciate her behaviour," Crow said, steeping his fingers. "To her home, with a delicately woven thread of retribution if she hurt you again."

Valkyrie snorted and rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I'm not surprised."

They smiled and talked about Crow's annoyingness into the night, outlining some of his absolute worst plans to his embarrassment until Valkyrie fell asleep against the armrest with a smile.


	51. Scars

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 51**

Thank God her four days of schooling went quickly, filled with talking to Tanith about her torture to work through it, talking to Nadia about anything and everything while avoiding increasingly burning questions and desires she wanted to bring into their lives, and working with Gordon on a new book idea he wanted to write with Valkyrie. She'd had a haircut too to even out the bits the Remnant had cut off. It was just brushing her shoulders, whereas before it had been down to her elbows.

By the time it came to her first unofficial day back on the job, Valkyrie found herself inexplicitly nervous.

She knew why of course.

There was always the possibility she might get hurt. There was always that chance of course, of simply falling down the stairs, but in her line of work, a very simple case of someone retrieving someone's stolen property could easily turn sour quickly. And then she'd get hurt and have to go to Kenspeckle.

She sat on her bed that morning, dressed, eaten and ready to go, looking at the letter from Kenspeckle in her hands. She wanted to read it, but the felt something weird inside her. Some fear, a little repulsion, but also guilt.

She didn't know why. She knew that Kenspeckle only had a few memories of what had happened and that he felt extremely guilty, but it still hurt her even if it hadn't been him. She swallowed thickly and opened it resolutely, knowing she'd just work herself up otherwise.

It was two pages long, outlining first that he was sorry and hoped she had a fast recovery before spiralling into begging for forgiveness and repeatedly telling her he barely remembered the experience and if he were ever to be possessed again he'd sooner take the infamous pill – something used by soldiers in the war and highly controversial, something Kenspeckle had always abhorred – than allow it to happen again.

She could feel the pain in the letter and knew it had been written in a rush and had been left unedited. It had a few tear spots on it and Valkyrie almost cried, knowing how the gentle man had been forced but still feeling the lingering anxiety about being in his presence. She didn't want to not go to him if she was hurt, because that would surely hurt his feelings, but she didn't want to go and break down either because that would definitely hurt him even more. She had no idea what to do but did feel herself soften towards him a little more even if she was conflicted.

She sighed and left it on her pillow, knowing she'd want to see it again later, and after washing her face of tears, she joined Crow in the car.

They were silent on the way there and when they arrived, Valkyrie knew why.

"Hi," she said, smiling and stopping herself from using his codename. Raven was there. "How are you?"

"I am well, thank you," he said, and he looked it too. Less sleepless. "How are you?"

"Grand, grand. Are you working on this case?"

"Yes, the Sanctuary has you on time off after all. I am sharing some cases I have been offered as a means of training you. I thought also, I could introduce you to Necromancy on the way?"

Valkyrie smiled, always ready to learn new magic, but she could feel Crow's conflict. His memories of Lord Vile and Necromancy were not positive after all. "I would love to. I've learnt a lot of magic now. I think I'm really heading towards Elemental though."

Crow relaxed a little and nodded. "It is always healthy to learn different things," he said quietly.

Raven smiled at him and Valkyrie saw a flash of warmth in his eyes though he did try to cover it. "Colour me impressed."

"That would be new for you," Crow said snidely and Valkyrie very nearly laughed. Instead, she bit her tongue and tried to disappear so she could watch. It didn't work. "We are here to train Valkyrie."

"Quite right. Valkyrie, take this," Crow said and handed her a ring. It fit her, though only her pinkie finger, and she looked back at him. "I am going to help you to direct your magic into it."

They must have spent an hour doing that, going through the process of finding the magic and directing it into the ring. She used Raven's cane a few times to help her feel what it should be like to find her own, and when she finally found it, it was just a matter of getting it to _stay_ in the ring. She was quite cold by the time they were done, but she was thrilled to have an immediate grasp of the instrument.

"You're doing well," Skulduggery said cautiously. Valkyrie took his hand, knowing the conflict inside – the pride he felt for her, and the guilt associated with the magic. Valkyrie was really enjoying it though. His pride meant a lot to her. It always felt very fatherly.

"Thanks," she said, turning to Raven. "What are we actually meant to be doing today?"

"We are on a search and retrieve mission," he said. "A fancy name for returning the property of a man whose mother took his car as punishment for breaking up with a young lady she rather liked. We have all the warrants."

Valkyrie frowned. "We're getting someone's car?"

"Yes."

"We're detectives," she said.

"Yes. Detectives find things, and that is your objective today."

"I'd rather be thrown at a wall," she said with disgust. "I don't want to be getting some cowards car. He can get it himself."

"Ah, but you don't know the best part," Crow interjected. "His mother is on holiday."

Valkyrie said nothing, just looked at him like a gaping fish.

"So all you need to do is find her house."

Valkyrie continued fishing.

"This is actually a test of you making your way from nowhere to the correct place," Crow said cheerfully, fixing his tie. "Off you go."

"I hate you," she glared. "Solomon, is this actually what we're doing?"

"Unfortunately," he smirked. "We can practice your Necromancy skills on the way."

.*****.

Valkyrie's week did not improve after that 'case', such as it was.

She spent her time with Crow and Raven as a weird third wheel and mediator, trying to deal with not only what ridiculous case Raven found but also whatever 'skill' Crow decided to test during said case. And the whole time she had to listen to them bicker and ignore her as they debated serious topics or squabbled over tiny details like Raven splashing a tiny little piece of mud onto Crow's calf.

She shook her head into her pillow and tried to focus on herself instead. At the text message she'd been staring at for almost five minutes.

Nadia had sent her a picture of some 'clothes' she wanted to wear to a date they had planned. She had sent the pictures at ten at night after checking Valkyrie was in bed, which she was, and the pictures were of each individual item. For example, the picture asking about the shorts was of Nadia, in her full-length mirror, wearing the article, with a view of the back, showing off the curve of her ass and her smooth legs, as well as her bare back.

Another picture was of the front of the shorts and her belly, stopping just, just below her nipples, giving Valkyrie a tantalising view of the bottom of her breasts.

To be fair, Valkyrie rationalised as she felt her body react, she has been jumping around this since she got home, texting Nadia probing questions without saying anything sexual. It seemed Nadia had finally taken it into her own hands.

Holding her breath, Valkyrie sent her a text – 'You're beautiful xx,' she sent. And then smacked herself, remembering she was meant to be playing along, talking about the clothes. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_ – her phone buzzed.

She looked and Nadia had sent her another picture, this time of a 'crop-top'. Valkyrie felt herself go red even though she was alone. Again, she hadn't shown anything, but still! She might as well have, and if that was a crop-top, Valkyrie wanted Nadia to wear them every time she saw her. But never in public – that wasn't allowed anymore.

'I love it,' she sent, biting her lip.

It took a few moments longer for a reply and Valkyrie almost started sweating with nerves. 'Show me what you're wearing?'

Valkyrie nearly choked, sitting up quickly in a panic. 'Now or for our date?' She asked with a flash of competence, trying to buy her brain some time to think.

'The date,' Nadia sent. Valkyrie jumped out of bed, falling to the floor with a bang as she tripped over her sheets. She didn't stop, crawling to her wardrobe and looking around. What did she have? What even fit her? Did she have to stick to what she put on now? Probably not, she realised, calming herself. Nadia had sent her pictures before, though not quite like these ones, and had not followed through on the outfit. She just had to flirt back, she realised. Flirt with her looks.

How did she do that?

Valkyrie quickly pulled her clothes off and thanked the gods of every and all religions she had shaved recently and ripped through the hangers to find something, anything.

The only skimpy things she had left since her growth spurt was old workout gear and a few items Nadia had already seen and were obviously out of the count for that reason. Was flirting meant to be stressful? She sighed and decided she'd let Nadia hang long enough and pulled on a pair of old shorts. They were kind of ugly, being bright blue and all, but Valkyrie owned nothing smaller. She threw them on, taking off her underwear first, and yanked them high. Remembering some 'leaked footage' from some magazine, she put her leg on a shelf and twisted to take the picture, leaving her top off and covering her small breasts with her arm and hand.

Hoping to the same god's she didn't look like the biggest idiot in all of Idiotdom, she sent it to Nadia and threw herself into bed with embarrassment, not wanting to start comparing herself to her gorgeous girlfriend.

'Val?' Nadia sent her.

Valkyrie swallowed thickly. 'Yeah?' She sent.

'What are those scars?'

Valkyrie felt the blood drain from her face and tears come to her eyes as the real embarrassment and dread filled her. She looked back at the picture and realised she had forgotten completely to hide the scars, the new scars she had taken great care to conceal from her family.

The nails that possessed Kenspeckle had hammered through her had been cursed in some way to leave scars, and the picture showed several, including the ones on her thighs, shins and the shoulder visible in the picture. She had sent her girlfriend, the one person she wanted to look beautiful and amazing and smart to, a picture of her scars.

She hadn't meant to do that. It was dark in her room and she hadn't realised her brightness was down. On closer inspection, the thin ones cut into her with the cursed straight-razor weren't even visible. And yet it was still so gross.

She genuinely hadn't even thought about it. In a way, the scars were cool, and she'd been trying to tell herself that for the last week, and despite how ugly they were she just hadn't thought about it when she hadn't seen them on her camera.

'I'm sorry,' she sent to Nadia and threw the phone down to cry.

She heard it buzz several times but didn't dare looking, lost in her own self-consciousness and feeling of dread, working up the situation in her head. At some point, she heard the phone ringing. She hesitated for a long moment, not wanting to face her shame, but pressed the button to answer out of habit. She raised it to her ear. "Hello?" She said, trying to mask her tears.

"Val, baby, I'm sorry!" Nadia cried, sobbing down the phone. "I didn't mean to say it like that, I'm so sorry I hurt your feelings!"

Valkyrie own eyes welled up again, but she coughed and answered stoically. "You didn't. I'm fine. Why are you crying?"

"I'm crying because I know I upset you," she said in a high, muffled voice. "I just didn't know about them, you said nothing. I just – I don't know why I said anything, you're still the prettiest girl I know, but I didn't _know_."

"You didn't have to know," Valkyrie grumbled.

"I–" Nadia started, then stiffed and started again. "I'm sorry, Val. I am. You're beautiful. I almost didn't notice the scars I was so busy looking at the rest of you. But I love you, I don't want you hurting."

Valkyrie put a hand over her belly, knowing there were far more ugly scars possessed Kenspeckle had slashed into her skin. Did she want to tell Nadia that? She didn't think it was beautiful, so how could Nadia? Perhaps she might be able to convince herself they were cool someday, but never beautiful. "It's fine. I'm fine. Don't think about it."

"Don't – Valkyrie how couldn't I think about it? It's a part of you now, I want to think about it," she said, with a huff of a laugh, something exasperated. "I love you. I love all of you. Scar's don't change that. Would you love me less if I had scars?"

"No–"

"Exactly! So don't even start that. Honestly," Nadia said. Valkyrie could hear the smile through her sad voice even through the phone, trying to cheer her up. "You are so hot. You should know that."

Valkyrie smiled, brushing a thumb over one scar. She said nothing, not exactly feeling it.

"I think it's hot anyway."

Valkyrie hummed at that, not sure if she really meant it.

"It is. It say's how strong you are, to have gone through so much. And you know how much I like how strong you are."

"I suppose," she said allowed, feeling the anxious knots fall away and suddenly reappear when she made her mind up. "I have scars on my stomach too. He – he ruined the skin," she said quietly, looking down at herself.

Nadia said nothing for a moment. "What do you mean?"

Valkyrie hesitated, taking a moment to push away from the anxieties and memories before focusing on the conversation again. "It's just lots of cuts. Like, loads. My whole belly is just lines and scars and ugly skin. I hate it."

"You're not ugly. Even if you hate it, it's not ugly."

"You don't know that," Valkyrie said heavily.

"I do, because you're you, and you're always hot," Nadia said confidently. "But why didn't the doctor's that healed you get rid of the scars?"

"He found the flip knife I got from a criminal, it's a cursed one. It's made of the same stuff as the nails he hammered through me. It leaves a permanent scar."

"Why would he even do that?" Nadia said hotly. "It's not as if he even has anything against you, he was just hurting you for no reason!"

"It wasn't Kenspeckle," Valkyrie defended quietly. "It was a Remnant wanting to cause me as much pain as possible, it's all a Remnant wants."

"You are perfect," Nadia said with conviction. "And I want to see those scars in person and I want to kiss them and I want to kiss your lips. I want to kiss all of you. I want to–"

"Nadia," she said, grinning with a mad blush. "You've made your point."

"I don't think I have," she breathed through the phone. "I think I need to tell you I love you and – and be left alone with that picture you sent me. So there. Goodnight. I love you."

Valkyrie bit her lip and thought over what to say but couldn't think of any type of comeback around the obvious innuendo. "I love you too. Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

"Yes. Have fun." And Nadia hung up.

Valkyrie grinned and put her face in her pillow, giggling. Soon though, she blushed, thinking of what Nadia was doing, and that caused her to go back to those pictures of Nadia as she joined in the activity.


	52. Stupid Crow

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 52**

Valkyrie made it through nearly six weeks without being critically hurt, mostly by getting Raven to join in on their cases. She had expected some resistance from Crow, but he seemed happier about the situation than her.

"Solomon," Crow said warmly, shaking the man's hand in greeting. They'd seen each other less than twelve hours ago. "How are you today?"

"I am well," he said, shaking it back with a massive grin. His happiness warmed his face up considerably and she could see a handsome, young man beneath it all. "And yourself?"

"I'm the usual," Crow said, standing back a little. "Dead."

Raven laughed and bowed them into the coffee shop they were meeting a client of his in. It was a training situation for Valkyrie but also a genuine case for them. She merely needed to observe how a professional dealt with information and decide if a case was, firstly, something they could handle, and secondly, technically legal to carry out.

The café was nice, a dark cubbyhole of a place with brick walls and vinyl's acting as art pieces covering the walls. The tables were reclaimed wood. The chairs mismatched. It was a nice place although nothing Valkyrie had expected a man like Solomon Wreath to pick. She decided the client must have chosen it.

"Here," Raven said, gesturing to a table for four. They sat down, Valkyrie making sure the men were sitting together so they wouldn't stare and chat the whole time like the last time they had gone out. She felt frustrated just thinking about it. They were annoying her. She kind of preferred when Crow hated Solomon, at least she was listened to then. "Valkyrie, what would you like to drink?"

"Um, a coke?" She asked him.

"Anything to eat?"

She glanced over at the counter and picked a slice of a lemon drizzle cake she could see. He nodded and went to get it.

"You don't look happy," Crow observed when Raven was out of earshot.

"Don't I?" She said.

"You were happy earlier," he said mildly. "Talking to Nadia."

"Yes, well, Nadia is a happy person," she smiled at him. "You're just annoying."

He hesitated and sat forwards a little. "Am I upsetting you? Our routine has changed. We’re not alone as much anymore."

Valkyrie shook her head quickly. "No, no, of course not. I wanted you to resolve your issues."

"Exactly," Crow said. "Which is why I was confused when you looked upset when I started speaking to Solomon. You suggested doing another case with him after all."

"I did," Valkyrie nodded. "I did, and I'm glad I did. I didn't mean to look upset, don't worry about it. I'm sorry."

"Valkyrie–"

"Really, I'm fine," she said, and went quiet as Raven sat back at the table.

"Is everything okay?" Raven frowned, looking between Valkyrie and Crow. "What happened?"

"Nothing," Valkyrie said, pulling over her cake and drink. "And thank you."

"It's fine," he said, dismissing the conversation easily. "Our client should be here in the next few minutes. Have you been practising your Necromancy?"

"I have," she nodded, fiddling with the little ring. "I think I want to get a properly sized ring to continue practising. Sometimes I feel like I can't use as much power as I have with this, it's like it's too small to squeeze it through."

He nodded. "That is just a practice or trainer ring. You need to get a proper item to pour your magic into. You mentioned your birthday coming up? Perhaps you could accompany me to the Temple and we could get you a ring. If you pick something else in your Surge, the magic will leave it and you’ll have a beautiful ring to keep."

Valkyrie watched Crow out the corner of her eye and was sure he would object but he didn't do anything, just picked a little lint off his suit. He truly didn't mind. A part of her was sort of hurt that just two or so months ago he never would have allowed that, but now she was allowed to go. Was it that he didn't mind and trusted Raven or that he just didn't care anymore? She didn't know but the feelings were there. He could be so protective that this sudden willingness for her to go places he hated was not particularly welcome.

"That would be nice," she said with a small smile. She took a quick bite of her cake and Raven saw the client come in the door.

"Mr Jakell," Raven said, standing and shaking the man's hand. "You have a case for us?"

"Yes yes," he said quickly, sitting down in a rushed way. "I haven't been able to find my brother – he went off on a hike in the country and never came back. I searched and looked and searched and I haven't found him, I don't know what to do. I heard Pleasant is working with you, and I knew I had to ask."

Raven nodded, not as offended as Valkyrie might have been. "We can look for him. When did he go on the hike, and when did you notice him missing?"

"He left for the hike on the second of August this month," he said. "And it was two days later I noticed him missing. I asked everyone. He went to get a coffee in a local café in a town he was hiking through, but he wasn't seen after leaving that town. No one has heard of him and the bank says no one has accessed his accounts."

"What's his name?" Solomon asked.

"Copper Everlast," Jakell said. "His nephews birthday is soon, he'd never miss it! I know he must have been taken, you need to find him."

"We'll do our best. What was his route?" Raven asked.

When they knew where Everlast had been and potentially gone, they went for a drive to the last area he'd been seen and after they parked in silence – Valkyrie could feel the tension in the car and just got more frustrated knowing she had caused the uncertainty – and they got out a map of the area and put it on the bonnet. They waited a moment for Crow to sketch out the route Everlast should have taken.

"Okay," Valkyrie said, trying to sound neutral and get on with what she came for. "We know he left this place having only spoken to two people."

"Which we know about," Crow interjected.

"Two people that we know about," she agreed. "So we should have a catch up with them and then start walking the way he should have gone to retrace his steps. Maybe knock on a few doors and see if any people saw him that Jakell didn't speak to."

"I agree," Raven said and Crow nodded.

They went to the café first, which looked more like a bar than its name, and spoke to a waitress. She pointed them to another, who pointed to another, who pointed to the owner and they trekked to her house. They knocked on the door.

"No one's home," Crow muttered. "Do we want to wait or move on?"

Valkyrie looked up in time to see a lace curtain flutter back into place. "Keep knocking. She's home."

Crow knocked again, louder, but they heard nothing. Valkyrie moved around the house to the window in time to see someone run past a window on the other side of the house, outside.

"She's running!" Valkyrie said and ran around the house and jumped the gate. The side alley was a tip, but with her protective boots, Valkyrie jumped over the rubbish and followed the woman over into her neighbour's house, and over the next fence and then the street. Valkyrie was just inches from the woman's back but Crow and Raven were even quicker and had run around all the houses and tackled the woman, making the woman shriek.

"Why were you running?" Crow asked, picking the woman up off the ground.

She shrieked in his face and Valkyrie stepped forwards and placed shackles on her quickly just in case she was a mage. "What are you doing?" The woman shouted. "This is a public place!" She was a mage then.

"Exactly," Crow said pleasantly from beneath his regular disguise. "So how about you come with us and we talk about this instead of fighting on the street?"

The woman huffed but looked around the street nervously and nodded. They walked back to her house and she led them in and sat on the sofa. Her hands remained cuffed but she never asked for them to come off. Interesting.

"Can I ask your name?" Said Crow.

"No. I want you to leave," she said with an American accent. "Leave me alone."

"We just need to ask you some questions," Crow said, and shoved a picture of Copper Everlast in her face. "Do you recognise this man?"

She opened her eyes slightly before sneering at him. "No. Now leave me."

"You know him," Valkyrie said stubbornly.

"You are a child, you know nothing," she spat.

"I'm the Head of Detectives at the Irish Sanctuary," she said, glaring. "You will answer our questions or you'll be arrested for being uncooperative."

"You can’t!" She shrieked. "My sister will not allow you to – that’s illegal! I want to speak to my lawyer!"

"You need to answer our questions. How do you know Everlast?" She asked.

The lady almost shouted, but then glared at Valkyrie and turned to Crow. "I will talk. But make _her_ leave first."

Valkyrie looked at Crow and her mouth opened when she noticed he was considering it. "You agree you will cooperate?"

Valkyrie hmphed and shook her head. "Don't worry, I'm leaving," she said moodily, and let herself out.

She didn't turn to look at them.

She could see when she wasn't needed.

She regretted getting Crow to talk to Raven and settle their issues. Obviously, she was no longer needed now he had someone better in his life to work with.

She considered staying at the car and calming down but decided it wasn't worth it. Instead, she wandered away and took a bus going into town and then another going past her house and got off there. She sighed heavily and let herself in. She didn't see anyone but knew they were in. She just felt even more worked up than when she left two hours ago, and she couldn't even shout at Crow about it, or tell Nadia because she was at school. She sighed and went to the kitchen to make lunch.

Weasel was sitting there already and had made a sandwich sitting on the other side of the table to where he was sitting.

"Is that for me?" She asked.

"No one else around," he said, leaning back in his chair. "What are you doing back early and alone?"

She sighed again and tucked into her lunch. "I don't enjoy being brushed off because Skulduggery has a new, better friend. He doesn't have to work with me if he doesn't want to, but I'd rather he said that before we went out instead of in the middle of a case."

Weasel smiled sadly. "That sucks."

Valkyrie nodded. "I'll just let him do what he wants. I don't have to work with him. I can work with someone else."

"Who?" Weasel asked curiously. "Tanith? I get the feeling she'll be too busy with Ghastly soon."

Valkyrie smiled. "Well, it's about time. Did he say something? Ask her out?"

"No," Weasel grinned. "But by the shorts she's wearing, she'll attack him if he doesn't do something soon."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "I'll lock them in a room together if it doesn't happen in a week. It's painful to watch."

"I know," he said. "But it's also kind of funny. So tell me, what's your plan?"

Valkyrie took a bite of her sandwich and looked at the time. "Right now, it's to ignore him and get a nap. Then I'll think about it. I don't know. I want to be Crow's partner, but I don't want to be cast off as soon as he finds something more interesting. I'm not something he can do that too."

"Exactly," Weasel grinned. "You've been trained well."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes at him. "Maybe, but not by you."

He snored. "I've taught you for years."

"Yeah, as a bad influence, not a responsible teacher."

"True that. Have a nice nap."

"Thanks," she said and went upstairs to her room. Confronted with her bed, she actually ended up getting a shower, shaving her legs, doing her nails, painting her toes, sorting a laundry pile and staring at it for nearly five minutes trying to think up a really good excuse not to do it before growling and throwing herself on her bed. She drifted off to sleep ignoring the one and only text she got from Crow in all that time.


	53. Back to normal?

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 53**

When Valkyrie woke up, she sulked in her room, having worked out exactly why she was upset with Crow.

She was jealous that he liked someone else. It didn't even matter what type of like, whether it was friendship, companionship or something more, she just wasn't happy about it. He was her friend, her kind-of father and when she tried getting Crow and Raven to be friends again she hadn't exactly counted on Crow suddenly ignoring her or passing her over in cases because of it.

So she did what she always did when she got bored and upset – she cleaned her room.

That was probably the only upside of all that. And talking with Nadia on the phone all morning as she worked since it was the weekend.

"But why would he cut you out?" Nadia asked her through the phone as Valkyrie worked on sorting through her papers and schoolwork. "I get before when he was upset with you, but now it makes no sense."

"I don't know, it's just what he's doing," Valkyrie griped.

Nadia hummed. "I think he's just excited."

"Excited?" Valkyrie asked, pausing to look at her phone. "I'm not sure about that. More like insufferable."

"Val, he just got his friend back, I bet he is quite excited to catch up. Especially since you did say that you think he always liked Solomon, he just hated him at the same time because of a handful of stupid things Solomon did. It was a long time to like him without talking or doing anything together. He lives with you, but he only has so much time of the day with Solomon."

Valkyrie shook her head as she sorted through the books. "No, that can't work because – well I don't know, alright, but even if it was true he still shouldn't push me out just because he found someone else to be happy with! He's my adoptive father, he can't just do that. Even if he’s not really my father or anything. Just a guardian."

"I know baby, I know, I wasn't saying that," Nadia said softly. Valkyrie pouted a little as she continued to clean, wishing she could see the girl. They hadn't seen each other in over two months. "I was just saying why he might, not that it's right."

She sighed. "I know. I'm just upset, and I know I was being stupid so I don't want to see him, but I also do and want to just get it over with. I don't want to lose my job, I love my job and I love working with Crow every day. I'd hate to stop. But I – you know what I mean, I just don't want to be passed over. God, my head is all over the place."

"Yeah, I can tell. Just keep tidying, I'm sure your room needs it."

Valkyrie smiled, looking it over. "I mean, it's a little better. I just have a lot, like _a lot_ a lot, of washing to do. I have four used towels in here to wash. That's a lot of towels."

"Why do you own so many towels?"

"I don't know, there's so many of us we just keep them all in one place and share. And I mean share them once cleaned, not share after someone else used it," Valkyrie verified. "We're close but not that close."

"Good. I'm glad you have boundaries," Nadia said with a smile. Valkyrie loved she could hear Nadia's smile, it was the best thing to listen to. She was a walking cringe machine apparently. "You really need to do your washing. Mum said I'd have to start doing my own washing soon. I don't even know how."

"You're nearly sixteen, how have you never done washing?" Valkyrie asked with a laugh. "Don't worry, I'll teach you."

"I know you are, I'm counting on it."

There was a knock on Valkyrie's door then and Valkyrie knew it was Crow. "Nadia, Crow's at my door, I'll talk to you later, love you."

"Love you too, bye!"

Valkyrie hung up and tossed the phone on her stripped bed. She opened the door and went back to her sorting. "Hi."

"Good morning," he said. "You didn't come down to breakfast."

She bit her cheek as her stomach growled. "I didn't. I was busy."

"You need to take care of yourself," he said, sitting in a chair. "Even if you are upset with me."

She didn't say anything, just moved a large stack of paper and books to the recycling pile.

He coughed slightly and continued. "I know I upset you yesterday by sending you away. I spoke with Solomon and he suggested that I was not spending as much time with you as I was before we… rekindled our friendship. I wanted to say I'm sorry. I didn't mean or realise I was doing it but now it has been pointed out to me, I see that I have been doing that quite accidentally. I am sorry Valkyrie. I didn't mean to ignore you."

Valkyrie sighed and rubbed her eyes. "I'm sorry for getting annoyed with you. I should have just said something instead of getting in a strop."

"I completely forgive you, it was my fault," Crow said and stood up with his arms open. Valkyrie quickly came in to hug him and wrapped her arms around him tightly. "Nothing between us will change, and if ever it does, I want both of us to be happy with that change. Okay?"

"Okay. Thank you. I forgive you too by the way."

He kissed her hair and pulled away. "Now, I would suggest going out or on a case, but I have a private appointment with China for a facade. It should be good."

"Like the one Panda got last week?" Valkyrie asked.

"Hopefully. Now I need to go, I mustn't keep China waiting. I will see you later. Get something to eat. And do your washing too. Why do you have so many towels?"

**.*****.**

After putting on two loads of washing – they had invested in two new massive washers and driers to help with the amount of laundry nine people generated – she called Nadia back and told her the conversation she just had and made herself a big brunch out of the breakfast leftovers before finishing up her room. She was glad to get it done, to be honest, and it really increased in size now she could see the floor.

She took the rubbish out to the bin and almost threw the piles of papers in the air when Fletcher popped in front of her.

"Valkyrie, I have–"

"What the fuck Fletcher?!" Valkyrie shouted, glaring at him until he had wilted down. She growled and threw the papers in the recycling bin. She swirled back around to punish him. "Why do you keep doing that?"

"I needed to talk to you, so I teleported," he smirked, running his hand over his spiky hair. "I'm a Teleporter – or did you forget?"

Valkyrie glared a last time for good measure but decided not to comment on that. "What do you want?"

"I have a question," he said, following her into the house giddily. "We need to talk about what's happening once I turn eighteen."

"When's your birthday?"

"February," he said. "So only, what, four months away? I need to know the plan."

Valkyrie frowned and made her way up the stairs. "Plan? What makes you think I have a plan?"

"You always have a plan," he said quickly. "So tell me."

Valkyrie sighed and stopped in the hallway to her room. "Look, I haven't really thought about it–"

"Come on Val," he said pleadingly. Valkyrie crossed her arms and looked at him standing at the top of the stairs, the big windows showing the late summer white sky, and his stupid hair. He looked desperate. "You know I'm useful. I might not be a Dead Man, or super trained, or the best, and I know I annoy you a lot, but I do the chores I'm asked to, I keep things clean and other than talking, I'm quiet."

Valkyrie hummed, knowing it was true. He was annoying. But he was also useful and generally a good house guest.

"And if you keep me around, it'll be your circumstances," he said excitedly. "I decided to do what you said and do some work. I talked to that Peregrine bloke and got some advice, I've been practising my magic, and the Sanctuary is helping me start up work. I know it's not my own business, and I'm only a beginner level employee, but I'm working. So I can pay you to live here."

Valkyrie shifted on her feet and thought about it. "I suppose it wouldn't be too bad," she said cautiously. "But I'd have to talk to the others. And we'd have to have a contract. And you'd have to pay rent. But we could work something out I guess."

He nodded. "Exactly. And I was thinking, at the moment I'd only have enough money for that little room I'm in at the moment, but there's that big flat thing at the back of the house–"

"How do you know that's there?" Valkyrie asked.

"I went looking of course," he said, rolling his eyes. "What do you think I do all day, tan and sleep?"

"Yes, that's exactly what I think," she said.

"Well, yeah, it is, but I also went exploring and found that flat thing you've got. So when I'm making more money I could rent there instead. I mean, you're not exactly using it, and it has a place to cook so I'd be out of your way."

Valkyrie sighed, knowing she was beaten. "I'll think about it, alright. Give me a month or so, and then I'll give you a final answer."

"Sweet! Thank you," he said with a big grin. "I love living here you know. But I did want to ask, why do you have that flat?"

"It's just an old butler or maid quarters," Valkyrie said absently, looking at a message from Nadia. Her mother had just announced a business partner of her fathers was coming to dinner, and Valkyrie knew the name as someone she was secretly financing. Not that Nadia knew that, Nadia just knew he was a really annoying man that told awful jokes and wanted to merge his business with her fathers and take it over. They had him over for dinner to keep him nice instead of trying to get other businesses to throw Mr Vinay out. He was one of the people Valkyrie planned on being open to about her backing and forcing him to submit to her incredibly big influence on the company. They'd have gone under several times without her, or rather Gordon's, intervention. Not that that mattered for several years so she sent a little message back about acting cute and put her phone away. "What were we talking about?"

"You’re going to let me rent the butlers quarters one day," Fletcher said. "And I'm going to go to Australia now – I have a date."

Valkyrie wasn't able to reply because a moment later he teleported away with a wink and Valkyrie just have to sigh at her strange turn of events and continue on.


	54. The OTHER bomb

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 54**

After the jealous wave of Crow not balancing his time, Valkyrie and Crow came up with a nice deal where Valkyrie went on once less case a week so that Crow and Raven could spend time together. And that one day, or duration of a case if it was a big one, she would spend doing school work so she didn't get behind and have to spend days off in order to catch up.

It was a nice agreement since Valkyrie could see an excited and happy Crow instead of an angry man holding onto the past. It made Valkyrie wonder if some of that anger at Serpine had been for the man causing him to lose a lifelong friendship as well as the obvious murdering of loved ones. Plus she could choose the day and if a weekend fitted the schedule of criminal activity, she could spend time with Nadia.

So they spent the weeks like that – days working in harmony with Crow, evenings with family and nights with Nadia, or rather, her phone. And the late nights with… Nadia in her mind. And Nadia often knew it. They hadn't quite progressed to talking about it with each other but were instead playing a game of knowing what the other was doing whilst never saying it. It was exhilarating and Valkyrie felt herself get more excited in their relationship for each night instead of just for the next time seeing each other – though she was still excited to spend time with her of course. She was getting more comfortable with the idea of moving forwards but honestly knew she was too embarrassed to dare say anything yet.

That was her boundary, she had decided. When she wasn't embarrassed about the idea anymore, she was ready to move forward. Nadia was the usual confident and calm and didn't push Valkyrie at all, except maybe with the pictures. Still no real nakedness, but more than Valkyrie needed to imagine. She was certainly enjoying playing with Valkyrie like that.

Valkyrie's fifteenth birthday passed in a flurry of cards, presents and a theatre performance she saw with Nadia, and then Nadia's sixteenth birthday passed two months later even quicker, and then Christmas with the massive Christmas tree they tepeed on Christmas morning for the hell of it. That had turned into wrapping each other in toilet rolls and opening presents as Mummies.

It was the New Year Sanctuary party, snowy and cold, that the mess began.

Valkyrie hadn't been there, just Wolf and Weasel had attended, but they had called and Fletcher teleported Valkyrie and Crow over. He left quickly, barely saving himself from being decapitated.

"What's going on?" Valkyrie shouted over the noise and then got her answer when a vampire flew into a man and ripped his neck out. "They're using the serum!"

"Good, they're more vulnerable!" Crow shouted, shooting one in the face. "Try to arrest any not covered in blood or murdering, the rest can be killed."

Valkyrie nodded to herself and jumped into the fray, clicking fire into her hands and throwing it at one whose hair caught fire. The vampire screamed and ran at Valkyrie wildly, letting her know the young woman was a new vampire who'd been told that all a vampire wanted is to kill and drink blood, making her very easy to trick with her own fighting skills.

As expected, when the female vampire got to her, Valkyrie flipped the girl over her hip and as she was covered in the blood of her victims, she stomped on her face twice and the girl's nose must have broken and busted in badly. She stopped moving.

Another one pounced on Valkyrie's back immediately and very nearly bit her – Valkyrie had been experimenting with purple energy with Wolf though and charged her whole body, the purple electric jumping on her skin. The vampire convulsed but it only made him hold her tighter and Valkyrie couldn't push him off, even when she body slammed him to the floor. She stopped the magic but it did nothing for his grip which was now locked tightly.

She rolled over and pulled herself onto her knees, the man clinging on and hissing in her ear, his dribble dripping on the floor. She flipped and his arms flew off her when she landed on him the second time, and she quickly stood and nearly hit him in the face before she was tackled by Wolf and a vampire flew over their heads.

"We need to get this finished!" Wolf shouted, throwing his magic at someone and then standing. Valkyrie scrambled up and kicked someone in the face.

"How many are here?" She shouted to him.

"At least a hundred! All are using serum!"

 _Fuck, fuck, fuck_ – "Why?" Valkyrie screeched.

"What?"

"Why are they using serum?"

Wolf punched a male vampire so hard they were instantly knocked out and looked at her. "You're the detective!"

She nodded and ducked so Wolf could punch a massive vampire with bloodshot eyes in the nose. "Why are they here?"

Wolf kicked the vampire into another and they got distracted ripping each other apart, giving the two a chance to run off before they were remembered. "I don't know Cub, the party was fine, we were only halfway through the countdown when they attacked."

"I don't think it matters when in the countdown they attacked!" Valkyrie snarled as she used her flip knife – not the Sanguine one that possessed Kenspeckle had used on her months ago, that had been destroyed, she'd stolen this from someone else to keep up tradition – to stab one covered in blood and brains in the eye. "Just why!"

"I don't know!" Wolf said, pulling a fire alarm to turn on the sprinklers. There was a sudden shout of shock as the frozen cold water splashed down. "I haven't seen a leader."

Valkyrie nodded and they barrelled into the back dance room, each tackling a person to the ground – Wolf had Samuel, Valkyrie had Mercy.

"Oh," Valkyrie sneered down at the woman. " _You_."

The lady sneered back and they began grappling on the floor, rolling and twisting, Valkyrie getting an elbow to the face but then holding the arm in place and biting the woman's forearm as hard as possible. Mercy screamed and kneed Valkyrie between the legs and Valkyrie let her go quickly.

Mercy stood and backed away from Valkyrie. Valkyrie scrambled up. "Why are you attacking here?" She shouted.

"We can't get to the Sanctuary," she snarled. "All that security was too much for Samuel's new vampire babies, so we came for the next best thing."

"The party?" Valkyrie asked, looking around quickly. Mercy ran off, and Valkyrie let her, finally seeing the plan.

The Desolation Engine.

She remembered now – she hadn't before. When the Remnant infested Kenspeckle had tortured her, he had talked and talked and talked, so much Valkyrie had forgotten in the whirlwind of pain and fear. He said he had made the Desolation Engine, the bomb the Dead Men had retrieved before it had been set off at the games by the suicidal Foe's Gang. They had barely gotten it and deactivated it.

But he had made a second, or rather, had fixed an original before Valkyrie had woken, the one that had been _taken_ by Foe's Gang before she had woken and had only heard about. It had been hidden away by them, she guessed, until this moment.

She had just been so distracted by what he was doing and the emotional recovery after she hadn't so much as thought of what he had told her.

Thurid Guild was holding the Desolation Engine and it was red and bubbling. If Guild let it go, or it was forced from his hands, it would go off and destroy everything for miles around them.

"Guild!" She shouted, pushing into a vampire and stabbing it in the face twice and once in the neck to get it down. "Don't let go of that bomb!"

"I won't!" He snarled, staring at it with horror. "Cain! Get my wife and daughter and leave! Get the teleporter!"

Valkyrie looked over from slamming a very young, maybe fifteen-year-old, vampire into the ground and shackled him to a doorknob. She took out her phone and hid behind a table and called Fletcher. It rang almost to the end and then he picked up.

"Valkyrie, I'm kind of–"

"There's a bomb I need your help!" She shouted through the phone.

"Just a moment–"

"NOW!" She screamed, and then had to suddenly fight off a vampire, an older, more experienced one, and accidentally used her phone to smash his head in – the only thing that broke was her phone. He snarled and batted her over the table with a strong swipe of his hand and Valkyrie shouted as she was thrown roughly away. Suddenly the alarms went off but Valkyrie had no time to wonder what that one was for as that vampire threw the whole table at her.

She rolled over the floor quickly, feeling like a child as she did, and then used her Elemental magic to throw a fireball at him as she shuffled back on her butt. He batted that away too and Valkyrie used her Necromancy to slice him but it had almost no power to it and she felt her heart jump as the panic began and he bared his teeth and –

Another vampire suddenly barrelled into him, the two of them going down in a tangle of fangs and limbs. Valkyrie didn't so much as look again, she just got up and ran, looking for Crow or Wolf.

She found Crow in the hallway with Fletcher who was incredibly pale and had a severely bleeding nose.

"What happened to him?" She asked quickly.

"Anti-teleportation wards," Crow answered. "He got in but it gave him a shock. He won't be able to get back out."

"Fuck," Valkyrie said. "Guild has the Desolation Engine."

"But we destroyed–"

"He made a second one, I didn't remember until I saw it," Valkyrie explained quickly, leading them through the slowly growing layer of vampire bodies on the ground. They all had blood on from killing each other and the fighting guests, so every move risked them slipping and it was so very easy to die when you were pinned to the floor so she was very careful. She heard Fletcher swear and throw up and Crow jumped out the way and let him fall. He joined Valkyrie in seeing Guild instead. "Can you get some shackles off if I cover you?"

"Yes," he said, seeing Guild's little girl. He got out his set of lock picks and got to work, they were too complicated for Valkyrie. She looked around, but Wolf had killed almost all of them and the Cleavers were rounding up the living and injured guests to make it easier. It still didn't help their predicament.

"What should I do?" She asked, looking around.

"Call the Grand Mage," Crow asked. "Get someone who can defuse the bomb."

"It can't be," Valkyrie ground out. "I remember Kenspeckle – possessed Kenspeckle – talking about it, he made it modified. It was meant to be the one they used at the football game but the Remnant made them the other way around for its amusement. They had to use the original design and send it ahead. This one will only detonate when it leaves Guild's hands. And he has to let go of it eventually. I can't believe I forgot about it."

"To be fair, you were being tortured," Crow said conversationally.

The girl let out a whine and started to cry. Her mother started to coo to her, trying to calm her down and Valkyrie got extremely guilty for being too open about the situation around her. She was just a little girl.

She thought about the situation quickly and knew what to do. "Crow, I need your phone."

"Left pocket."

She got his phone out and quickly found Kenspeckle's number. They had seen each other several, brief times since he was possessed and herself tortured, but never for her own treatment and never for long. It made her too anxious. But this was more than her, this was a ten-year-old kid that was sobbing because her daddy was going to kill her and there was nothing he could even do about it.

It rang out and Valkyrie called a second time, which was picked up on the first ring. "Hello?" Said Civet.

"Civet, it's Valkyrie!" She said. "I need Kenspeckle to come to the Sanctuary New Year party at the K Club Hotel in Kildare."

"Oh! Let me get him – Doctor! It's Valkyrie on the phone, it's an emergency!"

"Is she alright?" She heard Stentor say in the background.

"I'm fine," she said.

"She says she's fine," Civet relayed to his husband. "Doctor, there's–"

"I heard you the first time!" Kenspeckle said briskly, snatching up the phone. "Valkyrie, how can I help you?"

"The Desolation Engine – I forgot it even happened until I saw it, there's a second one, I completely forgot, the Remnant made you make it with modifications, it's going to go off!"

"What do you need me to do?" He said after a moment's silence.

"Can you deactivate it? I don't remember anything about a time addition, just when it leaves Guild's hands."

"Elder Guild has the bomb?"

"Yes, his wife and kids here too. There were loads of vampires too but we got them."

"Vampires?" He said in a slightly higher voice. Then he coughed quickly. "It's no matter, I will be there as soon as I can. Just do not let anyone touch that bomb. Have everyone in a nine-mile radius evacuate. I just need to collect some things."

"Thank you," Valkyrie said, taking a breath. She let it out and continued, feeling like something was coming off her chest. "I mean that. Thank you for helping. This wasn't your fault or your problem."

He sighed as well. "No, my dear. I may have been forced into making a second bomb, but I made the original and that made it possible. You have no reason to apologise in asking for my assistance. I owe you very much for what you have been through because of me. And don't try to tell me otherwise, I may have been forced but it was still my body and that is enough that I feel responsible. Please allow me to make up for even a small amount of that pain."

Valkyrie nodded, biting her lip harshly. "Thank you Kenspeckle. I'll see you soon."

As soon as he got there, she ran at him and gave him a hug, almost reducing the grumpy man to tears.


	55. Tanith and Ghastly

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 55**

It must have taken six hours before anyone heard from Guild or Kenspeckle again – everyone had been ordered to leave along with the residents who had evacuated due to a 'potential natural gas leak' that could have 'affected up to five miles in radius with its blast.' It didn't even get international news, just national and only to complain an entire nine miles was evacuated to be safe rather than just five. What if there had been a potential gas leak that could have blown up? What if it had gone off and it went further than estimated? Why were people so ridiculous?

In the end, there had been no problem and a tired Kenspeckle had reported the bomb not only deactivated but completely broken down and ready for destruction just like the other one had been. He had also reported great annoyance at Guild.

"That man is more concerned with looking powerful than doing any work," he had complained directly to the Grand Mage and Elder Crow who had sat down with Crow, Valkyrie, Guild's wife Emery Meek and their daughter whom Mrs Meek did not give a name for since she was only eleven or so. It was what people in the mage community. "I suggest you find someone that is prepared to replace him at a moment's notice, Grand Mage, because I know the moment something better comes up he will leave this country and take it. Even if it puts the rest of us in danger."

Meritorious didn't acknowledge the insults – likely due to Mrs Meek's company. "Thank you, Doctor Grouse. You have been a massive help and done us all an honour in assisting us. We will be in touch to destroy the Engine pieces."

Kenspeckle hung up without further comment and Meritorious gave the group a smile. "Well, I hope we will be seeing Elder Guild in the next half an hour. Administrator, perhaps you could show Mrs Meek and this young lady our staff room and get them some refreshments?" They left and soon it was just the Grand Mage, Elder Crow, skeleton Crow and Valkyrie sitting in the office. Meritorious immediately began scowling. "If I have to deal with one more problem because of that man, I'm going to kill him myself."

Valkyrie snorted. "I don't know why you haven't fired him yet. He's a nuisance, hypocritical, hires maniacs and we all believe he has a corrupted history. Why not just get him to resign?"

Meritorious shook his head. "It is not that easy. We always have prepared replacement Elders, and a replacement Grand Mage in the instance all three current Elders are killed at once, but three years ago when Serpine bombed the Sanctuary, those replacements were killed. We have yet to find replacements and we don't need the instability of an Elder resigning at this moment. There have been a lot of major attacks, as well as this being the new Sanctuary building for a mere six months. For all his idiocy and backchat, he is competent at what he does."

"So long as he isn't trying to get the Dead Men fired."

"So long as he isn't trying to get the Dead Men fired, yes," he said with a wry smile.

She frowned suddenly. "What about Mr Bliss?"

Elder Crow spoke up then. "I voted against Bliss being named an Elder as I believe he is interested in his own future and benefits more so than that of the country."

Meritorious nodded. "And he was involved in the plan to bomb the Sanctuary, even if his reasons were… tolerable. Regardless, Elder Crow voted against his involvement and as a vote implies, he is no longer an option."

Valkyrie let out a little breath of a relief. She didn't like him or trusted him. China was easier. At least she was somewhat open about her betrayals and unwillingness to become close to people. She liked that.

"Miss Cain," Elder Crow said after a short pause in the conversation. "I hear you have begun to learn the Art of Necromancy. How are you finding it?"

Valkyrie looked down at her ring briefly, considering it. "I like it. It's a lot of easy power and I don't have any problems with strength like I do with other magic. Solomon says I could go far with it if I decided to go forward with the magic after my Surge."

"And what are your thoughts on your Surge at the moment?" Elder Crow asked.

"I don't know. I like Elemental magic, but I also quite like Adept magic though I haven't looked into too many of the branches I suppose. Nadia, my girlfriend, can probably recite every type there's ever been," she smiled. "At least I have a few more years to think."

"As well as a few more years to learn. You are stuck with your choice for life so you must be certain," Elder Crow said. "If you would like some further guidance on Necromancy magic, I have many books you may borrow."

"Thank you," Valkyrie said, feeling a sinking feeling. Crow would definitely ask for them and force her to study every detail. He might not be able to tell her not to explore magic but he sure as hell could make her study until she gave it up for something more fun. "It's a generous offer."

Elder Crow nodded regally and they sat until the Administrator came to tell them Elder Guild's transportation was approaching with the man himself.

They all went to the beautiful entrance hall with its gorgeous staircase and floors and walls and waited for him. Valkyrie ended up standing next to Guild's daughter and they looked at each other accidentally and Valkyrie gave her a smile. The younger girl stared at her uncertainly but then the edge of her mouth turned up into a smile.

"How are you doing?" Valkyrie asked her.

The girl lost her smile and looked down, obviously shy. Valkyrie hesitated and then reached out slightly and put her hand on the girl's shoulder comfortingly. She looked up and quietly said, "Fine."

Valkyrie hummed and noticed the mother not paying attention at all her shy daughter. "You sure? I'm sure it must have been pretty scary. I've met those people before, they weren't very nice."

The girl bit her lip and nodded. "They really hurt my arm."

"Where did they hurt you?"

The girl indicated her upper arm. "It was the big man. Not the one that didn't speak. He kept telling the others what to do, and said some horrible things."

"I'm really sorry," Valkyrie said.

"Why? You didn't do anything. You saved me, with the – the skeleton man," the girl said, wringing her hands. "Father always said that he was horrible, but he saved me and he drove us to the Sanctuary with you and he carried me in when I was crying. He was really nice."

"Skulduggery's pretty good," she said. "But don't tell him that or his ego will get bigger."

"What's an ego?"

"It means he's full of himself."

Guild and his entourage of Cleavers entered in a swirl of anger and big gestures at that moment, making the two girls look away from each other and at the idiot. "If that Doctor thinks he can talk about this administration the way he has today he is sorely mistaken!"

Valkyrie sighed internally and Guild's kid held her hand. Valkyrie held hers back and squeezed comfortingly. Guild was pretty angry, she wasn't feeling exactly comfortable herself but she had to hide it as an employee and Co-head of the Sanctuary.

"Elder Guild," Meritorious said dryly. "It is good to have you back. How about–"

"Don't even begin that with me, Eachan! His conduct was unprofessional and he was constantly miserable. I know he is a genius but he is surely at the end of his career with the attitude he has," Guild shouted at Meritorious. "I don't ever want to see him again."

"Then do not become captured again," Meritorious said, glaring at the man. "You yourself acted unprofessionally and abusively during this whole debacle, and instead of trying to make it better, you immediately throw the blame on other people. This needs to stop or your position in this Sanctuary will be thrown into question."

Guild went from white with anger to almost purple with embarrassment, all because others pretending to get on with their jobs snickered behind their hands at the annoying man.

"Eachan," Guild snapped more quietly, pressing closer to the man. "That is a serious topic not for Sanctuary employees."

"I know," Meritorious said levelly, looking down at the man. "I suggest you speak with your family. They were quite distraught, considering they were captured and told they were going to be murdered by you."

Guild looked over to his wife and she immediately threw herself at him in a ball of tears. He held her surprisingly gently and held out a hand. His daughter left Valkyrie for her father and the three held each other.

Despite how much she hated him, a part of her ached to be hugged the way he held his daughter.

.*****.

"Well, that was more eventful than I thought it would be," Valkyrie said, yawning and sitting on the sofa at home. They had collected Wolf and Fletcher from the medical wing on the way out and all the Dead Men, Tanith and the annoying one were sitting around. "I sort of hoped Guild would be fired as soon as he walked in though."

Tanith laughed softly and took a sip of her tea. "I don't think he'll be around forever."

"He won't," Crow agreed. "I'm pretty sure we could find enough evidence to have him removed."

Valkyrie nodded. "I hope so. But can we do that tomorrow? I'm really tired."

Tanith grinned. "We have training in eight hours."

Valkyrie groaned. "Nooo! You can't do that. Make it at least twelve hours. It's torture otherwise!"

"I'm such a horrible person," Tanith said happily, drinking another sip and glancing at Panda who had come into the room in just his lounge trousers like he was – well, like a piece of food. It was surprisingly difficult to think of her sister looking at her brother like something to eat, it just wasn't okay in her head. They were sweet, lovable people that must not do that. In front of her.

That didn't stop her watching the exchanging of looks. Panda blushed awfully. She and Wolf caught eyes and very nearly started laughing.

"Come on!" Valkyrie said, standing up and taking Tanith's hand. "You're coming with me." Tanith was quite agreeable and they ran up the stairs, tea and all, to Valkyrie's bedroom and jumped on the bed and looked at each other. "Tell me everything then!"

Tanith grinned. "There's not much to say."

Valkyrie gave her a look.

"Honest! I mean, we kissed but nothing other than that."

Valkyrie squealed and almost bounced where she was sitting. "Tell me _everything_!"

The older woman laughed and nodded. "Alright, so we were in the kitchen this morning when all you other lazy butts were sleeping."

"From a fifteen-hour mission, yes."

"Yes. And I had a smoothie, and Ghastly asked for one, and I made it for him, and he got really close, and I gave it to him, and he didn't do anything. I was going to just wait and see what he'd do but he started going red, so I asked if he wanted to spar with me and he said yes. So that's what we did. We went to the sparing mats."

"Yes…"

"And we spared."

"And then…"

"We ended up grappling on the floor, and I kissed him."

"Eeee! Then what?"

"Well, we kissed. And kissed. And some more. And some things happened and now we're both banned for that gym eternally."

Valkyrie started laughing and almost fell over the bed when she looked at Tanith. "Seriously?!"

"Yep. We didn't do anything other than kiss. But I suppose we might have _tried_ to do more and we were caught. I felt like a little kid, I'm not even sorry. It was so funny."

"What did Panda do?"

"The gym guy came in and tried to stop us and I'm pretty sure Ghastly either didn't care or didn't hear him at all. He was all for just continuing right there."

"Oh my god," Valkyrie grinned.

"So the guy came right over to us but I started laughing and he looked up and just glared at this guy. It was just so funny, watching them glare and I was just lying there, laughing. I mean, we were mostly clothed so it wasn't too bad."

"Can you imagine if he'd had walked in five minutes later," Valkyrie said, covering her eyes as she accidentally gave herself unwanted pictures.

Tanith snored. "Yeah, I kind of did that before a few times."

"What?"

"I was kind of a hippy at the time and I was a part of this 'no tops for women' movement thing, and we didn't wear any tops or bras and went around like that. But then I met someone and I was completely naked and there might have been a little bit of breathing in other people's smoke and I just sort of started walking around butt ass naked after we, you know, and yeah. I was caught by a lot of people I know. They still joke about it."

"Oh my god," Valkyrie said, not sure if she should laugh or not. "Please don't do that here."

Tanith laughed again and pushed Valkyrie off the bed.


	56. Caelan

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**TRIGGER WARNING: No Valkyrie's were harmed in the making of this chapter. But it does contain strong themes of rape.**

**Note: I will never describe any type of graphic sexual assault in my writing, but this story will continue to have Valkyrie in very difficult situations like this. Valkyrie is a teenage girl in the world of the sickest criminals. This is a theme I thought ' _appropriate_ ' to include with that in consideration. **

* * *

**Chapter 56**

As promised, Tanith woke Valkyrie up in the morning for her training session but was nice enough to 'go easy on her'.

Valkyrie disagreed with that.

They had started with stretches as per usual, then she was left to do whatever she wanted for twenty minutes and Valkyrie chose to spend it doing some dancing which she hadn't done since her competition over a year ago. When she was done with that, it was all planking and leg curls and sit-ups and other horrible things that exhausted her. After that was sparring with Wolf, which was fun but difficult because every time she got even the smallest, littlest upper hand on him he would suddenly tickle her and she would lose again.

After nearly an hour of sparring cross tickle-warring, Tanith helped Valkyrie by pinning the man down for her to tickle until he begged her to stop.

"That's what you get!" Valkyrie said loudly over his laughing. "For making me lose!"

Wolf laughed uproariously. "Just because you're lame!" He shouted between his laughing. "I'll always win!"

Valkyrie laughed and tickled him until he claimed he'd pee and they let him go. It was nice for all of five seconds and then Valkyrie was sent outside for a run.

"I hate you guys sometimes," Valkyrie grumbled as the two laughed at her.

She did what she was told and began her run like the good girl she was. It was a somewhat nice day, quite cool and the sky white. There was no wind. A great day in Ireland, especially for time outside, and even with her shorts on, she was fairly happy on her run. She went around the treeline, then began on her favourite route through the woods, following the dirt trail down to the stream at the back. She stopped there for a moment, looking around and breathing heavily.

She went still suddenly, feeling someone come up behind her.

"Valkyrie," Caelan said softly, stopping close to her. Valkyrie turned slowly to see him. She couldn't move back, the stream was quite deep from all the rain they had had recently, and Caelan didn't seem to notice her discomfort as he stopped just inches away from her. "I have been searching for you."

"You could have called," she said, remembering quickly that she owed him a favour after he helped her with the skull. "What do you need?"

"I wanted to see you," he said. "You've been on my mind."

 _Oh shit_ , she thought. "Yeah? How about we walk and talk?"

He seemed to consider it and nodded, and Valkyrie's anxious knot of a stomach soothed just a little. They walked very, very slowly down the path the way she came.

"What is it you wanted to talk about?" She said after long moments.

"Us," he said instantly. "The fight yesterday – I had been following Foe and Samuel as I knew they had tortured you and it angered me. As you were not at the party, I did not do anything until that teleporter brought you in and you were almost killed. I intervened and saved your life."

"You did," Valkyrie said slowly, remembering an unknown vampire jump on the one that had been about to do just that. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. I wanted also to ask you why you live with these people?" Caelan asked, staring at her as they walked. She tried not to glance at him too much.

"Well, my Uncle Gordon basically made an agreement with the Dead Men that in the event he died, the Dead Men would get custody and raise me as their apprentice in whatever profession I wanted. I chose to be a detective like Skulduggery. He's my guardian."

"And why do they live in your house? I can smell your scent all over these woods. On every tree, your scent lingers, in all stages of life. On the tree swing at the front of the house, you were a very young child. But around the back of the trees you are older, and by the river, you are at this age, the present Valkyrie. Why allow them in a home that you have made your own?"

"Err, I didn't get a choice, they just sort of moved in."

"You do not like it?"

"I do, but I wasn't asked. It was pretty sudden. They did it for me. They left their homes and belongings to live together with me. They gave up a lot of freedoms to be with me."

He nodded. "When will they leave?"

"What do you mean?"

"Do you want them to live with you for your whole life?" Caelan asked.

Valkyrie hesitated. "I don't know. I haven't thought about it yet. I'd like my girlfriend to move in one day."

He twitched a little and Valkyrie suddenly wished she hadn't mentioned it. "Your girlfriend. Yes. How do you feel about her?"

"I love her," Valkyrie said, staring ahead resolutely.

"Just love?" Caelan asked quietly, coming to a stop. Valkyrie stopped also and looked at him.

"What do you mean?"

"Do you love her? Or are you _in_ love with her?"

"I'm in love with her. She means the world to me. I'd die for her. I'd do anything she needed, I'd get her everything she wanted. I don't understand why you want to know," Valkyrie said, frowning at him to cover her glare.

He said nothing for a moment. "It's nothing. I just thought… I have come to have feelings for you."

Valkyrie gaped at him. "We've spoken about three times!"

He took a step back. "I apologise. I didn't mean to tell you quite the way I did. However, my feeling are what they are."

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "I'm sorry Caelan. I feel bad now. I didn't mean to react like that, but I really didn't think you would say that at all."

"You had no idea?"

"Not even a little. I'm sorry, but even if I had, there's nothing between us. I barely know you, and I love Nadia anyway. I'm not interested, and I can't imagine ever being able to."

"Because I'm a vampire," he said, voice filled with self-loathing.

"To be honest, yes, but also because I just don't like men. I'm _very_ gay. Sorry."

He licked his lips slightly and gave her an intense look. "But have you ever tried to be with a man? Have you had a boyfriend?"

"Well, no, but I'm pretty certain."

"How can you know if you've never experienced it?"

"I'm certain. I really, really am. Like, one hundred per cent." He took a step forwards and Valkyrie didn't move. She been told never to take a step back if an aggressive animal approached, never to give ground. Did a vampire count as an aggressive animal in human form? "And to be honest, the idea of trying to have a boyfriend, even if I didn't have Nadia, is really not that appealing to me."

"You could experiment."

"I could, but I have a girlfriend and I don't want to."

Valkyrie expected it but she wasn't fast enough to escape him when he pushed her back into a tree and pinned her forcefully to it as he painfully pressed his face to hers, the bark of the tree scraping the back of her head.

With no place to go, Valkyrie pressed her lips tightly together and made no move, just waited for him to stop, scrunching her eyes closed against the pain. He moved his lips over her closed ones, putting a hand on her cheek and another on her hip and moved to fit his body more tightly against hers. He leaned his head back slightly and looked at her with hooded eyes. She squinted her eyes open at him.

"How about now?" He asked.

Valkyrie headbutted him.

He fell back a little and Valkyrie made a run for it but barely got two steps in before he grabbed her and threw her bodily into a tree. She cried out and fell to the floor, feeling the nettles touch her skin and the itch begin to irritate her instantly. She scrambled back and up quickly, pressing herself against another tree. She had no place to go where someone could find her. Caelan could catch her if she ran. She didn't think she could beat him in a fight either.

"Do not resist me," he growled at her as he stalked closer. "It is not safe for you to aggravate me."

Valkyrie breathed shallowly and glared at him. "I don't think it's very safe for me right now either."

"It is not night time, there is no danger," he growled to her.

"You threw me into a tree, that's not exactly kind," she spat at him. "Get away from me and get off my property Caelan. I don't want to see you again."

"You still owe me a favour."

"Then what do you want?"

He looked her up and down slowly and Valkyrie felt herself get goosebumps and gripped the tree behind her a little tighter. "I want your body. I did you a favour, a difficult favour with no reward for myself, and again saved your life, putting my own at risk. I deserve you and your… _virginity_."

"You do not," she tried to growl. It came out as a low whisper. "Don't you dare come near me. I'll kill you."

"You cannot," he said, shaking his head. "You owe me."

"I owe you a favour, but I can refuse if it's not equal to what you did for me. I owe you an item, a connection. You saved my life because you wanted to, that doesn't mean I owe you a favour."

"You do, and I want your body."

" _No_."

He came close to her and reached out a hand as if he were trying to be gentle and Valkyrie batted it away. He bared his teeth and punched her harshly. She fell to the ground with a grunt and felt her hand wrap around a stick – a sturdy, fairly long stick, dry and rough to the touch. Caelan picked her up by the hair and Valkyrie cried out even as she got her footing, before swinging around and hitting him in the head with the stick as hard as she could.

He let her go and stumbled back. Valkyrie took her chance and the stick, running as fast as she could on shaking legs to the house. By some miracle, Caelan didn't follow but it didn't stop her running like a madwoman for the house.

Tanith was waiting for her at the door, ready to start their next exercise, but when she saw Valkyrie, she ran to meet her. Valkyrie practically fell onto her sister in the garden, pointing and blubbering at the trees, inconsolable to Tanith's gentle voice and arm around her waist.

Wolf joined them outside a few minutes later, hearing Valkyrie crying.

"Cub? What's going on?" He asked quickly, looking Valkyrie over. "Are they _handprints_?"

Valkyrie looked at her arms and did indeed find two bruises in the shapes of hands on her arms were Caelan had held her. Her lip waivered and she bit her lip to try and stop her crying. She looked at Wolf and he didn't say anything, just picked her up and carried her inside. He didn't take her to the living room as Valkyrie expected, but up the stairs. Valkyrie pressed her face into his neck and heard Wolf kick someone's door and then move onto the bathroom.

He gently sat her down on the counter and fetched a flannel. A moment later Bear walked into the bathroom as well and stopped short, looking at her arms.

"What happened?" He asked cracking his knuckles.

Valkyrie looked down. "Do you remember when I got Crow his skull back two Christmases ago? I asked a vampire to help me get in contact with the dealer. I spoke to him, like, twice, and I didn't see him again. Then yesterday I saw him in the fight when he attacked another vampire that was about to kill me. He was at the river when I was on my run and he basically told me that he wanted me to – to _be_ with him to make up for the favour and saving my life."

They immediately understood what she meant without her having to spell it out. Tanith held her hand in support and Wolf came over to her with the flannel. "Cub… look, I can only see two options here. Either you take it to the Sanctuary and they assess your memories and decide if it qualifies to throw him in jail, or we don't and we kill him ourselves. No one will question a vampire going missing. What would you like to do? It's just, we need to take pictures if you want to go to the Sanctuary with this."

"Before that, what did he do?" Bear said, obviously trying hard to show restraint.

Valkyrie took a deep breath and tucked her hair behind her ear. "He pushed me, punched me, pulled me around and kissed me. He pushed me into a tree and I hit my head really hard a few times. I got away before anything else happened."

Wolf made her look down and looked at the back of her head. "There's a little blood, but I think it's just a little cut. Barely more than a scrape."

He let her go and Valkyrie glanced at Tanith. "I don't want to go to the Sanctuary. Let's just do it our way."

Wolf gave her a smile and pressed the flannel to her skin, using a pre-soaked stone to heal her bruises, then wiping it over her legs to fix the nettle stings. "What's his name?" Wolf asked as he worked.

"Caelan," she said. "All I know is that he is over a hundred and gets easily obsessed. Obviously."

Wolf nodded and threw the used flannel in the sink. He hugged her and pulled her off the counter at the same time, holding her tightly.

She almost compared it to the _embrace_ she'd had with Caelan, such as it was, but stopped herself at the last moment. He wouldn't win by upsetting her any more than the cry she'd already had. Wolf was her brother, he was family and his hugs were nice and familiar. Caelan was not ruining that. It still gave her a little anxiety, but it wouldn't stop her.

"Alright," she said, pushing him away. "I need to call Nadia, so you can start sharpening your swords or whatever. I'm considered busy now."

Wolf smirked, not one to pass up an opportunity. "Oh, and what will make you oh so unavailable Valkyrie? What will you be doing at this time of day? _Hum_?"

Valkyrie smiled at him and left the bathroom as he snickered. She heard Tanith giggle in the back and couldn't help but grin as she closed her bedroom door.

Caelan would _not_ bring her down.


	57. It begins

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 57**

"Valkyrie!" Wolf shouted down the hall. "Family meeting now!"

Valkyrie jumped up and out of her bed immediately, put on her shoes – she felt more able to deal with important things in shoes – and practically flew down the stairs to the living room. Family meetings were top priority number one.

The Dead Men and Tanith were in their new usual spots; Ghastly had switched to sit with Tanith nowadays which was a good sign, she and Tanith thought, even if other ventures had barely progressed. But that was a not-so-secret matter they fully intended to work on. Valkyrie sat next to Bear and looked over at Crow on his armchair by the window.

"Alright, now that we're all here," Crow began, picking a small hair off his chair. "We have some very serious matters we need to talk about concerning yesterday's events."

Wolf nodded, leaning forward and clasping his hands between his knees. "We all know that Valkyrie was attacked yesterday. To recap everything so we're on the same page – Valkyrie went out for a run yesterday at midday and when she got to the stream a vampire known at Caelan was there and waiting for her. This vampire is over one hundred years old and Valkyrie has seen him face to face only twice previously and spoken to him on the phone only two previous times. All interactions were very brief and Valkyrie says she saw no outward signs of attachment or obsessions with her, nor did he speak much at all."

Crow nodded and took over. "Yes. At the stream at the back of the property, Valkyrie was assaulted and he attempted to sexually assault, which she refused to, causing him to punch and throw her around. He kissed her, but as Valkyrie was able to escape before it went further, she was able to tell us in what we believe to be good conscience that she wants us to deal with the vampire as a family rather than go to the Sanctuary."

Valkyrie nodded through a deep breath. "That's right."

Crow indicated his head at her in acknowledgement. "After Dexter, Tanith and Anton spoke to and attended to Valkyrie's somewhat minor _physical_ wounds, Dexter went to visit China, however, she was away. Tanith, Ghastly and Saracen ran patrols around the property and noted all places we can place addition protection, something we should have done years ago in hindsight. Tanith, what are those places?"

Tanith pulled out a notebook. "In no particular order, the outermost edges of the property need a professional to rebuild large sections of the East and West walls, we need to find the exact edge of the property at the back, or North, of the property and build a wall from scratch as it's completely open. The front gate could do with an upgrade as well as an automated system and a single door key or fob door for people on foot. We should also think about something to stop people climbing over the walls, as well as security cameras. There are a few already cameras, but more angles as well as more places would be very good. I was thinking a full security room in the hall we want to put everyone's offices? Then it's just landscaping which would make moving and visibility easier in the event we need that, as well as a few backup exits."

"That was my idea," Saracen said, nodding. "I think with all the added security keeping things out, we need to consider how _we_ get out. If someone does get in, since I don't think there are any plans we could make that are completely failsafe, we need ways to get out undetected. I especially want to focus that on Cub's room. She is actually the most exposed from the outside, the second room being Erskine's as it is a structural copy."

"He can go without," Crow said.

"My thinking exactly."

"What?" Snake said, looking at them with wide eyes. "How come I don't get to live too?"

"Who would want to break into your room?" Tanith asked him with a frown. "What's the point?"

"Maybe a scorned ex-lover," Wolf grinned. "Coming for revenge."

Snake nodded. "Exactly. It might be that; I could die!"

"Too bad. Moving onto the other security changes inside?" Crow said, looking back at Tanith. Snake grumbled but looked at her too.

She smiled and continued on the list. "Again, in no particular order, we need to find those escape exits, which I say because an escape route is only good if the exit can't be detected by the enemy. Moving inside, we need to fix some bannisters to be a little sturdier. A few security cameras inside would be very useful, and I need to speak with some English friends about some security system they use at the English Sanctuary that I think would be good."

"What's it like?" Valkyrie asked curiously.

"I don't know, but I know it's good," she said. "New coded doors for certain rooms are a must and we really need to completely deal with the caves under the house. If anything ever got out it would be a disaster. I thought your friends could do that Dexter?"

"The Monster Hunters? They'd love to! But I've been in there and it's more work than for just two people. I'll ask some other friends. If we all get a couple of people, we'll be able to kill everything down there and then we can destroy the source."

"I'm taking a guess at signals," Crow said.

Everyone looked at Saracen. He shrugged. "I've got nothing. I get the feeling something's blocking it, but I might be wrong. It's hard to know what's a _feeling_ and what's just me thinking."

Crow nodded. "With a large team, we can tackle the caves. We could use them as escape routes as well, and use the upper structure to create a larger basement."

"We need that," Bear grunted.

"That's on our list then," Crow said, looking at Tanith who had written down the other things they had spoken about. "Now, back to the vampire specifically. We need to learn more about him, more about his habits. We can't ask Dusk like I normally would, so I suggest going to Moloch."

"Skulduggery, that's not a good idea," Panda immediately interjected.

"Moloch has no reason to attack us. So long as we don't harm him, he doesn't harm us, that is the deal," Crow said pointedly. "I only plan on asking about Caelan's personality, not his whereabouts. I can find him at any time. What I want to know is what I will deal with when I do find him since I want to talk to the rational side to make sure he knows exactly what he's done when I'm tearing him apart. Aside from that, I also want to talk to China for the same information, perhaps some past history."

"I've never heard of him before," Wolf said, rubbing his chin which had a few days of tasteful growth. Everything he did looked so good, it wasn't fair for him to stand next to Valkyrie. She was battling an onslaught of spots recently thanks to being a teenager. "Do we know what country he's from?"

Valkyrie shrugged. "I assumed he was Irish but maybe not. He's been around for a hundred years, he might just be good at changing his voice."

"That's true," Crow said. "Hopefully China or Moloch knows something."

Valkyrie nodded. "Before we wrap this up, we do have another point of business," she said, letting their attention slip to herself. "In February, Fletcher will turn eighteen and not be Crow's responsibility. He asked if he could continue living here for rent. He has a job lined up at the Sanctuary he's working on right now, and in a couple of months he wants to be earning enough to move into the old butler's suite at the back of the house."

"Where is it?" Panda asked, frowning.

"The back of the house," Valkyrie said, giving him a look. "It's like a studio apartment. There's already a bed in there, a little kitchenette that's about a million years old and a little bathroom. It needs a clean but is otherwise liveable. I wanted to ask what you thought."

Tanith was pouting. "I thought he was going to leave."

"I thought he was leaving you alone," Valkyrie frowned.

"I still have to _see_ him though."

Valkyrie smiled. "I thought that too, but then, that butler's suite is quite far away and only has one window so we will hardly see him, plus he'll be working in the day and probably spending time in Australia like he's always saying at night. If we improve the kitchenette, he can ban him from downstairs except for laundry too."

Crow sighed but looked at Bear. "How do we do that?"

"It's doable," he said. "Not likeable. We may have to register to have someone pay us rent, or we can do it under the radar, though that is illegal."

"A lot of what we do is illegal," Valkyrie pointed out. "But so long as you're okay for him to rent some space here, I am too."

"We should vote on it," Snake said. "All in favour of Fletcher living in a tiny room and giving us money, say aye!"

Valkyrie, Tanith, Panda, Snake, Weasel and Wolf put their hands in the air. Bear and Crow were outvoted. "Sorry guys. Guess you have a new project."

They both grunted.

"Come on, we have jobs to do," Tanith said standing up. "I want to talk to this Moloch guy."

"I want to talk to both of them," Valkyrie said, standing up. "But I have to get ready first. Wait for me!"


	58. Caelan's past

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 58**

They decided to see Moloch first, that being Valkyrie, Tanith, Crow and Wolf, heading in the Bentley up to Ballymun, a district on the edge of Dublin. The vampire, Crow told her, was centuries old and had a deal with the Dead Men.

"We met him almost two hundred years ago. He was chained up and about to be slaughtered with his Infected but managed to break his chains. We expected him to rampage or escape, but he broke open the cages to his Infected and the other vampires and was protecting them so they could escape," Wolf recounted. "I remember him trying to bargain with his captures, offering himself in their place. We stepped in and we fought them together."

Crow continued. "After the battle, we made a deal, a truce of sorts. He had to have no involvement in the war and we would offer protection. When the war finished, we changed it so he couldn't hurt humans in exchange for us getting him land to live on. Ghastly and Hopeless never trusted him, but the rest of us trusted he'd honour the deal because it benefited him."

Valkyrie nodded. "I'm assuming he has then?"

"Yes."

"And if he's centuries old he'll know Caelan?"

"Perhaps," Crow said. "Moloch may be centuries old but he is rather reclusive. He'll either know him well or not at all."

They arrived at an apartment complex on the north end of the estate and got out the car. It was an overcast day and so much colder than the day before. They didn't waste time going into the building and right up to the top, twelfth, floor. They knocked and a few moments later it was opened by a vampire. Inside were several vampires and a young woman standing in the middle with a syringe. When she saw them she burst out crying and ran out the door, throwing the syringe on the floor.

Valkyrie watched her go with an uneasy feeling, glancing at Tanith who was looking just as unsure.

"Skulduggery, Dexter," a vampire said silkily. He had been sitting in a high-backed wooden chair, so Valkyrie assumed he was Moloch. "It has been so long since we last saw each other."

"Yes, quite," Crow said a little drily. "I see we scared away your dinner."

"The first time can be a little daunting," he said with a small upturning of his lips. "Will you introduce your companions?"

"This is our close friend Tanith Low, and my adopted daughter," Valkyrie couldn't help but smile at that, "apprentice Dead Man, and partner Valkyrie Cain," Crow introduced. "Valkyrie is the Co-Head of department at the Sanctuary and Second Detective."

Moloch inclined his head to Valkyrie. "You are doing very well for yourself, I see."

"I work very hard," she said quietly.

He stood and came forward with very normal movements compared to the hunched, stalking moves Valkyrie had imagined in her head. He held a hand out to her. "It is a pleasure to meet you. I am honoured to meet someone so young and talented. Come, sit with me."

Valkyrie was gently led from her friends to sit with the vampire. He sat in his high-backed chair and another vampire with a soft smile brought up another chair that sat just as high as his. It was equal except the vampires standing beside him.

"Valkyrie," he said, taking her hand in his own and resting them on the armrest. "Tell me why you are so anxious for a young woman so strong and successful?"

Valkyrie scowled. "I am not anxious."

"I can smell your anxiety, your nerves. But why feel that way?"

She took a deep breath. "There was an incident yesterday with a vampire. We need to know more about him."

"What incident?" He asked.

"He was – he attacked me," she said, feeling the anxiety acutely. She could speak about it with family and Nadia, that was okay, but a random stranger was a little different. It was a boundary thing. "He tried to hurt me. His name is Caelan."

His face darkened. "Yes, I know him. I know what he has done to you." He looked sharply at Crow. "How did you allow her near such a _beast_?"

Crow tilted his head. "I didn't. Valkyrie met him in secret to organise seeing a dealer about an item she wished to gift me with for Christmas. I didn't know of the meeting, of course, and I know nothing about Caelan whatsoever."

"Caelan is a disobedient little pup. I would deal with him myself but I must respect the code," he said, referring to vampire code not to kill a fellow vampire. "Of course, you killed several of my vampires before."

Valkyrie pulled her hand back from him, and he let her go which kind of surprised her.

"I am willing to make a deal with you though," Moloch said, looking at Valkyrie alone. "If you can kill Caelan, I will not take any actions against you."

Valkyrie nodded. "We need to know some information on him first."

"Yes, I think that would be wise. Caelan is not a child of mine. I do not know who turned him, but it was in Belgium some hundred and twenty years ago, and he came over to Ireland after being a vampire for just a handful of years but left again to travel, but always returned. He is incredibly violent. He becomes obsessed with women, kills their lovers, husbands, their families and children, and then forces them to have sex with him. He will tie them up and leave them there for weeks, using them for amusement. He believes he can impregnate them and if he does, they will love him. He cannot, of course, as he is a vampire and it is a biologically impossible feat, and when he grows frustrated or they try to fight him, he simply kills them and finds someone else."

Valkyrie felt herself go pale during that recap.

"I suggest the full Dead Men, and your sister, all fight him at once. He is not a good fighter, but I do believe he is single-minded and likes to think he is wholly independent of the vampire."

"He's delusional," Crow said darkly. "And you say we can kill him without consequences?"

"There is no vampire I would rather kill except perhaps whoever decided to turn him," Moloch said with conviction.

Crow nodded. "Thank you for the information. We will be in contact when he is dealt with. Valkyrie?"

She stood and so did Moloch. He held his hand out and Valkyrie shook it. He held it for a moment and wrapped his other hand around their hands and closed his eyes. "I hope you have your revenge, Valkyrie Cain."

"Thank you," she said quietly. She knew he didn't have the full picture but there was no way she was getting into that conversation. Or maybe he considered all assaults as equally evil. Just leave it there. It was much easier.

"You are welcome."

He released her and they went down the stairs and into the open air. None of them spoke until they got back in the car.

"Okay, that was kind of creepy," Tanith said from the back seat.

"You're telling me," Valkyrie said with a nervous laugh. "Let's go to China's."

They did, turning on the radio to dispel the feeling Moloch had left on them. By the time they were in the library they felt a lot better, Valkyrie especially. China was some way into the aisles looking over her books but gave them a smile when they approached. "Valkyrie, Dexter, Skulduggery, it's so nice to see you. Tanith."

Tanith didn't say anything, just crossed her arms. Valkyrie hid a smirk behind Wolf. "How are you China?" He asked.

"Oh, I'm always well," she said with a sweet smile. "I assume you're not here just for a social visit?"

"Unfortunately not," Wolf said.

"Sanctuary business?" She asked looking to Crow.

"Dead Man business. Can we talk privately?"

China raised a delicate eyebrow but nodded and led the way to her apartment. They sat down and Crow took his hat off. "So what is it I can do for you?" China asked.

"We need to know some information on a certain individual," Crow said. "He is a vampire, about one hundred and twenty, his name is Caelan. Has a history of abusing women."

China frowned lightly. "I don't believe I have. I've heard of women that have been slaughtered by vampires, but that is equal to the amount of human men slaughtering women in the same way, as well as the many women that kill male humans and vampires. I would need to know more details to identify one from another."

"We don't know the exact women he has killed," Crow said. "But he does have a history if killing their families also."

She sighed and shrugged. "Again, so many murders happen in similar ways. I am sorry I can't help you more."

Crow nodded. "Thank you anyway."

"Can I know why you're looking for such a person?" China asked, glancing at Valkyrie.

Valkyrie nodded. "There was an incident yesterday. I escaped but we think he'll come back. We're going to be prepared."

"Is there anything I can do to help?" China asked, looking to Crow.

He tilted his head curiously but nodded. "We wanted to ask if you could put some signals around the walls of the property to make them harder to get over, if not impossible."

"I will send some of my apprentices to assist you," she said. "I hope you can deal with the vampire easily."

"Same here," Valkyrie muttered darkly. "We've battled harder people, one vampire will be easy."

China smiled at her. "I'm sure it will be."

The meeting was short after that and they went back home where the others had been hard at work organising the changes to the house and extended property. Valkyrie went straight to her room to avoid being roped into helping with the changes. It looked too much like hard work to her.

Of course, being alone in her room meant phoning Nadia. She picked up after a few rings. "Hey Val," Nadia said tiredly.

"Hey. Are you okay?" Valkyrie asked. She sounded stressed.

"Yeah, yeah," she said. "I was just worrying about you, and then mum was telling me about some schools she wants me to apply to when I get my results but they're all really far away and I don't think I want to go."

"How far is far away?" Valkyrie asked slowly, sitting on her bed.

"Not Ireland," Nadia said. "The closest is London, but that's the one I hate the most. I don't know what to do Valkyrie. I don't want to live so far away from home or you."

"I don't know. Can you just tell her no? Talk to your dad?"

"Dad wants me to go more than her. They're mage finishing schools for people with straight A's, so he really wants me to go there. Mum was on my side since they are so far away but now he's convinced her and I've got no one."

"Aw baby, I'm sorry. We'll work this out. Maybe you could do the course here? Or say you want an apprenticeship here. Or just pretend to apply and not do it," Valkyrie suggested.

"I guess," Nadia said uncertainly. "I kind of like some of them though, they're just so far away from you."

Valkyrie bit her lip. "Don't not go because of me," she said, trying to sound normal. "Do what you want to. We'll work us out along the way. Don't worry."

"Will we? I wanted to move in with you, not move to France."

"We'll work it out. I promise. Tell me more about these schools."


	59. The 'Inherited Empire'

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Note: I talk a lot of money and business here but know nothing of it. Sorry. I probably messed up a lot but this is fanfiction and my world so let's roll with it.**

* * *

**Chapter 59**

That night brought a flash thunderstorm and flooding to the area Valkyrie lived in, but it didn't stop her brothers and sister from preparing the house for the new security. Valkyrie had sat by the window with Tanith for most of the night on watch, mostly because she didn't want to lie in bed awake and worrying, but also because she wanted to spend time with her sister. At some point around three in the morning, Valkyrie was staring outside and narrowed her eyes, looking into the black outside.

"Tanith," she whispered. "Is it me, or is there something by the front wall on the right?"

Tanith leaned forwards to look better but Valkyrie didn't see it again and was sure Tanith didn't see it either.

"Call the alarm anyway," Tanith said after a moment. Valkyrie nodded and went to the nearest other person, Weasel, and told him there may be someone outside, and he spread it to the others. They already had everything on highest security as it was and anyone coming it to any entrance would set off the alarms. But as they had already discussed, their alarms and security wasn't good enough. They were all tense.

When morning came, they were all tired and had slept in fitful shifts. Morning did bring builders and security advisers and fitters and installers, but it didn't make them any less nervous. If anything, they were more worried as it left a lot of open spots for someone to get into the house.

To combat that, they started taking things outside to confuse anyone that might have been looking. They started taking large items out of the house from the hall they were doing up into an office hall, focusing specifically on the one that was going to be the security room. Valkyrie herself was packed into a box to go alongside the other boxes of stuff, and she had to stay very, very still and quiet as Bear and Crow carried her outside and packed her into Panda's van. Panda, Crow and Tanith drove them to the skip and they dumped all the items except Valkyrie herself, getting her to hid in the van under the bench.

They then went to Crow's house, a place they didn't go particularly often. Positioned at the end of a pretty street, there was only two competing funeral services to share the space with. The house was fairly large, with a big kitchen, two small bathrooms and three bedrooms and a few sofa beds for the Dead Men from before they took in Valkyrie. They hadn't lived permanently together before that, with Bear at his hotel for at least five days a week, Panda having his own place, and the others either at those places, Dexter's apartment, or travelling.

They took Valkyrie into the house quickly, though they didn't think anyone had followed them.

"How long are we staying here?" Valkyrie asked.

"Only me and Tanith are staying here with you," Crow explained. "And hopefully for only a week. If we get Caelan before that we can move back in then, if you'd like."

Valkyrie nodded. "I prefer our house."

He came over and gave Valkyrie a hug, sensing her upset at the change. "Don't worry. We can find Caelan any time, we just want to make sure we're at our strongest, alright? Our friends are coming over to help with the caves, and if we have to throw one vampire at them I'm sure we can manage."

"And give him a piece of my mind," Tanith muttered darkly from the back door where she was sitting and sharpening her sword.

"And cut him up a little," Crow conceded. "The main point is, we'll make him suffer and kill him before he ever so much as sees you."

"I want him to know you're doing this for me," she whispered into his sternum. "I don't want him to think this is for anything but keeping me safe from him."

He stroked her hair. "I promise. Oh, and you're in your usual room with Tanith."

Valkyrie turned her head and glared at her sister. "You better not snore this time."

.*****.

The week was boring. Really, really boring. As a part of keeping her safe, they had to keep her relatively hidden. And since they were pretending she was hidden at the mansion she couldn't be seen outside or Caelan would catch on that she wasn't there. So she had to sit in a small house, compared to the mansion anyway, and do nothing. She could talk to Nadia but with tensions high at her house with the still undecided schooling situation, Nadia was on eggshells not annoying her parents with other things.

Still, they got to text a lot which was nice.

But she also had to do a lot of home schooling again.

"It's Skulduggery's turn," Tanith had told her when Crow had sent her to Tanith for lessons. "I've done weeks of playing teacher, Skulduggery should take a turn."

Valkyrie had gone back to Crow and informed him it was his turn to be teacher and dumped all the learning resources on his lap.

"Why do I have to do it?" He complained.

"Because you adopted me and Tanith's sick of teaching," Valkyrie said, organising her junk. "And I need to talk to you about something important anyway."

"What type of important?" He asked.

"Something to do with Gordon."

"Couldn't we talk about it with him here?" He asked.

"Yes, but I want to talk about it with you alone first," she said, sitting down and getting a few different notebooks and folders out of a box she had brought with her. "This is all of Gordon's business work."

"His business things?" Crow asked, taking a chair next to her at the table.

"Yep. Let me explain it." Valkyrie sorted the folders quickly to be on the table – five folders, neatly placed in front of them in a line. Each was labelled from one to five, with a name. 'Folder 1: Dad's Business,' 'Folder 2: Family Business,' 'Folder 3: Stocks an/op,' 'Folder 4: Investments an/op,' 'Folder 5: Backer/Intervention/Other an/op.'

"What does an slash op mean?" Crow asked.

"Anonymous and open," Valkyrie said. "Wait for me to explain okay? Dad's business is a fairly small but well to do mortal construction business. It's relatively simple and run by the managers without much work, we just get a small profit. We, that is me and Gordon, spoke about selling it but I don't want to just let it go, to be honest. But, the only other easy option is to merge it with the family business, which is Folder Two, but that means firing everyone and hiring magical folks, which I don't want to do even more. Folder Two, like I said, is the family business which Gordon converted to work in making construction supplies made with magic properties, like signals and infusions and stuff. It's the second largest in the county. It only does business in Ireland, actually, so Gordon wants to expand.

"The other three are fairly simple. They have all the information for every person and business Gordon has money in. Stocks are obvious, we get a percentage of the profits, and almost all of them are anonymous. Investments are similar but I think they are much larger than the stocks and most of the companies know it was Gordon. There aren't many of them. And then the 'other' file. Not much profit comes from this but there is a lot of favours involved, even though a good half are anonymous. These are the people Gordon helped when there was financial trouble or another business was going to top them, so the favours are massive. Only one has significant profit coming from it, and that's anonymous again."

"Gordon covered his tracks well," Crow commented.

"He did. Almost every single stock and investment is either for a company supplying in another country or significant other countries as well as our own. It's hard to link them."

Crow picked up the folders and looked through each, making small sounds when he recognised a name within.

"You'll like this one best," Valkyrie grinned, handing him the Fifth, 'other', folder. "Look at this – it's the intervention money Gordon gave the Cleaver and Reaper Producers."

"My God," Crow said, taking the folder. "I never knew they were so close to going under."

"That was the point. Gordon found out from another company who Gordon helps finance that they hadn't gotten their Reapers to take their money to the bank and wanted to ask what he wanted to do since they owed him a lot. Gordon did some digging and found they needed help which is why they weren't able to send out security and staff. They knew he donated but it was private to everyone else, but now I'm older I've been in contact to tell them upon my eighteenth birthday, the continued donations we send them will not stop. That's why the Cleavers at the Sanctuary are so nice to me, they are told to be because Gordon, and eventually I, will be giving them so much money. It's why Reapers bow to me too."

He stared at her incredulously. "You could practically control them with the amount Gordon's sending! You might as well be investing."

"I know," Valkyrie said. "It's weird. But it means we can ask for Cleavers from the producers directly and they'll almost always be able to send us a dozen."

"Valkyrie," Crow said, shaking his head and flicking through the folder quickly. "This is incredible. With just a little work you could convert a lot of the consistent donation money into an investment and gain an even better income each month. I always wondered where the money came from, but I never asked or thought it could be as elaborate at this. How much profit do you make a year?"

"Neither did I," Valkyrie admitted. "And I worked it out to be six-hundred thousand a year just from this and with taking the Cleaver donations into account which is a very significant amount, though that number has been going down each year by about fifty thousand for the last five years, but I know the problem and can fix that when I'm eighteen fairly easily. But see this company here? This is one that we need to do some work on. The owner, Mr Apúrate, he's trying to merge his business in real estate with Mr Vinay's business in the same thing, but it's sort of a well-known rumour that if he does it he'll push Nadia's father out and leave him with nothing. Obviously, Mr Vinay has more sense than to agree but Mr Apúrate uses some underhand ways to get what he wants in the last few years. I think we need to do something about it."

Crow nodded. "I think you're right but only because of the underhanded ways part. I understand stocks and the Cleaver Production parts, but the getting businesses to do what you want thing is not my forte. I suggest talking to Anton and Ghastly about that. Between the pressure of you being a detective, Anton's contacts, and Gordon's business know-how, you could get anything you want from him."

"Is that not illegal?" Valkyrie asked suspiciously.

"So is his underhanded methods," Crow pointed out. "We can simply arrest him if you want. But if you want to benefit and live long term on these profits, I don't want to ruin that for you. I don't think it's a good thing, but I do want you to have the most successful life you can, even if it's something I don't like."

She smiled at him. "Thanks, Crow. You're a good bad influence."

"I know."

"Do we still have to do schoolwork?"

"Absolutely."

"But I did all this work myself!" Valkyrie whined. "All this folder stuff and labelling and maths and graphs. At least don't make me do maths, I already did loads."

"Fine. You did maths. You can do physics instead."

Valkyrie put her head on the table.


	60. Valkyrie's Corrival

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 60**

Although _their_ plan was to keep her hidden, the Elder's had other ideas. And Valkyrie and Crow simply had to be there for that particular meeting.

They drove fairly openly as the house was just about finished, certainly enough for them to be creating their final plan later that day, as well as clearing out the last of the monsters with the Dead Men's various friends whom Valkyrie hadn't gotten to meet yet. So, they had already decided to allow Valkyrie to be seen in the hopes Caelan followed them back to the house where their friends were to draw him in for the final part which they were, again, deciding that night. Valkyrie was practically giddy to be free of the vampire so she could go back to her own life.

"What is the meeting about anyway?" Valkyrie asked, bouncing her leg excitedly as they drove to the Sanctuary.

"I believe it has something to do with Guild but I'm not sure how. I do know that Erskine and a dear friend of ours, Corrival Deuce, is there. Have I told you about Corrival?"

"Many times, don't worry," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "You've all spoken about him so many times I feel like _I_ know him and we've never even spoken."

"Yes, he's been quite busy these last few years. He's been in Ireland a few times but always had to go away again a few days later or it's been in the middle of a case of ours. I think you will like him."

"I think I'm going to be his favourite," Valkyrie said offhandedly.

"Why? He doesn't know you."

"I'm everyone's favourite. I'll be Corrival's favourite too," she said confidently.

"Oh really? Well, I should warn you that Corrival is a hard man and a mean one at that. He'd definitely think it right to put you over his knee if you put even a toe out of line. He'll call you 'young lady' a lot and cross his arms and do a lot of lecturing."

"Sure, sure," she said with a smile. "Look, he can't be worse than Anton, Kenspeckle or Meritorious. They all love me!"

"You do know that's not his first name, right?"

"Yes, but I already learnt it wrong, alright, it's not my fault. Don't draw attention to it, okay?" She grumbled, looking at her phone. Nadia had been very quiet these last few days and Valkyrie was going to ask her after their meeting if everything was okay at home or if she'd upset her somehow. "How far away are we?"

"Only a few miles left," Crow said.

As promised, they got there with time to spare, giving Valkyrie a chance to fix her hair in the mirror before they had to get out and go inside. In there were the usual people, as well as Snake and a somewhat elderly looking man with sharp eyes and frown wrinkles on his face from all the pressures of his previous jobs. He had a strong body though, and stood, as Crow said, with his arms crossed and was waiting impatiently for them.

"What time do you call this Pleasant?" He growled out. "I've been waiting here for you for the last half hour."

"We were held up in traffic," Crow said smoothly. "It's good to see you again Corrival. I'm proud to introduce my partner and Co-head of department, Valkyrie Cain. The Dead Men's apprentice."

He looked at her sharply and she looked at him the way she already envisioned him in her head – a massive marshmallow that wanted to look horrible to her brothers but secretly loved her to bits. She knew he didn't feel like that yet, but she already adored the man and gave him a smile. "What do you have to smile about, hu? You proud of being late too?"

"We're not late, you're just really early," Valkyrie said. "And anyway, Guild will hold us up by at least half an hour so it doesn't matter."

"It certainly does matter young lady! If only I met you some years ago, then I could make you run around this building until you were sick and yelling 'yes, sir' when I told you how stupid you sound. Now take me to this meeting room. I still have to finish this damn crossword puzzle."

Valkyrie grinned. He was perfect and she wanted to adopt him. She did what she was told though because she really did believe he'd do that if he could, and after knocking a few times on the meeting room door, she let them in. Corrival sat down with a grumble and got to his crossword while the other two men sat nervously some seats away. Valkyrie sat next to Corrival and checked her phone.

"What are you doing with that thing?" Corrival asked gruffly.

She glanced at him. "I'm seeing if my girlfriends sent me a text. She hasn't."

"Should she have?" He asked.

"No, but she usually would have mentioned being busy. I'm just worrying about nothing," she said, putting it away.

He huffed in discontent. "Back when I was young you'd never have young women and men dating so young."

"Didn't people get married at thirteen a few hundred years ago?" Valkyrie asked him.

"Exactly! They'd get married and be happily unhappy. Or they'd cross their legs and wait until they finished their education, that's what I always said they should do. You still in school?"

"I'm home schooled, mainly by Crow – that's Skulduggery, sorry, and Tanith. The others chip in, but they do the bulk of it."

"And which one told you to get a boyfriend?"

"Girlfriend," she clarified. "And none of them. They all said not to go near boys, so I didn't. Except for Anton, he didn't say much, but he knew it wasn't going to work before the other ninny heads caught on."

He grunted a laugh. "Ninny heads. Yeah, that suits them. And this girlfriend, you gonna marry her? Or is she some plaything? Because I hate when people disrespect the people they're dating and the youth of today don't exactly make me feel confident in the future."

"Is it disrespect if I don't know if I want to marry her but I love her?" She asked uncertainty. "I mean, I'm fifteen, I like to think I can finish my _own_ education first. We might have to slow down a bit."

He grunted. "Good enough," he said. "For a kid taught by ninny heads."

Valkyrie had to grin at that, and they were interrupted by the Grand Mage and Elder Crow joining them from a door at the back. Meritorious gave Valkyrie a nod when she stood up and shook Corrival's hand quickly and they sat down without small talk.

"We are waiting on Guild but what's new?" Meritorious said, handing out some papers to them. On it, Valkyrie read quickly, was information about Esryn Vanguard, the man Scarab had been framed for killing but had actually been killed by Guild personally who'd then framed Scarab. There was more information on there, all things Guild had done to annoy the Sanctuary both before and after his anointment.

"Are we finally getting rid of Guild?" Valkyrie asked hopefully.

Meritorious nodded. "That's the plan. He's crossed too many lines and we've finally found a replacement Elder in order to go through with firing him."

"Who?" Corrival asked gruffly, looking at Meritorious.

"You."

"Me?" He asked in the same tone.

"Yes, you. You are the perfect candidate."

"I am not. I don't want the job. I don't want any job, I enjoy travelling and doing nothing," he told the Grand Mage. "You'll have to find someone else, like Skulduggery here."

"There is no way I'd allow Detective Pleasant a seat as Elder so long as I live," Meritorious said with a thin smile. "As it is, we need someone who the public will be glad to have working for us, someone who won't be stupid or do stupid things like Guild has. He allowed a lunatic to be a detective and when we removed him, Guild brought him back. He allowed that same detective to stalk and harass Valkyrie Cain as an attempt to have her and Skulduggery as well as the other Dead Men removed from our employ. He's spent thousands of euro on stupid projects that lead to nothing. People have lost faith in him and it's extending to the wider Sanctuary. We need someone very skilled and competent to take that place."

"No. And you're an idiot for hiring him. Ask Bliss."

"There was already a vote which came back negative for him. But you are very much wanted here."

"What could you possibly give me," Corrival said, leaning back in his chair, "that could possibly entice me out of retirement?"

"Easy," Meritorious said, looking at Valkyrie. "An apprentice."

"Me?" Valkyrie asked unsurely.

"Yes, you. Corrival, Valkyrie Cain is the most talented and inspiring young women we have. She is the gem of the new generation, she's the diamond of our society right now. She is the apprentice of multiple people already but has chosen to work in the Sanctuary alongside Skulduggery. As the Dead Men's leader, you are just as entitled to help teach her."

"The most talented in her generation? The diamond of our society?" He asked, looking at Meritorious like he didn't buy even a little of that. Valkyrie wasn't sure she did either. "How long did it take you to think that up?"

"It's true," Elder Crow said lightly from her chair. "Detective Cain knows multiple and diverse magic and is not swayed by other's opinions. She is sure of herself. She is confident. She is the face of our Sanctuary currently, and with some further guidance from someone with more experience than the Dead Men, she could be the shining light of our country."

"The Dead Men have plenty experience," he said with a frown.

"It is not as much as we wish to impress on Detective Cain," she said, staring at him with hooded eyes. "Valkyrie Cain is the new generation, the leading figure of the future. We need to train her to not only fight or learn business skills or have charisma but also to negotiate and hold her temper. You can teach her the things the Dead Men… lack."

He grunted. "I suppose that is true. But I still don't want to be Elder. I could stay for a few years to help, maybe borrow your oh so amazing child-Detective and teach her, but why would I want to be an Elder? It's too much hard work."

"We have that part covered," Meritorious said with a sly smile. "We'll hire more assistants and three undersecretaries. The work you'll have to do is simple and the meetings can be kept to a minimum. All work you enjoy will be assigned to you and we'll do the rest, and your day will end at ten at the latest no matter what else is going on, period. Does that sound like a deal?"

"And the pay? I want good pay to come out retirement," he said with narrowed eyes. "Or did Guild blow that too?"

"You'll receive the same as myself and Morwenna, two-hundred and fifty thousand a year. It's not as much as it could be, but we do want the Sanctuary to float after all. You've seen what they did in America. How is that?"

"Sure," he said, leaning forwards and shaking both their hands. "But you could have just offered a fraction of that and it would still be worth it compared to being retired."

Guild chose that moment to barge into the meeting. "Are we ready to start?" He snapped at then, sitting in a chair loudly and glaring at Valkyrie and Crow.

"Guild," Corrival said disdainfully. "How you haven't changed."

"Deuce," he sneered. He noticed the sheet sitting in front of Corrival and frowned a little harder. "Eachan? What is this?"

Meritorious sighed. "This is your retirement Thurid. You need to hand in your notice of resignation and go on a long, long holiday with your family."

"Retirement? Resignation? Why?"

"Several months ago, Detective's Pleasant and Cain uncovered the truth of Vanguard's death, as well as helped compile a list of other transgressions those at the Sanctuary were able to add to. The amount of verbal abuse alone should be enough to fire you, but we want to give you an option due to your other, more honourable work in the war. Resign and we'll destroy this information, or don't and we'll have you arrested and send you away for war crimes."

Guild went red in the face. "You're not even going to give me a choice?"

"It is a choice," Crow said gleefully. "A choice I hope you make rashly."

Guild sneered at Crow. "I'll be in my office. Writing my resignation papers. When should I expect to vacate?"

"Two months is standard," Meritorious said. "But we can make it one for you. Say goodbye to your assistant too. We know she's been having an affair with you."

He sneered and swooped out the office without looking back. Valkyrie grinned from ear to ear.

.*****.

They decided Corrival should come back with them to plan since he had no other place to be and Valkyrie had decided he was her new second-most favourite person after Nadia. He was quiet except to question Valkyrie on the Dead Men and their home, on how they live and how they train and teach her. The others seemed amused, as if they thought he'd make it worse, but Valkyrie could already see the harsh layers melting and they hadn't noticed. He was an awful backseat driver and for every snap he made at Crow for his driving, he'd speak that bit softer and nicer to Valkyrie.

Her brothers had no idea what was in store for them. Valkyrie chuckled evilly in her head.

They got to the mansion and Valkyrie immediately took in the new appearance. The outside was much more foreboding, with black iron gates that must have been twelve foot at the height of the curve, going down to an eight-foot high wall on either side.

The wall, the original stone up to six foot, had been added to with matching iron spikes that had signals all over each and every one of them to make it next to impossible to scale. Shrubbery was on the outside sitting beautifully by the curb to offset the iron, something they decided to do to keep the mortals from getting suspicious as to why only big iron spikes had been added to the house.

Crow used a beeper with the English Sanctuaries technology Tanith had been able to get from her past flame at the Sanctuary, a Mage Identification Device, which was keyed not only to the beeper into all gates, but also the house itself. Only someone with actual, verbal permission could get into the house without them all knowing all about it now.

The iron gates opened a lot quicker and smoother than Valkyrie thought they would and closed immediately after. The road had been re-gravelled, and the flowerbeds and grass attended to at the same time as working on the house. There were new windows all over with signals that would stop them being broken into, but did allow them to be broken out of for an emergency.

They parked the Bentley inside the new gazebo-like car shelter – she'd been told its fancy, real name and immediately forgotten it – they had erected to fit all their cars that were regularly used so there was more space in the garage for the other vehicles they didn't use often. Crow had been against leaving his beautiful Bentley to the elements until he had seen it under the ivy and rose covered gazebo and realised how gorgeous she looked. Now she lived there and Crow often looked out the window admiringly at her.

They got out the car and went into the house as normal – the new system knew who they wanted inside and not, so it was easy to let Corrival in. Inside looked identical still so there was no trouble going to the living room.

Greetings were short and sweet – Corrival told them to sit their arses down and to get him tea, which they already had. Easy.

There was no time for Valkyrie to get to know the other dozen or so other mages in the room before Corrival started up again.

"Tell me what all this is about then," he said, sitting back with his tea. It seemed to Valkyrie it had a calming effect on the man. This must be where Panda got it from. "Don't think I don't know Mage Identification when I see it."

"There's been some trouble," Crow said and then explained what had happened with Valkyrie and Caelan and the several sightings of something in the distance since, though didn't mention it had been a sexually driven assault, only that he was after Valkyrie and what they knew he'd done in the past.

The friends - who were also there and quiet in the presence of the new Elder - and Corrival nodded and looked deep in thought as Crow explained Caelan's violent history and finally had looks of determination when it came to the final line of coming up with a plan to kill him for good.

"Would it not be easier to find him alone?" Frightening, Tanith's knowledge in England and her past boyfriend, said in his deep, deep voice. "Or as a turned vampire?"

"I had thought that," Wolf said from his seat, one arm over Weasel's shoulders which wasn't an unusual sight, but definitely getting more common. "But we believe he's using the serum Dusk created years ago before we killed him. It keeps a vampire in their human form in the night. We think he's making it every few days and then just stalking us all night."

"You mean there's been a vampire outside this whole time and you never mentioned it?" A short lady asked. Valkyrie remembered her name was Aurora Jane. She had a mean scowl on her face.

"Yes," Crow said quickly. "We needed to secure the house before we could move onto our next project of destroying him as we didn't know how strong he'd be. Although relatively young and apparently not a good fighter, he _is_ a vampire and he _does_ have a long and violent history. We wanted to make sure whatever we decided to do had not only backup but also a place to come back to if anything happened."

"The plan, boy," Corrival growled at Crow. Valkyrie grinned – Crow was just a kid to Corrival, it was great!

Crow cleared his throat. "Yes, the plan. I am certain he is still on the grounds and unable to get off them now we have added to the security, something we hoped for. We will put the house on a fake lockdown, meaning it looks as if no one can get in or out of the house. The vampire doesn't seem to want anyone to hurt Valkyrie, so someone will pretend to attack her. Then, when we know Caelan is _trying_ to get in, and I'm certain he'll take his chance, we will be ready from the back via the new tunnel system to attack and subdue."

"Subdue?" A short man asked from beside Fletcher. "I thought we were killing."

"That's the Dead Men's business alone," Crow said strictly. "If in the fight you have to kill him, do it. But unless necessary, leave that to us."

The others nodded. They decided to wait for half an hour before continuing with the plan, giving them all a chance to go to the toilet and prepare. Valkyrie checked her phone and decided to give Nadia that call.

Up in her room with the new impenetrable windows, Valkyrie sat on her bed and tried calling Nadia. She didn't pick up and Valkyrie ended the call feeling both fed up and really, really upset. Nadia never ignored her. Maybe her parents had taken it away? Nadia said they never wanted to do that since Valkyrie had been attacked without a phone though, they were too nervous for her.

She sat on the bed deep in thought for twenty minutes until her phone started buzzing from beside her. It was Nadia. She answered it excitedly and held it to her ear.

"Hello my beauty," Caelan said.


	61. Face to Paste

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 61**

_"Hello my beauty," Caelan said._

Valkyrie felt sick and had to stand up. "Where are you? Where's Nadia?!"

"I have an offer for you," Caelan said down the phone. "Would you listen? Good. Valkyrie, my love, I need to see you again. Forget about favours, I need to see you in the flesh once more. Meet me at Nadia Robin's house and we can talk. If you do, I'll let her go. If you don't, I'll assume you want me to kill her family. Make sure you come alone or I'll kill Robin then and there."

"Don't you–" He hung up before she could finish. "Fuck, fuck, fuck," Valkyrie cried, throwing the phone on her bed and walking in circles. She had to think of something, she had to do something. What could she possibly do though? She might have been trained by the best but she couldn't keep a vampire from killing any one of those three people, four including the stupid _butler_ , and if she didn't make it in good time he might decide to kill them anyway! "Fuck!"

There was a knock at her door and Valkyrie jumped nearly a foot in the air. She quickly steadied herself and took a breath. "Come in."

Fletcher opened the door and looked at her in concern. "You okay? I heard you swearing."

An idea popped into her head. "I'm fine. Fletcher, I need your help. You need to keep a secret."

His eyes opened wide, but he came in the room and closed the door after himself. "What is it?"

"Caelan has Nadia and her parents at their house. I need you to take me to them."

"We should tell Skulduggery," Fletcher immediately said.

"He said to come alone or he'd kill Nadia. If I don't get there quickly he might kill her parents, Fletcher, I need you to teleport me there! Down the street from her house would do, just don't tell anyone or they'll ruin it."

"Valkyrie," Fletcher growled, looking incredibly angry, "there is no way in hell I'm taking you to that monster to be – to be raped and killed! Don't you dare make me a part in that!"

She looked at him stonily. "I can kill him, Fletcher. I can kill him and I will be fine, but Nadia won't be. She'll be – she won't be fine, okay! I can do this. I'll rip him apart and then I'll call you and I'll make sure Skulduggery doesn't kill you. Please, you're the only one that can help me."

Fletcher sighed and teleported over to her with a glare. "You better know what you're doing," he said, gripping her upper arm roughly.

They teleported to the end of Nadia's street, hidden behind the low garden wall. "Thanks," she said airily, feeling a little lightheaded. She breathed quickly, getting herself ready for the fight and felt her mind get into the right place and all the other feelings take second place. "I'll call you."

She climbed over the wall easily and kept to the trees, coming up to the house and through the back door. She'd never gone that way before, never more than the parlour and dining room next door. She moved silently through the house, seeing all the beautiful art and the white walls and the white carpet and the solid oak wood floors of the hall and the high ceilings. She carefully crept through the whole downstairs and found nothing, meaning she had to carefully creep up the stairs and through the hall. It wasn't a massive house, thank goodness, nothing like Valkyrie's home, so she only had a few options. And only one of those were open and Valkyrie was sure she saw a shadow move behind the door.

She used her ring to feel for death and found nothing which relaxed her just a little and let her focus on her tasks instead. She moved to the door and got ready. She breathed quietly in once and used her foot to slam the door open, bringing fire, shadows and purple magic to her fingers.

Caelan, Mrs Keena, Mr Vinay and Nadia were all there, the family tied up and Caelan standing over them. He turned and smiled at her, seemingly unfazed by the magic. Mrs Keena was trying to say something from behind her gag and was moving a lot but Valkyrie didn't understand any of it, while Mr Vinay just kept glaring at Caelan and Nadia had tears on her cheeks but hope in her eyes when she looked at Valkyrie. It made Valkyrie more confident.

"Release them, Caelan," she said. "I'm alone and I haven't told anyone. No one's coming. You can let them go."

"If I do, they'll get help," he said, staring at her like she was fascinating. "I need to keep them tied here."

"If you let them go," Valkyrie said, "I'll key you into my house system. You'll be able to get in whenever you want and we can talk about this. But you have to let them go."

He thought about it and then shook his head, getting down on one knee. "Valkyrie, my love, you are so generous to make me a part of your family, but I simply couldn't let you do that until we are married. Valkyrie, would you marry me?"

"If I say yes, will you let them go?" Valkyrie asked, still holding the magic.

"Of _course_ , I would do anything for you. We will be a family, we will love each other and be loyal to no one else," he said in wonder, staring at her. He got a creepy look on his face. "We will have many beautiful children together."

Valkyrie held back the instinct to shudder. "Then yes, I will. Now release them."

He stood up, taking a step forward. "We must marry first."

"We can't leave them here if we're getting married," she said quickly. "We need to let them go and then leave."

He shook his head slowly, taking another step. "When I was a child before I was killed, you were married only when the husband had slept with his wife."

Valkyrie took another step back and was out of the room, leading him like a crazed child. Her heart was beating violently but she had to keep focused. She had to get the fight away from Nadia. She had to keep her safe at all costs.

She nearly fell back down the stairs as Caelan stalked her and had to stay still as he came right up to her, just inches away. She still held the magic, but her hands were level with her stomach now, where she felt sick.

Panicky.

Terrified.

He lifted a hand a stroked her cheek. She released the three magic's to hit him at once.

He howled in pain and pushed her by the face backwards and she used the wind to keep herself up at the last moment. He snarled and came at her, using his fingers as claws and swiping at her – she generated as much purple electricity as she could onto her body, letting it radiate from each limb, and then reached out right after dodging a punch, touching his forehead with a single fingertip, letting it all go straight into his head.

He shuddered and went rigid as it went through him in shocks and starts, but although it was powerful, it was also quick, and Valkyrie had to jump the bannister and float down to avoid him as he fell rigidly down the stairs.

She landed not far away and safely on the oak floor, but it seemed falling down the stairs and on his face several times as well as getting his brain fried hadn't done what she expected for the vampire, as he was already groaning and bringing himself up to his knees after barely a few seconds.

She looked out the window next to the front door but it didn't hold any help or backup - she should have just listened to Fletcher. She had no chance if he wouldn't be killed or unconscious from what she had just done. It was her strongest move.

She had no more time to feel sorry though. Caelan growled thunderously and pulled himself to his feet and practically threw himself on Valkyrie. She sidestepped him and kicked his hip, pushing him into the banister, and he used it to pull himself straight and push off at her at the same time. She didn't get much time to move and found herself pressed against the wall. He moved back clumsily, half his face looking slack and his movement becoming jagged.

It didn't stop his baring his teeth and hissing at her, throwing a sudden punch at her she dodged and another over her head she ducked. His fist went through the wall and Valkyrie slipped under his arm and tried to get into the living room where she knew a nice, pointy poker was but he used his other hand to grab her elbow and she came to a jarring halt.

He looked at her with one glaring eye and half a snarling mouth, frothing at the lips. The other side of his face made no movement. "I'll kill you," he growled to her with a thick tongue. "I'll destroy you."

"Fuck you," she growled back, and he threw her back onto the wall.

She covered her face as he hissed and went in to punch her again.

Something else growled behind Caelan and less than a second later she heard a _thud_ , _thud_ , _thud_ , the sound of flesh on flesh, and then Caelan wailed out and she opened her eyes just as Bear crashed passed her with his hands around Caelan's neck right through the living room wall!

Her mouth gaped in shock as she moved on shaky legs to where Bear and Caelan had fallen over an armchair and onto the floor to settle. She couldn't even see if the vampire was still alive as Bear sat on his chest, beating the vampire's face quite literally into the floor. All of his bones must have been broken and his leg was at a funny angle and she knew Bear well enough to know he was using his full weight on Caelan and at least half his ribs would be broken already.

Bear showed no sign of stopping and Valkyrie didn't mind one bit as she turned tail, almost going right into a pale Fletcher, and up to the stairs. "Thank's Bear!" She shouted as she ran to get Nadia.

The door was still open but none of them had moved, obviously, as they were all tied up. Valkyrie grabbed her little flip knife out her jacket and undid the bonds around Nadia's body, letting her move a lot freer. "Are you okay?" Valkyrie asked her as she rummaged through her jacket for her lock pick. Nadia nodded, little tears forming in her eyes. "Hey, don't cry! It's okay, Bear smashed up the wall a bit, but now he's hitting Caelan, so we're safe. I think he's probably dead."

She nodded but it seemed Nadia couldn't stop the tears as they began to fall. Valkyrie moved around her and quickly unpicked the shackles and Nadia immediately held her wrists that had been chaffed and badly bruised by the cuts. Finally, Valkyrie undid the gag around her face.

"Are you hurt anywhere else?" Valkyrie asked, taking Nadia's hands and inspecting the mark. It was free of dirt but definitely didn't have clean cuts where they had rubbed too hard. "A healing stone and a bit of time will sort that," Valkyrie said gently.

Nadia nodded, biting her lip. "My leg really hurts. He broke it."

"Where?" Valkyrie asked quickly. She couldn't see either because she was sitting on her knees.

"Don't make me move! It hurts so much!" Nadia said, breaking down and sobbing.

Valkyrie nodded, moving forwards and holding her gently in her arms. "It's okay. I promise. I have to move you but you just stay still, alright? I'm going to put you on the bed and untie your parents. You shouldn't sit on it."

Nadia nodded as she began sobbing more loudly and put her head in the curve of Valkyrie's neck. Being a shorter, much thinner girl, Valkyrie had no trouble putting an arm around Nadia's back and another carefully under her butt and lifting her right up in a sitting position to not hurt her leg too much.

Moving quickly, Valkyrie lay her down on the bed in the room, kissing her cheek gently. She desperately wanted to just hold the girl, but she couldn't exactly leave Mr Vinay and Mrs Keena tied up, so she quickly worked on their shackles and then cut the bonds on both before finally taking off, firstly, Mrs Keena's gag.

Mistake one.

"You stupid girl," Mrs Keena growled out at her, standing up on wobbly legs. "This is your fault! This is all your fault!"

Valkyrie bit the inside of her cheek, unable to answer. Instead, she untied the gag on Mr Vinay who'd been trying unsuccessfully.

Mistake two.

He got himself to his feet on steadier legs and sorted the cuffs of his white shirt that had marks of blood on it where Caelan had nicked his side. "Valkyrie," he said slowly, going to his wife who had started crying uncontrollably. "I think it would be best if you left."

Valkyrie swallowed thickly as her heart jumped up to form a knot in her throat. "I can get Fletcher to teleport you to Kenspeckle's if you want," she said quietly.

"Please leave my house," he said calmly, looking at his wife's wrists as she sobbed in his shirt.

Valkyrie turned to Nadia who was silently letting tears fall down her face. Nadia held a hand out and Valkyrie went to her obediently, leaning over to hug her tightly. Nadia pulled herself up on her good leg to hold Valkyrie tighter and Valkyrie felt the pit of dread open up inside her as she held her gorgeous, bleeding girlfriend. Tears pricked her eyes. "I'm so sorry," she whispered to Nadia. "I'm so sorry this happened."

Nadia leant back and sat on the bed again, wincing at her leg. "It's not your fault. None of this is your fault."

"Get out of my house," Mr Vinay said more deeply, his native Indian accent coming out much stronger with his anger. Valkyrie could practically feel his rage and blame.

Valkyrie quickly kissed Nadia's forehead and stood back.

"I love you," Nadia said with a smile.

Mr Vinay grabbed the back of Valkyrie's coat and manhandled her out the room, the knots of helpless blame, guilt and dread too strong to get any words out. Mr Vinay pushed her at the stairs like he was going to push her down but held on at the last minute, instead, pulling her down them at a speed she couldn't keep up with when he was pushing and pulling and dragging her along. Bear was at the bottom but said nothing. He stared at Mr Vinay without emotion.

"I have called the Sanctuary," Bear said emotionlessly. Blood dripped from his loose fingers. "They will handle the damages and mess, as well as remove the body."

" _Get out of my house_!" He shouted at Bear, pushing Valkyrie harshly into him. Valkyrie fell into Bears arms and he held her in a tight hug. " _Get_ out of here _now_! I never what to see your twisted faces _again_!"

Valkyrie held back her tears and ducked under Bears arms to leave through the front door, getting onto the street and almost tripping up on Fletcher who was waiting for them. He looked worried, even more so when he saw Valkyrie crying, but he didn't get to say anything because Valkyrie wrapped her arms around him and wailed into his shoulder.

He held her awkwardly, stroking her back and not saying anything, for which she was grateful. How was she meant to ever see Nadia again if her parents hated her so much? Was she really being blamed for this? Other than their hurt wrists and Nadia's broken leg, they were fine. No one was dead, mauled, or worse, and she had gotten there in time.

 _But if I didn't date Nadia_ , her brain said, _or if I didn't exist at all, Nadia and her family would never have been hurt in the first place. Just like Mum and my real dad_. That just brought on more guilt and crying. Everyone always worked around her, were in the wrong place at the wrong time doing things for her, and they died! This was her fault all over again!

Bear gently put his hands on her shaking shoulders and pulled her off of Fletcher and picked her up like a small child, letting her put her head on his shoulders and wrap her legs around his middle. They teleported a moment later back to the mansion, upstairs and in the hall right between Valkyrie and Tanith's bedrooms.

"Valkyrie?" Tanith asked, coming up and shoving Fletcher back from entering Valkyrie's room. Bear put her on her bed and sat next to her, stroking her back as she drew up her knees and sobbed violently, hiccupping and sniffing. "Val, what's wrong? Fletcher told us about the phone call, we were so worried. What's going on?"

She took some deep breaths and sniffed, lifting her head up. "Everyone's fine," she said quietly. "Nadia has a broken leg but she's fine. But her parents said it's my fault he came to their house and they hate me now and Mr Vinay said he never wanted to see me again and I think he's going to make sure I never get to see Nadia. He's going to send her to boarding school in France. I'll never get to see her and it's all my fault!"

"Aww, Val," Tanith said, shuffling up besides Valkyrie and holding her tightly. "This is not your fault. I promise. And no one got hurt, except for a broken leg, and that'll be fine, yeah? Is Nadia angry?"

"No," Valkyrie said, the sobs coming back. "She said it wasn't my fault too, and she said she loved me but her dad pulled me out the room before I could say it back and I feel so _bad_."

Valkyrie spent the whole of the rest of the day crying and waiting for a message from Nadia, being held by Tanith for most of it until Wolf came upstairs and decided it was his turn and Tanith was relieved.

They spent the evening and night wrapped up in the covers like people burritos – "peritos" as Wolf called it. She lay on Wolf as they watched some movie she didn't look at once, stroking his arm absentmindedly. He'd kiss her hair or cheek every ten minutes or so, telling her it wasn't her fault or Nadia was fine or that he was there for her whenever she'd get too lost in her thoughts.

He kept asking her to talk about it, to explain how it could be her fault that Nadia got caught up in Caelan's insanity, and when she made comments on her real parents, he asked her to explain her logic there too. She knew it wasn't logical though, and that's what made her angry and frustrated. It just felt that way and she didn't want to talk about it.

Just as he was falling asleep on her pillow, she kissed the shoulder she was resting on and told him he was the best brother in the world. He really was.

Valkyrie turned off the movie and looked at her phone, noticing it was nearly two in the morning. No calls or messages from Nadia. She sent her another, the third since... whatever it is that happened, just saying that she loved her and goodnight, and closed her eyes to try and find sleep wrapped up in her loving brother's arms.


	62. Preparations

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 62**

Valkyrie didn't hear from Nadia for three days, and by then Valkyrie had had enough. It was obvious that Nadia's parents had taken away her phone and probably all other means of communicating with Valkyrie, and she hated she couldn't talk to her after their last time seeing each other.

Over those three days, Valkyrie had had lessons with Corrival to ease her pain but hadn't had the energy to go into the caves to help with clearing them of monsters.

She barely looked at or spoke to the other visitors. She was just too occupied in her mind worrying about Nadia, stressing over Nadia's parents and fretting about their future. It was all-consuming. She spent all her time training by herself, sleeping or being spoken to about all sorts of things by Corrival.

On the upside, they had gained a closer relationship. While the Dead Men liked to have a sister with sass and attitude and enough strength to give as hard as they gave, Corrival was much more paternal. He enjoyed having Valkyrie tucked under his wing delicately and babying her whilst also getting her to do all the ' _traditional roles of a young woman_ ' three or more hundred years ago.

He would talk to her about strategy, tactics and criminal psychology while she baked a cake, and then she'd sit at the table drinking hot chocolate and eating all day as he encouraged her childish nature and taught her. It was different, and Valkyrie definitely felt the power he liked to have by being in control of the conversation, but it wasn't a control he wanted to manipulate over her, so it was easy for her to relax and just listen and do what she was told. It was better than thinking.

But by that third day, she was ready to do something. She lay in bed that morning thinking it over and decided exactly what needed to be done. It was a cold, rainy day and with a check of her phone, she knew there was meant to be bad storms all day, thunder and lightning beginning in the night. Perfect.

Valkyrie started her day simply, going for the workout she had been for the last three days in solitude, then taking her shower and using that time to shave as much of her body as she possibly could. Getting out the shower, she wiped some steam off the glass and looked herself naked in the mirror.

Carefully, she preened and prettied herself up, cleaning anything she could and covering over the rest with creams, perfumes and makeups. Her nails were painted, she tweezers a few missed hairs and her eyebrows, and applied a very light mask of makeup on her face, just enough to make her feel extra confident but nothing that would run in the rain.

She dried her hair and played around with it in all sorts of updos and plaits before settling for down and natural, dipping into a pot of Tanith's incredibly expensive hair oil she'd kill Valkyrie for touching and putting some in her hair to make it softer than ever.

Almost two hours since she went in the bathroom, she was ready, standing amid a mountain of products, naked and more confident than ever in the mirror.

She cleaned the room a little and wrapped up in a towel to go to her room and straight to her clothes. What to wear? There was what she usually would – a pair of super, super tight jeans, or perhaps a pair of tiny shorts. But Nadia had seen all those things in pictures now. What to do?

In the end, she just went causal and chose some black jeans and a red button up shirt with a black spaghetti top beneath. But that was for later – for then she stuck on whatever and tied her silky hair out her face and ran down the hall and down to the kitchen where most of the Dead Men and their friends were crowded in drinking coffee and getting lunch.

"What are you so excited for?" Snake asked her, sipping his coffee.

"I'm getting ready," she said, pulling out the recipe book. She flicked through it quickly, finding a chocolate chip biscuit recipe she wanted. "Do we have any bars of chocolate left?"

Wolf snorted from his place next to the cupboard. "Chocolate? Have you seen the kitchen? I'd be impressed if we have potatoes left."

Valkyrie glanced at Bear as she started pulling the other things she needed out the baking cupboard. He shook his head. "No chocolate. We have raisins."

She grimaced as she searched out the baking powder. "Raisin biscuits give me trust issues. I need chocolate."

"What for?" Snake asked.

"Biscuits," Weasel said quickly.

"I like biscuits," Snake said hopefully.

"Not for you," she snapped, pushing him out the way and starting a cup of coffee for herself. "I'm seeing Nadia. I'm going to the shop."

There was a chorus of noise, all 'aww' and whooping. She ignored them, checking the battery on the weighing scales. She stood and made a list on the notebook of what she needed to buy. It took a few minutes, but she soon had it and ripped the page off.

"I'll take you," Bear said, coming up beside her silently.

Valkyrie nodded and grabbed her cup of coffee, blowing it quickly.

"I want to come too!" Snake said. "I want biscuits now!"

"I wouldn't mind the trip," Aurora said from her seat. "I need a few things."

"I don't have much time," Valkyrie said uncertainly.

"We have plenty," Bear said soothingly.

"Well, I want to come too," Wolf said, pushing off the side. "Let's go before anyone else does."

Valkyrie nodded and they left in one of the cars, driving down to the local supermarket. Valkyrie went ahead and got her basket and started collecting everything she needed for visiting Nadia. She got candles, plastic baby pink plates, a big picnic basket, some beautiful new cutlery – completely unnecessary but Valkyrie liked being overkill – some fruits, lots of chocolate and some other foods.

She finished it looking around for presents because that was the whole point of the visit. Proving she was the best girlfriend in the universe.

When she had all the things she wanted as well as some she didn't but knew Nadia would love, she went to the checkout line. She spotted Aurora and went over to her.

"Hi," she said, balancing her basket and the overflow in her arms.

"Oh my God," Aurora said, eyes widening at Valkyrie. "You sure you've got enough?"

"I really hope so," she grumbled. "I know she'll love it though."

"I'd hope so," Aurora laughed, taking the wrapping paper to help Valkyrie. "What's your big plan then?"

"I'm still working on it," Valkyrie said, the line moving up enough for Valkyrie to put some of her things on the _thing_. She had no idea what it was called. She was too old to ask now, she just had to call it the _thing_. It moved slowly as the other person's stuff was slowly scanned and packed. Valkyrie sighed impatiently. "I have no idea, to be honest. This could be a really bad idea."

"Well, the Dead Men are known for their bad idea's. Looks like you've learnt quite a bit from them," Aurora smirked. "In fact, I bet you've learnt a lot. Tell me, what's it like living with them?"

"The Dead Men? Eventful, I suppose. But it's sort of normal. Not as mega exciting as people expect. Usually there's less stuff going on and the house is very quiet and we're all out doing our own things. We only see each other in the morning and at dinner, maybe for a movie, the rest of the time we're all split up. Some people think we're joined at the hip all the time."

"So no crazy sex parties?"

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow at her.

"There's just been some wild rumours, is all," Aurora said with another little laugh. Valkyrie could see how Tanith had been drawn to the woman.

"Well, that's not true. I bet none of them are, actually. Are there any other fun ones?"

"Well, there's a rumour you and Skulduggery are an item," Aurora said with an eye roll. "Not many people believe it, but they say it anyway. There are a few saying they spotted Saracen and Dexter at it again, but what's new there?"

"At it again?" Valkyrie asked incredulously.

"Did you not know?" Aurora asked as a young man packed her bag. "It's always been a rumour those two have been together, they've been casually on and off since they met. It's just the gossip mill trying to find out which one of those they're in."

"I knew it was a rumour, but I didn't realise it was real."

"Yeah! You have to keep up to date," Aurora said, getting her card out. "You need to tell me all the details about you and your girl."

"I will," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. Her things started going through the till and soon enough all the bags were packed and she had paid, and a steep pay at that, and she and Aurora went to the front to wait for the others. "It's really not that interesting though."

"I know all the starting bits like how you met," Aurora said. "Everyone does. But I want to know the details."

"Well, ask me and I'll see if I can tell you."

"Did you two really have sex for the first time is the Sanctuary staff room?"

Valkyrie snorted and started laughing. "Is this really what people spread rumours about? No, that's not true."

Aurora grinned. "I thought so. What about the one about having sex in the Irish Grand Mage's office?"

"Not a chance."

"In the locker room?"

"No. Is there other questions?"

"Let's see," she pretended to think. "No. But I'd like to know all the cute things."

"Cute things?"

"Yeah. Like, why are you spending almost two hundred euros on the fly for her if you haven't even spoken to her in three days?"

"I love her."

"You're too young."

"I'm too young for love?"

"You barely know it yet," she said, looking at Valkyrie curiously. "Why do you think you love her? Don't you want to explore?"

"I know I love her. And not particularly. I'm happy with Nadia. I know what I want and I intend to keep it," Valkyrie said, looking around for Bear, Snake and Wolf. They were checking out now. Valkyrie could see Snake was holding an armful of different packets of biscuits. "Why wouldn't I know?"

She shrugged. "You need to know lots of things first. People don't just jump into it."

"Maybe I want to," she retorted. "Maybe other people don't want to do that but that's not me."

"Maybe," Aurora said, unconvinced.

Valkyrie shrugged her off, deciding to not pay attention to Aurora's pessimism.

A few moments later the others were ready and they were driving back, Snake eating his biscuits in obvious child-like delight and Wolf taking some when he was busy telling the others how good they were. Back at the house, the kitchen had been cleaned up for her and the sides were easy for her to get the food out and get to work.

She made as much of Nadia's favourite foods as she could, including biscuits, chocolate strawberries and bacon Valkyrie intended to warm up later with her fire magic. How she'd get it to Nadia without it either being ruined or soaked through or both, she didn't know.

"You really haven't thought this through," Aurora said from the table with the others. Valkyrie could see why Tanith broke up with her.

"I like to live on blind luck, hope and prayers," Valkyrie muttered, putting the cooled biscuits in plastic boxes. She still needed to work out how to get everything to fit in the picnic basket. And get changed. How was she going to stay dry? _This is going to be interesting_ , she decided.


	63. The next step

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 63**

She had a light dinner and got herself ready and finished her preparations with time to spare, so she spent it fretting and thinking of all the possible scenarios.

In the end, it got to leaving time and she swore and grabbed the basket and her bag and left the house. At least she was moving now.

She travelled by the late bus to the nice area Nadia lived and walked out into the dark, stormy night in a big raincoat she found in the cupboard she was sure was once Gordon's. There was a bright flash and shortly after, a loud crack of thunder. It was a short walk to Nadia's street and Valkyrie very nearly crossed over and missed it completely before a flash of lightning lightened up the street sign.

She jogged down the street with the basket in hand, finding Nadia's house and running past it quickly. She ran into a neighbour's house and around the back, jumping the wall and hiding behind a tree.

She had to work out what window connected to Nadia's room. It was nine in the evening so Valkyrie expected she'd be in her room, but she couldn't be sure.

There was a light on in three rooms. She took a guess and decided one was an office, another her parent's bedroom and the last would be Nadia's room. She didn't dare take a peek or feel with the air. She just had to hope and pray. The best method.

She decided, based on the size of the gap between windows, that the two end lights were bedrooms because they had the most space, and they had windows on the left and right side of the house respectively, so they were obviously big rooms. Nadia had two windows, so she only had two to decide between. Left or right? Valkyrie didn't know.

She sighed and watched the right one, the one she was nearest to, carefully. It had a balcony. Did Nadia's room have a door? Valkyrie couldn't remember. She took a guess and decided she didn't. She had mentioned liking them, so maybe that was her desire to have one also? Either she got it right or she'd die tonight. Taking a breath, she cut across the garden and around to what she hoped to be Nadia's bedroom.

Working quick, she used the air to pull herself up to the window and looked inside. There was no one in there but she recognised the bedsheets. Thank every god that ever existed.

Valkyrie carefully opened the window and pushed herself and the basket in the room. She closed it quickly and noticed the shower in the ensuite was on. Working fast, Valkyrie pulled off the massive raincoat and used her magic to pull the water from her and put it in a plant pot. There was a little water left but barely. She opened the basket and put a blanket on the bed, then put the basket on it and made the picnic up quickly, warming the bacon and spreading out the rest.

Heart beating rapidly, she sat back against the headboard and threw her shoes somewhere else and tried to relax.

Nadia took absolutely ages in the shower and then took ages getting ready in the bathroom. Eventually, though, she opened the door, rubbing her dark hair with a towel.

She screamed.

"Shh!" Valkyrie hushed her quickly.

Nadia slapped a hand over her mouth and they both silently stared at the door for almost a minute, waiting for anyone to check on them, but no one came. They each let out a sigh of relief.

"God Val," Nadia said with a grin. "What are you _thinking_? What if they catch us?"

"I'm willing to risk it," she said quietly, tucking her legs under herself. "I made dinner."

Nadia laughed quietly. "I see that." She came over, tucking the large bath towel around her. "Is that bacon?"

"Yep. It's warm."

"What the hell?" She said, grinning and taking a bite. "This is so cool Val. I'm so, so happy to see you."

"Me too," Valkyrie said, losing her smile a little. "I was really worried about you."

Nadia walked about the bed and sat on Valkyrie's lap, holding her shoulders and leaning in for a kiss. It felt very different in Nadia's room. Nadia had been in Valkyrie's room once but they had been younger. This felt a lot different. Valkyrie rested her hands on Nadia's waist, feeling the dip between her hip and waist.

Nadia pulled away with a little smile, pushing some of her wet hair out of her face. "I missed you," she said. "But I was fine. I am fine. I'm just so happy to see you again."

Valkyrie smiled. "Good. Because this took a lot of work and it'd be disappointing if you didn't want to see me."

She laughed and took another ration of bacon to chew on while she got ready. Valkyrie watched her as she nattered about how good the food looked and how impressed she was with the warm bacon, preoccupied with the slivers of skin Nadia showed as she dried herself with the towel still wrapped around her.

She was saying something about her friend at school when she turned around - away from Valkyrie - and undid the towel, letting it hang loosely around her hips as she dug something out a drawer. She emerged with a hair tie and put her hair up, showing off her beautiful back. She covered it with a bra a moment later, just a thin, blue, unpadded one that let Valkyrie see the definition of her breasts when she turned around. She was so interested in that she didn't get a chance to see anything else as Nadia pulled a pair of shorts on under the towel and threw it to the floor.

"Enjoying yourself?" Nadia asked with a grin.

"Maybe a little," Valkyrie blushed, sitting up a little higher on the bed. "Do you want something to eat?"

"Yes! I've been starving since I last saw you," she said, sitting on the bed next to Valkyrie. She grabbed a biscuit and took a big bite, leaning to lay on Valkyrie's arm. "Mum and Dad have been going crazy. I've been trying to calm them down or at least make them less mad at you but it's not working well."

Valkyrie put an arm around her. "What's been going on?"

She sighed. "They just blame you. I get that they're being protective but trying to keep me from you isn't going to work – point in case. But I just don't get why they suddenly hate you so much. I mean, Mum's always been love and hate, she is about everything, but Dad's been on my side since forever and suddenly he's telling me to break up with you? How is that fair on me? What did I do? What did you even do? You came and protected us, you saved us, and he's just so mad at you for it."

"They're upset Caelan used you to get to me," Valkyrie said quietly, breathing in the scent of Nadia's freshly washed hair.

"Yeah, but how is that your fault? Like, you're younger than me and they expect you to somehow predict what he's going to do and save me in advance? I just don't get it. I don't want to break up with you so I'm not going to. It's just making me really mad with them."

"They could stop us communicating," Valkyrie pointed out nervously.

"Why? It would mean they couldn't communicate with me either. Anyway, the reason I'm really stressed is that Mum's decided she's not speaking to me until I say all this what your fault, which it isn't, so I'm not. I'm avoiding her. I – I've kind of been not eating much."

"Not eating much? Baby, you can't starve yourself," Valkyrie said in concern. "You'll get ill."

"I know, don't worry. I got a friend to bring me snacks from the back gate, it's fine. And now you've come so I have lots of food here. It's fine, I'm not getting ill or anything, I go downstairs at night and stuff, it just means that in the daytime I can get a bit hungry because I'm not having full meals." She glanced at Valkyrie's face. "I'm still eating! Don't worry, alright? I have lots of snacks, and my friend's bringing more tomorrow."

"She better," Valkyrie grumbled, getting some more bacon. "Eat this. And here, I brought a few little presents."

Nadia laughed but did what Valkyrie said as she got the wrapped gifts out. Nadia was laughing as Valkyrie put them all in a pile in front of her. It was a little bit excessive. She opened them all between eating and they giggled about them. Valkyrie had got her candles and incense, a pretty little watch that she pretended 'wasn't as expensive as it looked', a pretty top Nadia had wanted but never got around to buying, some nice colouring pencils and some adult colouring books Valkyrie had thought she'd like.

Along with that were some photo frames and printed pictures of them for her room and wherever else Nadia could hide around the house.

After a hug and thank you, they chatted and ate while Nadia updated Valkyrie on her other friend who'd found out she was pregnant. The father was not someone her parents would be happy about, not that they'd be happy anyway, and Nadia had wanted to talk to her but was now on house arrest.

"She won't hate you," Valkyrie said soothingly, running a hand down Nadia's arm. "It'll be fine, just you see."

"Yeah," Nadia sighed. "At least that's one thing going for us. There's no way for us to get pregnant so my parents can't hate us even more at least."

"Yeah, there is that," she smirked. Clearing her throat, she tried to act nonchalant. "I actually wanted to talk to you about that."

"Being pregnant?"

"No!" She laughed. "I mean, like – well, I wanted to talk a bit about maybe taking our relationship further. And stuff. You know?"

Nadia picked at the sheet. "I want to do that too. I just wasn't sure when you'd be ready for that step. You being younger than me, I guess I was worried I'd push you or something."

"You couldn't do that," Valkyrie smiled. "Just look at your little arms. You've got no chance."

"Be serious!"

"I am being serious! I wanted to talk to you about this for ages."

"Say it then."

"I am."

"You haven't though."

"I don't want to."

She laughed. "Why not?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. I just don't want to say it wrong and ruin it. That would suck."

"I guess," Nadia conceded, sitting up onto her knees to look at Valkyrie better. "I think I would like to move our relationship up to the next level, but I think I'm nervous about it since my parents might send me to boarding school at the end of summer. I don't want to rush things."

"Neither," Valkyrie said quickly. "But, we don't need to move into, like, full-on sex or anything."

"No, I'd want to be a bit slower than that," Nadia said with a nod. "But still. I think I'm just overthinking. I don't want to regret anything or for us to do it and then not work out a few days later like so many people."

"We're not like other people. You mean the world to me. I love you so, so, so much, Nadia," Valkyrie said with as much conviction as she could in her voice. "I'd do anything for you if I could. We are not going to break up right after we do anything. We're not breaking up until we've tried every option and we're good and ready. That time is nowhere near us."

She nodded. "Thank you. I love you too. So what type of moving up are we doing if we're not going up to sex level?"

Valkyrie held her breath and decided to be bold – she leaned forwards and kissed Nadia softly, opening her mouth and letting their tongues dance. Being slow and gentle, she pushed Nadia down on the bed and continued to kiss her, moaning into Nadia's mouth.

She lowered herself onto Nadia's body, their covered breasts touching, their stomachs resting on one another and legs brushing up against each other. It was so new to Valkyrie to be on top of someone, at least without fighting them, but at the same time, it felt so comfortable.

Nadia moaned as Valkyrie trailed her hand over her bare side, the skin flicking as her muscles reacted to being touched by someone else so intimately. Valkyrie's mouth trailed over Nadia's neck as she stroked her abdomen and the elastic edge of her shorts. Nadia's breaths came out short and rapid, her legs tensing around Valkyrie's.

"You've got too much clothes on," Nadia whispered to Valkyrie. "I want to see more."

Sitting up, Valkyrie unbuttoned her red shirt and let it fall off the edge of the big bed, then looked at Nadia who smiled and she pulled the spaghetti strap top off too, revealing her own dark grey bra. Sitting up, Nadia reached out and stroked Valkyrie's badly scarred stomach, tracing the faint line of the developing muscles there. Her scars were on show for the first time in real life and Valkyrie almost felt self-conscious again, but Nadia barely acknowledged them, focusing on her shape and muscles instead. It was so amazing to suddenly feel this... perfect, womanly, even sexy.

"Will you take your trousers off?" She asked, looking Valkyrie in the eye.

Valkyrie did, she had to do what Nadia asked, it was some sort of driving need in her, and they too were discarded on the floor to show her matching pants. Nadia practically tackled Valkyrie onto the bed, rubbing their nearly nude bodies together and kissing each other with more vigour. Nadia was more forwards that Valkyrie was, kissing straight down the middle of her breasts and to her stomach. The familiar feeling of being wet flooded over her and all those other feelings of nerves melted away with Nadia's kisses. Nadia trailed a finger over her pants and Valkyrie lifted her hips, letting her girlfriend pull them off.

Sitting up, Nadia looked Valkyrie over, naked apart from her bra and staring at Nadia with lust filled eyes. "You are so pretty," she said, running a hand up Valkyrie's leg and gently pushing them open to sit between.

"You need to make it equal too," Valkyrie said, pushing up on her elbows.

Nadia smirked and pulled her shorts off before falling onto Valkyrie and they rolled around, rubbing their skin together and getting light feels of each other's folds on their legs at the moved. Valkyrie made the first move this time, putting a hand between Nadia's legs and softly – very, very softly – brushing over Nadia's clit, watching as Nadia's eyes closed and she moaned, pushing her body down for more contact with Valkyrie.

That moment of first intimate bliss between them set something off, and they spent so much time exploring each other with their hands, moaning and kissing forgotten as they enjoyed their own pleasure and listening to the other.

Valkyrie crept towards her orgasm quicker than she ever did alone, Nadia's thin fingers rubbing her and playing with her clit better than she'd imagined in all those nights alone in bed, and she worked hard to bring Nadia there too, groaning like crazy as Nadia slowly pushed her fingers in and out of her pussy and began to scissor her fingers until she could slide three in, suddenly kissing her lips as she moaned and her clit throbbed with pleasure beneath Nadia's other hand.

She was almost dripping wet and had completely stopped touching Nadia to fall on her back, arching her spine as the pleasure rolled over her again and again. She had to bite her hand to stop herself shouting, her body tensing until she came all too soon in a way she never had before.

God, she loved this girl.

She rode the high for just a little while before grinning and flipping them over to Nadia's quiet laugh. It was a lot easier to focus on Nadia now her needs were a tinsy bit more sated. It took longer but it was good for Valkyrie who quickly became addicted to the sounds and smells of Nadia, who clenched the sheets and arched her back, or would spread her legs for Valkyrie to thrust her fingers but would kick them in pleasured frustration if she slowed down. As Valkyrie kissed down the inside of her girlfriend's thigh and used both hands on her, Nadia came with a small cry. Valkyrie continued, like Nadia had, until her girlfriend practically went slack on the bed and with a light kiss on the crease of her thigh, Valkyrie crawled to hover over Nadia.

"I love you, Val," Nadia said, her forehead sweating.

"I love you too," she replied, kissing her nose. "I'm not sure what we're meant to do now."

"Probably kiss," she whispered. "But I really want to clean my hands. It's kind of sticky."

"Agreed."

It might not have been a crazy romantic afterglow, but Valkyrie knew she'd remember those moments forever, regardless of whether they called it touching, sex or whatever else, she just loved every part of it. Every part of Nadia. Her heart practically stuttered when she watched her move into the bathroom naked, hips swaying and wet hair messed up.

"It's strange," she said as they washed their hands.

"What, that we've still got our bras on?" Nadia laughed, looking at their reflections in the mirror.

"Yes. But also that we're so, like, young, but I feel so sick of waiting. I just want to move in with you and live together forever. We could eat chocolate strawberries and bacon on the bed and talk all day."

"And then touch each other all night," Nadia finished with a grin, hugging Valkyrie. "I think it's weird how much taller than me you are. Look! You're almost a foot taller than me. How tall are you?"

"I'm five foot eight or nine. And you're basically five four."

"No! I'm five five _and_ a half. I'm still tiny though!" Nadia complained. "And you're so much stronger than me."

"You could work out," Valkyrie suggested.

She grimaced at her reflection. "Exercise? My efforts stop at tennis and swimming on holiday, thank you. Maybe a little running but I'm not good at that. And anyway, I like it. Look, if I stand in front of you – you have to be, like, two inches wider than me in the shoulders!"

"Hey, I'm just big boned," she said with a grin, kissing the top of Nadia's head.

"Don't do that, I look like a child," Nadia complained.

"You don't act like a child," Valkyrie smirked. "Much."

Nadia snorted and kissed Valkyrie. "I'd love if you spent the night."

Valkyrie kissed her a few times and leant back. "I'd love to too. But I don't want to ruin it getting caught in the morning. If I go, I can come back. If I'm caught, I'll be hung, drawn and quartered by your parents."

"True that," Nadia conceded, and helped Valkyrie pack a few things back in the basket and collect her clothes. After a final brush of her hair, Valkyrie kissed her goodnight and stepped out of the window into the rain and wind of the night, leaving only her jacket behind for Nadia to wear.

It was a long, but nice, walk to an area she could get a taxi from, which dropped her back at the mansion. It must have been three in the morning, hours since she left that evening, but several lights were on and waiting.

She sighed, knowing what was coming, but still hopeful. She very, very carefully unlocked the door and walked into the house.

No sound was made but she was sure they were there. She quietly closed the door. She had expected someone to accost her at the door. She dropped the basket and kicked off her wet shoes and threw the raincoat to the ground as silently as she bothered since she was sure they were only quiet to spy on her and ducked her head into the living room.

Literally everyone was sitting there staring with big grins.

"Oh, my God. You guys need to get a life," she said, grinning back. "Are you waiting up for me?"

"Yes," Tanith said with a shit-eating grin. "So. Why were you gone so long?"

"I was visiting Nadia. You all know exactly why I was gone, don't play with me," she said brushing some hair out her face. "You act like you don't already know."

"Yeah, but what happened?" Gracious, one of the Monster Hunters, asked from the edge of his seat with his more reserved partner Donegan and Fletcher.

"We spoke for a while," she said, leaning on the doorframe. "Nadia's friend is pregnant."

"The one that had that scare a few months ago?" Tanith asked.

"No, a different one," Valkyrie said. "Honestly, her friends are stupid. And Nadia's parents have turned into crazy anti-Valkyrie Nazi's. Her mum won't talk to her until Nadia says all this was my fault or some rubbish, so Nadia isn't eating much because she doesn't want to see her. She ate most the food I brought over."

"Anything else?" Aurora asked with a grin.

Valkyrie pretended to think about it. "Hmmm, nothing that's any of your business," she said sweetly to the group. "You're all overgrown children, you know that?"

"But the details!" Aurora whined.

"There are no details," Valkyrie said with a laugh, looking at all the crestfallen faces. "And even if there were, I'd hardly tell my family and a bunch of relative strangers."

"Harsh," Gracious said with a big grin. "I say all sorts of uncompromising things happened."

"Agreed!" Snake said immediately, one last pack of biscuits in his lap.

"Sure, sure," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "You speculate all you want. I'm going to bed."

She left to cries of disappointment but by the time she was in her room, she was giddy with excitement at the thought of how well the night had gone.


	64. Breaking up

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 64**

**_Three weeks later_ **

"No changes then?" Valkyrie asked.

"None," Nadia said from the mirror, brushing her hair into plaits for bed. "I think they've chosen the school I'm going to but they haven't told me. Daadii is coming to babysit while they look at it in person, wherever it is. They're getting a plane and going for a week, that's all I know."

" _Who's_ coming to babysit?" Valkyrie asked.

"My grandmother," she sighed. "She's lovely until she's mad. And she gets really, really mad when anyone she considers a child disobeys, and I definitely class as a child. I'm not looking forward to this. I don't think you can visit so long as she's here."

"Is she just coming for the week?" Valkyrie asked hopefully.

"No, she's staying for two weeks after my parents get back."

"How long until they ship you away?"

"Three and a half weeks." Nadia got up, went over to the bed and sat down. "I might only get to see you one more time."

"Baby, don't say that," Valkyrie whispered, coming up behind her and rubbing her shoulders. Nadia relaxed into her and Valkyrie tried to work out the tense muscles. Nadia had lost a little weight since she had stopped talking to her mother and it hadn't gotten better since. She was eating, Nadia had reassured her, but it wasn't a good situation either. She kissed her shoulder. "I will see you. I'll travel to France or Africa or India or wherever they take you and stay there. I promise. I'll visit you and be with you as much as I can, and we can talk every morning and night, and I'll send you cards and letters, and presents and flowers. I'll do anything to keep you happy and remembering me."

"Val," she said, turning in her arms. "I'm not going to forget you. I'm going to miss you, but I won't forget you."

"You say that now," Valkyrie said quietly, grim sadness on her face, "but soon you'll be in a private fancy school with all these pretty fancy people with all their money and prettiness and they'll all be in skirts all the time and you won't get to see me very much. Everybody says that those things tempt people. They all do. And then you'll forget all about me and I'll never see you again except with some pretty, fancy girlfriend with loads of money and it won't be fair at all."

She glared at her. "So you think I'll just throw you away because some other girl is standing near me?"

"No–"

"That's what it sounded like."

"That's not what I meant."

"It's what you said."

"No, I meant that I'll not be there and they will–"

"And that I'll be disloyal and cheat on you. Or that I'll decide you're not worth it after two and a half years of dating. Is that it? Is that really how little you think of me?"

"No! I don't think that at all! But it's what they say and I don't want it to happen," Valkyrie pleaded. "I love you, Nadia, I just don't want to lose you."

Nadia lost the fire in her glare and her eyes filled with tears. "I'm sorry Val. I love you too. I just hate all this so fucking much. I don't want to leave."

Valkyrie bundled her into a hug and pulled her on her lap. "I'll make it better. I promise. I'll do anything."

"The only thing you can do to make it better is to make me not go at all," she cried, beginning to sob again. "I hate crying!" She cried.

.*****.

**_Two weeks later_ **

Valkyrie sat with Tanith in the girls' room, Tanith carefully painting Valkyrie's fingernails in a light pink.

"What should I do Tanith?" Valkyrie asked.

"You should calm down," Tanith told her, concentrating on painting. "You've been stressed and worried about this for weeks. If you're not careful, Skul's going to take you off of cases."

"I'm trying," she grumbled. "It's not that easy. We still don't know where she's being sent and I haven't seen Nadia in ages."

"You saw her two weeks ago. I remember you coming back and throwing a tantrum."

"I did not throw a tantrum."

"You literally stomped your foot and threw yourself on the ground and Skulduggery dragged you upstairs to your room and you threw all your stuff on the floor. I'm pretty sure that's a tantrum."

Valkyrie said nothing.

"See?" They were silent for a few minutes until Tanith had finished the last coat of colour and screwed the brush into the bottle. "You could always go to finishing school with her."

Valkyrie grunted. "I'm a year younger. I need my GCSE's to go and I could get some now, I guess, but I need all A's and A stars like Nadia. And I'm not sixteen."

"I thought they did numbers now?"

"Beats me. But she got all the top scores for her tests, and she knows three languages, and she can do a bunch of sign language, and she can do some really advanced magic. I don't know a lot of what she knows and all my magic is aimed at combat. She can do all those little things, like healing magic, and money counting and stuff."

"You could learn."

"Yeah, but she'll be gone a year anyway, and by then I'll be old news," she grumbled.

"Do you really think she's going to forget you?" Tanith asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

Valkyrie sighed. "I have no idea. I don't know Tanith. I don't want to know. I don't want her to go at all."

.*****.

**_One week later_ **

Valkyrie waited behind a cluster of bushes in a neighbour's front garden, waiting for Nadia's grandmother to leave. She looked like a spry woman, with a strong resemblance to Mr Vinay, her son, who seemed to have all of her features except her jawline which was more angular on her. She was aged, with wrinkles and wisps of grey hair poking out of her headscarf that likely had some religious or cultural significance Valkyrie was ignorant of.

She tightly hugged her daughter-in-law, and Valkyrie noticed she seemed to be a very severe, strict woman who likely had been incredibly vigilant over Nadia. Nadia herself stood in the doorway waiting for her parents to say goodbye. She was in similar clothes to her grandmother, but without any headscarf and a purple dress down to her knees. Her hair was done up tightly in a bun.

She was tired, with dark enough bags under her eyes for Valkyrie to see across the street, and she looked anxious and uncomfortable, holding her stomach.

It took a long while, but soon enough the elderly lady had left in her taxi and the small family went back inside.

Valkyrie gave them a full minute before she snuck out of the garden and around to Nadia's room, sneaking in the window once again. She rolled under the bed quickly in case anyone else decided to join Nadia in her room.

As it was, she lay under there for a long time, long enough to complete a few levels on a game on her phone, before she started hearing shouting from downstairs. She put her phone away and tried to listen but couldn't make out the words. After ten minutes, Valkyrie nearly jumped in her hiding place as the door was pushed open and slammed shut.

It was opened immediately after by Mrs Keena and Mr Vinay. Valkyrie's heart thudded in her chest.

" _You will not slam doors in this house, young lady_!" Mrs Keena shouted at Nadia.

" _Sorry_!" She shouted back angrily.

"Don't you give us that attitude," Mr Vinay said as a deadly calm level. There was a silence in which Valkyrie was sure a lot of glaring was happening before he spoke again. "I have half a mind of sending you on that plane with her so she can teach you some manners."

"I did use my manners. I've been polite, courteous and good this whole time she's been here. I've done everything she's said. I've worn everything she told me to. I've eaten everything she's cook and helped with every meal. I listened to every word she said. What more do you want?"

"I want you to show some respect!" He told her. "This is the exact reason we need to send you to this school. Do you think we want to do this? Do you think we want to not see you or talk to you for months?"

"It'll be no different to living here," Nadia sneered. Valkyrie didn't dare move a muscle. "We barely speak and I don't get to say anything even when we do. You might as well send me there forever. I don't want to see you for a long, long time!"

" _Don't_ speak to us like that!" Mrs Keena said. "You _will_ enjoy this school. It's a very good school. You can meet a lot of good people, honest people, make some good connections. You have a long life to live, Nadia, and I expect you to live it well!"

"I was living it well," she said, emotion in her voice. "I had friends at school, good grades, a girlfriend and a future. Now what do I have? All my friends think I've been ignoring them for months, I never see my girlfriend and I've been too stressed over this to do a single bit of studying. All those things were making me a great future, one that I wanted to do, one that I would have enjoyed! I don't want to leave all that!"

"You'll make new friends," Mrs Keena said certainly, obviously trying to be convincing. She certainly seemed to have herself convinced. "You'll make better friends, sorcerer friends that can stay with you for life. You can find someone else to date, Nadia, and at any rate, you shouldn't be doing any of that until you've finished school."

"Can't I decide what's best for myself?" She asked with exasperation.

" _You don't know what's best for you_!" Mrs Keena shouted suddenly, and stormed out of the room, down the hall and slammed her bedroom door shut much like Nadia.

There was a long, long silence.

Finally, Mr Vinay spoke. "You will forget about that girl, Nadia. She might be nice now, but she'll only grow more brutish over time. She'll break you and your heart, and don't think I'll have any sympathy for you if you do this to yourself. We're trying to protect you."

He left the room, shutting the door softly behind him. Nadia stood there and when Valkyrie was sure no one was coming back, she pulled herself from under the bed. Nadia looked at her with tears running down her cheeks, not shocked or surprised.

"I don't want to do this anymore," Nadia whispered, looking away and at the floor. "I don't want to do any of this."

Valkyrie slowly wrapped her arms around Nadia and held her tightly. "We have the day together. You could come to mine?"

"They'll know I left," she said despondently. "I – just go Valkyrie. You should go home."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I love you but I can't do this anymore," she cried, sobbing into Valkyrie's shoulder and holding her tighter. "I don't want to fight about these things. I want to pretend like everything's fine."

"We can do that," Valkyrie said quickly. "We can pretend like we split up. We'll tell everyone we did, I'll even tell Crow and Tanith that. I'll visit you in secret."

"How? They're sending me to India. To some tiny reserve by the beach with no one else around but other crazy, isolated girls."

"Fletcher," she said, thinking fast. "He lives with us, rents that room, remember? He can reach you and take you to my house any time we want, and take you back before you get in trouble. I said I'd make this work."

"He'll be spotted," she said, clutching Valkyrie's jacket. "I just – I don't want to sneak around Val. I want to be free and spend time with you and kiss you against the wall again. I want to go on holiday with you and make coffee and go on walks and all those things. But I don't want to lie."

"You said you wanted to pretend?"

"Pretend I'm fine!" She said, bringing her fists around and hitting Valkyrie's chest. There was strength to it and it hurt, but Valkyrie just kept holding the girl. "I don't want to pretend about us. I don't want to do this anymore."

"Baby, no, let's talk about this! They've confused you, this isn't normal. Don't let them pressure you into this," Valkyrie tried desperately. Her stomach felt physically sick and she felt lightheaded. She might have been about to have a panic attack. "Please, what happened while your grandmother was here?"

"Nothing happened," Nadia sobbed viciously. "It was just what they said. Mum and Dad called every day to tell me how stupid I'm being, how horrible I am, how everything is wrong because of you. And Daadii kept telling me all about how good it was before we met. Just everything, Valkyrie, it feels like years have gone by and I can't cope anymore! I don't want to live like this! I – it's too much."

"Come away with me. Run away, it doesn't matter, they'll forgive you eventually. I swear, you don't have to do this."

"Don't be so fucking stupid," Nadia lashed out, shaking her head violently. "Just go away! Go home, I don't want you here anymore. I want this to go back to normal."

"Honey, no."

"I want to break up, and that's final Valkyrie. This is over."

"You really want to break up with me?" Valkyrie asked quietly, her stomach dropping even further. Her knees began to shake and her vision blurred for a moment.

"Yes! I don't want to do this. It hurt so much. It hurts," she said sobbing. "I don't want this anymore."

Valkyrie swallowed the bile in her throat. "We said we'd trying to make it work–"

"That was before," Nadia ground out between her tears. "I can't do that anymore."

"But–"

"No! No buts, this is it! You can't control this like you try to control everything else, you can't buy your way out of this and you can't call anyone for help. This is over. Get out of my house before I shout for my dad. I can't do this with you, it's over."

"I – if you really think this is what you need," she whispered quietly.

Nadia hit Valkyrie as hard as she could in the shoulder, pushing Valkyrie back, and Valkyrie let her go. Nadia started crying uncontrollably and stumbled into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her. It didn't stop Valkyrie listening to her sobs.

Not knowing how to handle it, Valkyrie shut the pain down, trying to feel nothing at all. It worked, a little, and she mindlessly folded the random shirt on the bed without thinking about it. It had little hand-sewn stars in it. Valkyrie put it neatly in the drawer with the others. She carefully made the bed the way Nadia liked, thinking painfully of the three times they had been intimate with each other on it, then quickly shut the memory out before she could cry.

Was it right that she felt violated? That she had agreed to more forward thinking they wouldn't break up until they both wanted to, until it was something they both agreed on, and now Nadia was pulling the rug out from under her. Everything felt wrong. She felt tricked and blackmailed, even though it was in no way logical and she knew it wasn't true, but a part of her felt so utterly betrayed that she didn't know how to look at any of their relationship except with doubt and horror.

Without thinking, she took off her protective jacket and folded it into the suitcase in the corner of the room and left it there to go with all the other clothes she'd left at Nadia's house. In case the needed it.

She left to the sound of Nadia's sobbing, not daring to look back.


	65. Soul Catcher Thief

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 65**

Valkyrie got back to her house, numb and cold, and did what any other self-respecting fifteen year old would do if they'd just been dumped by the girl they loved – she purged the ice cream, found a big spoon and ignored her family.

They didn't follow her but Valkyrie didn't bother to think about it. She went to the girls' room upstairs and sat alone watching television and eating as much in each mouthful as possible to prevent her from sobbing even if tears did fall from her eyes.

She had finished two whole pint-sized ice creams and felt a little ill when Tanith came looking for her. She took one look at Valkyrie with her red, blotchy face, glum eyes and ice cream smothered mouth and knew exactly what was wrong.

"Aww, Val," she said, coming in and wrapping her arms around Valkyrie. "It's alright. It's going to be okay."

.*****.

The last week of the official summer holidays left them far behind, and although she thought often of Nadia and wondered what she should do, Valkyrie's pain eased over the months enough for her to work without suddenly breaking down in the car or randomly hugging someone for comfort. Her sixteenth birthday passed with a flurry of presents and on Nadia's seventeenth birthday two months later, Valkyrie tried not to cry.

She still bought and wrapped her a present though. She didn't have the guts to send it to her.

Christmas came up on them quickly and Valkyrie did her best with Nadia's birthday behind her to enjoy the season. She helped with the tree, she joked and laughed, she went swimming a lot with Tanith and she helped clean up the dead monsters in the caves to renovate it in the New Year. The last one hadn't been as fun or a Christmas activity, but she liked to think it was a positive help anyway.

But nothing stopped her thinking of Nadia every day and every night. She woke up thinking of her without meaning to, she had dreams about her almost every night. Most of them had turned to nightmares of her leaving her again and again, blaming her for things that were real and fake. She started taking a lot of numbing leaves to help with all her headaches, tried meditating, tried anything. But even with almost four and a half months since their breakup, nothing had yet helped.

"Cain! Pleasant!" Corrival boomed down the Sanctuary hall. "Wreath is at the door and he wants you! Sort him out!"

"What type of sorting do you think he means?" Valkyrie muttered to Crow as they nodded and made their way through the crowds to the front of the castle. It was such a huge Sanctuary – second only to the America United Sanctuary – a common grounds place for all the States to gather in and where the Grand Mage and Elders resided – which was oversized, and Valkyrie had been there to know exactly how oversized and stupid it was.

 _Their_ new Sanctuary was much, much larger than before but was not oversized. Everyone, including Valkyrie, was incredibly proud of it and had a thing about proving the American one was only bigger for stupid reasons. Patriotism.

Crow just grunted and they pushed their way to the front where Raven was indeed.

"Skulduggery," he said warmly, greeting each other with double-handed handshakes which looked very close to hand-holding before they let go and stood just a step away from each other. Valkyrie just smirked at them. "I have a case that I wanted to share with you."

"Of course. Do you want to come to our office?" Crow asked.

"Actually, I think it'd be easier to drive and talk," he said, gesturing for them to go first. They left and went to his car, Valkyrie getting in the back and the two men in the front. "Valkyrie, how have you been?"

"I've been okay," she said. "Going with the flow and stuff. You?"

"I've been well. I am glad to see you again, I haven't seen you since our lesson right before the New Year. Have you been doing the assignments I left you?"

"Yes," she said with a laugh. "I've read three of the seven books and I've been practising a lot. Like, _a lot_ a lot. I feel like the ring isn't able to hold my magic now. Is that weird?"

"If you read the rest of your theory, you'd know," he smirked at her in the mirror. "But yes, it is. I will organise getting a new, stronger ring melded for you. You're just a very powerful sorcerer and a powerful sorcerer needs a powerful instrument."

"If they're a Necromancer," Crow argued. "Any other magic doesn't need it. Because are _normal_."

"Yes," Raven said obligingly, although did roll his eyes. "That is true."

They went to the Temple, a pretty place in a dark, dead way, and Solomon stopped them before they went in. "So this is the case. We've had a break in, and we haven't worked out what they've taken yet. One man, as shown on security, came into the Temple from the front gate at three in the morning last night and went down to the storage at the bottom of the Temple. On his way up he was spotted and fought his way out, killing seventeen Necromancers and injuring twenty-seven more. Most of those were minors as he took the route with our student rooms."

"How many students were killed?" Valkyrie asked nervously.

"Ten."

Valkyrie bit her lip. Did she know any of them?

"Have the bodies been moved?" Crow asked.

"Yes, but I'm heading the investigation, so rest assured I handled it," Raven told him with something like a smile. "It was a butchering. He used just his hands and it was too dark to see his face. He's an Adept, I believe using a Bonebreaking strand of magic."

"A Bonebreaker," Crow muttered. "We need to see the storerooms you spoke about."

They did that, going down to the storerooms at the bottom with side looks of disapproval, approval, anger and all those too strong emotions that came with friends and family dying. The storage rooms, three of them, had been smashed up. "He tried to hide his tracks," Valkyrie muttered, looking in the three rooms briefly as Crow looked over her shoulder. "Do you have a record of what's in here?"

"Yes," Raven said. "But we're still trying to account for everything considering the damage."

She hummed. "What type of stuff do you keep here? Not food. Artefacts?"

"Some," he said slowly, glancing at a frowning man out the corner of his eye. "We keep a lot of things in here, none perishable."

She went into the furthest room and looked around. "He took it from in here," she announced, bringing Crow in from the other room.

"I agree," he said immediately. "The least amount of damage indicates he found what he wanted."

"But what did he want?" Raven said from the doorway.

"We don't know that without a name," Crow muttered looking over the shelves with Valkyrie. "But we can work out what they took, which may be a clue to lead us to a name. Here."

Valkyrie was already looking at it. "Something kind of big."

"How do you know?" Raven asked in bewilderment, coming right into the room.

"See the broken things on the ground?" Valkyrie asked, indicating to the empty shelves and the massive amount of damage on the floor. "Right here there's not much on the ground. Also, look at the shelves. There's dust in the shape of a square here, like something was picked up, but everywhere else the dust is moved from where he's thrown the things to the floor."

"Yes," he said with surprise, agreeing with her. "I see. I can't believe I didn't notice."

Crow turned to the man with the clipboard. "What was placed here?"

The man glowered. "We don't know inventory as of yet–"

"Yes, but what was placed here? I'm not asking if it is still here, just what once was."

He sneered but checked his sheet, flicking through pages back and forth. The three stood with their arms crossed glaring at him but it still took a small crowd and nearly three full, silent minutes before he spoke. "That item is classified."

"Classified?" Raven frowned. "I give permission for these detectives to hear that information."

He glared more. "This item is of the highest classification. It does not even say the name on my sheets. You can only get that information from High Priest Tenebrae."

Raven sighed but nodded and the three made their way to the High Priest's office, which was surrounded by the Cleric's offices. They didn't find him there but did catch him on his way over _to_ his office looking grumpy and irritated as per his usual.

"High Priest," Raven said, bowing. Valkyrie and Crow didn't bow. Valkyrie did gave a nod but that was all it was and she hoped he knew that. "Do you have time for a short meeting?"

He sighed. "Wreath, what is the skeleton detective doing in our halls?"

"High Priest, I brought my friend Skulduggery in to help in the investigation of the attack last night when we hit a dead end on leads. I have been given permission by yourself to bring other detectives in," he said smoothly as they were led back down the hall to Tenebrae's office. "They have successfully found the missing item, however, its identity has been classified by yourself."

"What's the item number?" He asked.

Raven told him.

"Ah, yes," he said, sitting at his desk. "Close the door." They did. "This particular item is top secret, Wreath. However, if Pleasant and Cain are willing to take an Oath of Silence, I would be willing to talk to them. Otherwise, I will have to deny all knowledge of its existence."

"What could you have the Sanctuary doesn't want to know about?" Crow asked silkily. "After all, the Temple and Sanctuary are already on rocky terms. Surely you'd do nothing to jeopardise that?"

Tenebrae glared at him. "Take the Oath or you can forget about it, Pleasant. This is a one time offer, and only because I fear more for the safety of the world than our own treaties."

"We'll take the Oath," Valkyrie said before Crow could ruin it for them.

Tenebrae nodded and they went through the Oath, which was bound to their magic but in no significant way, as that would be illegal – it merely meant Tenebrae would know if they broke it, it held them to nothing. One of two legal oaths allowed worldwide.

"What is the artefact?" Crow asked as soon as the Oath of Silence was finished.

"The Soul Catcher," he told them, tapping his finger on the desk annoyingly. "With the Remnant safely inside it. We got it accidentally – the security was attacked on their way to dropping it off to whatever safe place it was meant to go to and it fell out the van. Neither the assailants or the security saw it, and neither did any inquiries ever happen as to where it went. So we kept it here as, until now, it was obviously safer."

Crow grunted. He said reluctantly, "I'll be asking questions about that. But I suppose you were in the right to mind it, however, it was and is Sanctuary property. You should have brought it forward."

Tenebrae shrugged. "You were obviously not interested in it and we knew the destructive powers it held, as can be told by our joint student her, Miss Cain. So we kept it. Now you know what it is, I expect it to be retrieved and at the very least have this thief and murderer brought to a more… Dead Man style of justice."

"You want us to kill him," Crow stated evenly.

"I am not an executioner," he said, sitting forwards, "but I am old enough to know that there are occasions when it is acceptable to give someone a little of what they paid for. The thief and who he works for should feel that wrath from me. Understand?"

Crow put his hat on. "I'll see what I can do. This sort of case is delicate as it has the deaths of multiple minors. This is also a Sanctuary operation, not a Dead Man mission. But I shall keep it in mind."

Tenebrae nodded slightly at Crow. "That is acceptable. I hope now this can be finished quickly, hum, Wreath? Remember what we discussed."

They took their leave after that, headed out of the Temple and back into the car. "What did you discuss?" Valkyrie asked immediately, looking between the seats at the two men. It was the only time she had to sit in the back.

"It was about you," he said. "All apprentices and learners of the Temple must remain in the Temple until they are at least twenty-five, usually, but you are, naturally, a special case. I have been working to make the High Priest allow you to continue studying Necromancy without staying in the Temple or a commitment to the Temple in any way, but it is difficult. Each member has a purpose and a job they will grow into. You have expressed your wishes to learn but likely not take Necromancy after the Surge. This makes it difficult to convince the Temple as a whole, not just the High Priest."

"What does that mean for Valkyrie?" Crow asked.

"Just that I am fighting on her behalf," Raven said as they made their way to the mansion for whatever reason Crow had decided. "He wishes to acclimate Valkyrie into the Temple and slowly convince or manipulate her into staying. I have said multiple times that Valkyrie shows incredible power and skill, as well as a moderate interest in the theory. However, he would much rather show Valkyrie the more intimate side of the Temple."

"I don't think I want to even know what the intimate side of the Temple is," Valkyrie grimaced.

Raven smirked at her in the rear mirror. "Very funny. The Temple is a family. Every member works together to keep things running, so each person is close to another. The High Priest wants you to feel that first hand in an effort to convince you to become a full Necromancer. Unfortunately, the Clerics came up with a very convincing middle grounds I have had trouble arguing as I would enjoy it myself. They want Valkyrie to stay in the Temple like any other student for a month to experience it and then allow you to decide. They are confident it will work. I would enjoy for you to experience it myself, like I said, but I have been arguing for you at any rate."

They sat in silence for the next half hour of the ride back and stopped under the shelter at the mansion.

"I wouldn't mind it," Valkyrie said slowly.

Crow turned and looked at her. "You wouldn't?"

"I guess," she shrugged, looking at her lap. "It's something different. You always say to try new things. I still want to go with Elemental, or maybe some type of Adept I haven't found yet, but if it's really as nice as Solomon's saying, and he'll be there as my teacher too, then I wouldn't mind. Honestly, I – I need a break from the house. Maybe a reset staying somewhere else with a culture shock is what I need to start feeling better again. You would be there all the time, right, Solomon?"

Raven nodded. "We would have morning classes every day, and we can talk after your other classes, and your weekends are free to spend with me if you'd like. I can organise for you to sleep and live in the room next to my own rather than with the students if you wish."

She bit her lip. "Can I think about it? I'll tell you in a week or so. At least after this case anyway. I don't want to go anywhere until this Remnant business is sorted."

"Good idea," Crow said, brightening up and getting out the car.

"He doesn't like it at all," Valkyrie said quietly to Raven.

"No, I don't think so either," Raven agreed quietly, looking at the man out the window.


	66. Little Miss Lonely

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Dedicated to Lonelygirl702**

* * *

**Chapter 66**

"So we know what this person is, and their sex," Raven said, pointing to the whiteboard in the office with his cane. "I've also told you the general looks of the man – dark, short hair and large. We also know he drives a black van and is likely working for someone but alone. Your brother Anton has also said no one has attempted to attack him or get into the Remnant room in the Midnight Hotel."

"Correct," Valkyrie said, studying it. "Have we got the general direction the van went in? And the description of the van?"

"It's a black van, square in the front and back. There are no other discernible features. They drove out to the countryside so either they meant to go there on the way to their destination or they meant to avoid cameras," Crow said.

"So either their somewhat incompetent as they could have led us to their master, or they're a professional," she stated. "From the killing technique, I'd say professional. Someone who's done this from a young age to choose the discipline he has."

"Agreed," the two men said at once. Raven wrote 'Professional' on the board.

"I'll check the recently released for anyone with this description and also see if there's any record of any visiting mages coming into the country," Crow said, getting his phone out.

"Can I ask how you do that?" Raven said, a frown marring his features.

"Check for visiting mages? There are always lookouts in the major docks and most airports around the country. They're not relied upon, but more so to help spot any well-known criminals and inform the Sanctuary."

Raven nodded and looked as if he were pondering it over. Her stomach growled loudly and Valkyrie told them she was getting food and left the room.

Strolling through the corridor, she considered what she wanted to do. Obviously, she was hungry and wanted food, but what about long-term, or at least for that year? Her mind immediately went blank of answers and she sighed, rubbing her eyes.

There was a bang followed by a thud in a room next to her and Valkyrie stilled. There were no more noises. Creeping closer and hoping she wasn't going to get in the middle of a disagreement, she slowly opened the door and threw it wide open.

Weasel and Wolf stood five feet apart with a table between them. They looked at her, clothes rumpled and sweat dripping down both their faces as well as soaking their clothes.

"Do I want to know?" She asked after a few seconds of silent staring.

Weasel and Wolf looked at each other and seemed to have a silent conversation. Valkyrie crossed her arms.

"Well," Wolf said finally, moving around the table with Weasel to sit on the edge with him. "Me and Saracen have just been doing some adult talking."

"Adult talking?" She asked incredulously.

"Yes, adult talking," he said again, putting his fingers together. "And we came to the conclusion that, well, we will consider becoming a couple."

She let a few moments pass and glanced at Weasel's grinning face and back to Wolf's serious one. "I really can't tell if this is a joke or you're serious."

"I'm very serious," Wolf said, a smirk breaking out. "At any rate, that's what we were adult talking about."

"Suuuure," she said slowly. "You know, I think I'll just let you get back to me on that when you've decided."

"Sounds good," Wolf replied.

"Have fun," she said. "Not too much, mind you."

She closed the door behind her and walking quickly down the hall, not wanting to hear if they decided to 'adult talk' about anything again. Shaking her head, she went to the kitchen and looking in the fridge, finding a good-sized tub of leftover pasta. She put it in the microwave and at almost the same time she took it out and burnt herself, Fletcher popped downstairs barely a foot away from her.

"What do you want?" She snapped, sucking her burnt finger.

He frowned. "What did you just do?"

"I burnt my finger, what's it to you?" She threw the lid in the sink and grabbed a fork. "What do you want?"

"I have a question," he announced, taking a seat opposite her at the table. "I was just thinking, you know I'm renting the big room upstairs now?"

"Yeah?"

"I wanted to know if I could bring people there?"

Valkyrie looked over at him slowly. "You want to ask my permission to bring people home with you?"

"Because of the security!" He said quickly. "You have all that people-finding security, and I wanted to know if I'd blow them up if I brought anyone in!"

"You want to know if you'll blow them up if you have sex with them here?"

"No! Valkyrie, be serious," he hissed at her angrily. "I just want to know!"

She cracked a small smiled but hid it behind her fork. Getting it under control, she nodded thoughtfully. "Well, we could make it so it's safe. But to do that, you'd have to introduce each person so they could be scanned and added to the 'friendly' list."

"Really?" He asked. "I'll have to introduce you to them?"

"That bad, hu?" She smirked at him.

He glared.

"Aww, I'm just kidding. We made sure that room alone could allow people in without setting off alarms. Just make sure they don't leave the room or the alarms will go off, and I will _never_ let that go."

He continued to glare suspiciously. "You mean it?"

"Why would I lie to you?" She smiled sweetly. "It'll be fine, I promise."

He let out a breath of air. "Thanks."

He teleported out and Valkyrie was left to eat in silence with just her thoughts of Nadia in her head. It made her stomach hurt a little so she dumped the rest of her food in the bin and decided a shower was the best thing to do. It was only just six in the evening, but she felt tired after seeing pictures of the injured and dead. Taking a breath and dressing in a different set of protective clothing, she went back downstairs to see Raven and Crow.

At the door, she carefully looked in to see the two men standing incredibly close to each other and talking in soft voices. Nearly sighing, she decided to leave them, knowing they both deserved happiness, even if that was standing in front of murder photos and ideas of where a murderer could be. Weird.

She closed the door behind her anyway and hurried away, wondering what she was meant to do now. Fletcher was likely cahooting in his room, Wolf and Weasel were doing the same or close to it somewhere unknown and she really hoped it remained like that for her eyes, and now Crow and Raven were busy with each other. She decided to try her luck on Panda being at his shop and ran up the stairs to see Tanith.

Unfortunately for her, there were loud bangs and moans going on somewhere down the hall towards Tanith's room that hadn't been there not long ago and with a blush blooming on her face, she ran back downstairs quickly.

Standing at the bottom, her shoulders dropped. It wasn't about sex, just holding each other and the physical closeness. Her body practically ached to cuddle someone and breath in the scent of their hair. Other than maybe Bear, she was the only one with no one to so much as go to for hugs or kisses or whatever she wanted.

Not that Bear couldn't have that. For all she knew, he did.

That made her feel even worse. She was the only one. It wasn't fair.

.*****.

Night came, and Erskine strolled into the mansion whistling a nice tune and sat by Valkyrie in the living room where she was sprawled across a sofa in the dark. He turned the lamp on.

"What's up, Cub?" He asked cheerfully.

"Nothing," she said shortly.

"Doesn't sound like nothing."

"So? You're not my dad, who cares?"

He frowned at her and leaned in. "Hey, what's up? I might not be your dad, but I'll always be your brother. You can talk to me. I promise I won't tell."

She sighed and sat up, feeling bad. "Everyone has someone but me."

"You mean like their dating?" He asked in confusion. "Because I don't know how to break this to you, but I'm not dating, Dexter isn't dating, Saracen isn't, Skulduggery isn't, Corrival isn't, and God knows Ghastly doesn't know how," Snake said with a big grin. "We're all in it together, see?"

She sighed. "But you all have someone to _go_ to. And Crow is kind of dating. Well, not exactly, I don't think. But him and Solomon are getting pretty close and it's only so long before they are, and Wolf and Weasel are essentially dating now."

"They're back at that?" Snake laughed.

"Yeah. And I'm ninety-nine per cent sure Tanith and Panda are dating now."

"Really?"

"Well, I assume so from the sounds I heard earlier," she sulked. "You and Bear can do whatever you want too. Even Fletcher is seeing someone! He literally told me so. So I'm just sitting here not doing anything all evening because everyone else is busy with whoever. I'm not even being weird about it, I just want a freaking hug and I can't even get that."

He patted her shoulder comfortingly. "It's alright, Cub. You know what you need? A rebound. Someone to kiss and have fun with until the pain goes away."

She frowned. "That sounds like a really bad idea."

"Of course it isn't! It's a tried and trusted method, I swear."

She smiled a little but shook her head. "I don't think that's going to work."

He shrugged. "If you think. I could always take you somewhere and you could meet people. You hardly have to sleep with them, just chat them up a bit for fun. You'll bounce back."

She sighed. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's an awful idea and also illegal."

He shrugged. "Maybe. But there's always that under eighteen's club near where you used to live with your mum. I'll drive you if you feel like it."

"I'll keep it in mind."

Snake stood and stretched, showing his lightly haired middle, which Valkyrie took advantage of and began to tickle. He boomed with laughter and she pushed him down and sat on his legs to fully torture him, getting right up his sides and under his pits, making him shriek and beg through his laughs.

"No!" He shouted, trying to pull her off and protect his sides at once. "I give in! I'll tell you anything! Stop! Mercy!"

She laughed so hard at him she had to stop ticking and ended up being hugged so tightly she couldn't breathe instead.

"I love you, Val!" He laughed at her. "I love you sooo much!"

She closed her eyes and hugged him back.

Right in time for the alarms to go off.

Still no real hug for her then!


	67. Shattering defeat

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 67**

Valkyrie, Snake, Panda, Tanith, Wolf, Weasel and Raven all panted as they glared at Divina Marr who sat in the middle of the room tied to a chair. Crow was standing right over her with a somewhat satisfied look on his face. There was no way the Elders could allow her to continue to be a Sanctuary detective now she'd tried to break in, after all.

"Detective Marr," Crow said from behind her. The others quickly moved into position, standing at the doors and windows, allowing Tanith and Valkyrie to stand right in front of her and cross their arms. "What could possibly have made you think it's a good idea to try and break into the residency of the Dead Men and co?"

She said nothing, just spat blood onto their carpet.

Crow tutted. "Breaking in, I can deal with. Breaking that vase, I can deal with."

"It was from Beryl anyway," Valkyrie put in.

"Exactly. Disgusting! But spitting on the carpet? Someone has to clean that now. _That_ is just rude."

Marr sneered. "I have reasons for coming here."

"But not for spitting on the carpet," Crow said, coming around and standing between Valkyrie and Tanith. "Tell me the reasons."

"No."

"Why?"

"I can't."

"Why can't you?"

She said nothing.

Crow hummed and used his magic to pull his armchair over to sit opposite her. "We're going to have to guess, are we? I think you're forgetting that as this is not yet a Sanctuary operation, no one here is being held by Sanctuary rules so we can do this our way." He leaned in. "Or you can tell us what we want and we can put you under Sanctuary protection by taking you in."

She glared at him. "You're all despicable. You shouldn't have that type of power to mess with people's lives. You're still a Sanctuary Detective. You're still Head of the Investigations Department. You shouldn't be allowed to pick and choose when you follow the rules or don't."

Crow tilted his head. "And you don't get to break into other people's homes, but look where we are."

"You arrogant prick. You have no idea why I'm doing this, or else you'd understand."

"Would I? Perhaps if you told me that reason I could make that verdict for myself. So what is it going to take to make you talk? Last time it was the threat of losing your job that made you leave myself and Valkyrie alone, but I think it's fair to say that's worn off. What could I try next? The fact you'll be sent back to America, or at least out the country if you lose your job? The fact you'll never be able to get a Sanctuary job again? Maybe it's your sister, that's still on trial following her aiding and abetting a murder in this country? Or perhaps the threat of having a psychic friend of ours rummage through your head for us is enough?"

She glanced at Valkyrie and Tanith's stony faces and wetted her lips. She looked nervous but no less convinced in her motive. "Get your psychic. They won't find anything."

"Why won't they?" Valkyrie asked her.

She spat at Valkyrie and blood landed on the carpet an inch from Valkyrie's socked feet.

"It's probably worse to make me angry," Valkyrie told her calmly. "Unlike him, the Elders like me and would let me get away with cold murder. So you might want to stop throwing your blood on my carpet and tell me why they won't find anything in that head of yours. Or are you so stupid you forgot?"

"That's not how it should work!" Marr snarled. "A child shouldn't be able to hold that much power. It's not right or safe and everyone is letting you get away with it!"

"Says the woman that used her power to conduct an unwarranted investigation into my activities and then forced me into letting you search my home in an inappropriate way. Is that the sort of things they should allow leniency in? Something tells me the public would prefer a cute kid running around with the backing of their favourite people than some bitch that breaks into children's homes."

Marr snarled but didn't say anything for a pause, so Valkyrie smirked at her. "The public doesn't understand what it needs. I need to make them see."

"See what?"

"That all of you are being given so much leniency it's causing more bad than good. If you lot weren't here unsettling the balance, this country wouldn't have the problems it does."

"Ireland was the battlegrounds for most of the war," Crow said smoothly. "Not only that, but it's a Cradle of Magic. There are many people that still want to upend what we have fought for, what we sacrificed for, to gain a little more power for themselves. Not just other supporters of Mevolent either – other Sanctuaries are ready to pounce on us if we make even one false move."

Marr laughed bitterly. "You think other Sanctuaries want to take your precious Cradle away?"

"Of course. They have for many years. The Sanctuary was very open with all the people and countries when they asked the Dead Men to remain a unit and work on any cases they brought to us. It's to keep a level a fear the Sanctuary alone cannot bring."

"You admit you use fear?" Marr laughed. "I didn't think it would be so easy."

Crow tilted his head to the other side. "Of course. We know we use fear against our enemies. It's not a secret. But we do not do things to raise fear. Mages know our reputation and that is all they need to stay clear of crime in our country. It's why only the worst of the worst come here – they're looking directly for us. But we can always handle them. We stop the majority of murderers and terrorists from trying to destroy our country simply by being here."

Marr didn't look convinced. "You're wrong and so is everyone else. You're nothing special. You just convinced everyone you are. I'll make everyone see."

"See how horrible we are? Is that why you broke in?" Crow asked her.

"No," Marr said.

Out the corner of her eye, Valkyrie saw Tanith half turn around and a bullet hit her in the shoulder.

She growled out her pain and they all turned as Wolf and Weasel barrelled right into a massive man wearing black and a mask. They were thrown back by him and Weasel slumped on the floor unconscienced.

"He's the Bonebreaker!" Valkyrie shouted, the little glint of the mask reflecting just like it had in the Temple's security camera.

They all backed off and he slowly walked into the room. "Dead Men," he said slowly, coming to a stop just inside. Wolf slowly got up behind him but they all kept a good distance to escape his magic. He had a Russian accent. "The basilisks in a world of headless geese. It is an honour."

"Why are you here?" Crow asked quickly, pulling the trigger of his gun back.

The Russian looked at Valkyrie. "I have orders."

He came up so fast on her Valkyrie couldn't so much as take a step back before the Russian tapped Valkyrie very, very gently on her sternum right above her heart. It blew the air from her lungs but her jacket took the worst of the blow.

Tanith pushed him back with a kick and the others threw their power straight at him, bullets, purple energy, fire, air, and punches all hitting him at once but he was merely rocked left and right and punched Valkyrie so hard without magic he broke her collarbone anyway.

Valkyrie fell to the floor and shuffled away from the frenzied fight. Catching movement, she saw Marr was struggling out of her shackles and had very nearly scrapped her skin off in an attempt to get them off – and it was working.

Growling against the pain, she jumped on the woman and they both went down, Marr screaming her pain when her arm got caught between the chair and floor with both their bodies pushing on it.

It didn't have the effect it needed though and Marr punched her bloody fist into Valkyrie's eye with a pained cry. Rolling off the woman, Valkyrie gathered shadows to herself and flicked them to the slowly rising Marr, throwing her halfway across the room. She'd have thrown her about more, but Crow was thrown into her and they both tumbled across the floor in a tangle of limbs.

"Get off me!" Valkyrie growled at Crow and he got up with a deep groan. She attempted to get up but the fractured bones ground against each other when she tried. She screamed in pain and fell back to the floor, breathing heavily through her teeth. Crow reloaded his gun and was shooting, and the alarms went off again when the window was smashed by Marr. Crow ran after her and Valkyrie forced herself to sit up against the wall and watch as the Russian used his magic on Panda, making his scream and fall to his knees as a mess of broken bones and blood. Tanith swiped at him with a war cry, fainting, and swooping to slice his leg right open.

He shouted in pain and moved back towards Valkyrie.

"Let him go!" Bear suddenly shouted. "Let him go!"

They held back and the Russian ran and jumped out the same window as Marr, making his getaway. Those who could ran for the window - Valkyrie had a view from the floor - and watched him go, running straight for Crow and picking Marr up and throwing her over his shoulder before Crow could get her away from him. She shouted at the man but he ran faster than Crow could and he stopped trying when he saw the rest of them looking from the window.

As he made his way back to the mansion, the rest of them took note of what had to be done, and Snake used his magic to lift Panda and take him to the car.

"That was a shattering defeat," Tanith muttered darkly next to Valkyrie in the van.

"You can say that again. We don't even know what they want, other than to kill us all," Valkyrie said, chewing a leaf. Looking over Panda's broken, barely alive body, she grabbed Tanith's hand and held it tightly.

"Don't worry," Tanith whispered, closing her eyes tightly. "It's okay. It's going to be okay. Ghastly will be alright."

"Will he?" Valkyrie asked as unwanted tears filled her eyes.

Tanith just rested her head on Valkyrie's shoulder, acting more anxiously than Valkyrie had ever seen her.


	68. Tanith, Torment, Tesseract and... Craven

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 68**

Valkyrie sat with Tanith in Kenspeckle's hospital, holding her hand silently and waiting for the pain to recede after Kenspeckle had smooshed around her bones getting them back in place. It was an easy fix, thank goodness, but painful even with the leaves. Tanith was equally in pain, though hers was worse and she held it in so much better, though she was far more stressed than Valkyrie.

Everyone was healing slowly. Civet and Stentor had helped them all, got them all feeling a lot better with drinks and snacks and blankets and bright smiles, but so long as Panda was battling for his life under Kenspeckle's careful hands, none of them could relax.

Tanith closed her eyes and lay her head on her knees. "I don't feel well," she muttered.

"Do you want some leaves?" Valkyrie asked in concern. She had refused to take them but now her stubbornness was getting a bit stupid for Valkyrie's liking. "You haven't taken any yet."

She shook her head, making her pretty, dark blonde hair fall over her face. Valkyrie shuffled closer and put an arm around her.

"Can I do anything to help?" She whispered. "I won't ask any questions or anything."

"What makes you think I don't want to talk?"

"The fact you're not doing it," Valkyrie stated very, very quietly. They were alone in the ward but the door was open and the others were sitting silently just behind it. "You know you can trust me. I won't say a thing to anyone at all if you want."

"I don't have anything to hide," Tanith said moodily, looking away from Valkyrie.

Valkyrie bit her lip and decided not to bother her sister. They hadn't had the chance to really talk about her and Panda's relationship but Valkyrie knew – obviously and unfortunately – that they had gotten pretty serious with each other unless they were going for the opposite, completely fooling-around type of relationship, but she was sure Tanith hadn't wanted that.

She sighed internally. She'd been so wrapped her in her own slog of unhappiness she hadn't spent time with Tanith and now she didn't know what was going on with her relationship or emotions. She was turning into a bad sister and made a vow right then to be better.

Her stomach growled. 

"I'm going to get something to eat. Do you want to come too? They're going to be at least an hour," Valkyrie told Tanith, standing but not letting her hand go. Tanith said nothing. "It might help you to get some fresh air."

Tanith sighed deeply but did get up. They left and went for a walk around to the shopping street and went into the little café they liked that stayed open really late. Tanith sat down at a table without saying a word so Valkyrie ordered her a milky tea and sandwiches and herself a panini and coffee. She sat down opposite Tanith with their drinks.

"Thanks," Tanith muttered. She rubbed her head. "I feel awful. I can't work out why."

"You mean other than the fact you were shot?"

She waved her hand. "That's nothing. I just can't get why I have such an upset stomach. I was fine earlier but then we had the fight and my stomach's hurt since."

"It's probably just a bug," Valkyrie suggested kindly. "I mean, you never get sick, so you've probably just caught _all_ the bugs _all_ the little kiddies are spreading _all_ at once. Have you been around any children lately?"

Tanith smiled bitterly. "I save one from being thrown over a bridge."

"See, that's it," Valkyrie grinned, sitting up as their food was brought over. "It infected you with all the child germs and now you’re sick. This is at least three years' worth of sickness. You're bound to feel terrible. I wouldn't even be surprised if you threw up. Kids are always doing that."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm sure it won't be that bad."

"I bet it will be. But don't worry, it'll be over soon," Valkyrie told her and tucked into her sandwich. “Nice to bring you down to human level.”

"Thanks, sis," Tanith smiled and started her own food.

They ate in silence and when they were finished, Valkyrie stirred her coffee and saw Tanith was a little better even in the horrid yellow lights.

"So," Valkyrie smirked. "You and Panda are getting on very, very well."

Tanith groaned and started laughing. "If you say you heard something–"

"Oh, I _definitely_ heard something."

"No!" Tanith laughed, kicking Valkyrie under the table. "Cow."

"It's hardly my fault!"

"It is now." Tanith took a sip of her tea and leaned in. "We've gotten really close."

Valkyrie grinned massively. "I had a feeling. Are you, like, properly dating?"

"I think so, but we haven't said anything to anyone. He made me dinner a few weeks back and it was like, immediate. As soon as we started talking all of those little feelings I was considering just came to life and I'm absolutely certain on him. I think we could really be onto something."

"Like, forever type of on to something?"

"I don't know," she admitted. "But at this point, I am kind of hopeful. He's been amazing. It's kind of why we moved up to sex so quickly."

"Aw, don't say it out loud!" Valkyrie whined. "That's my brother."

Tanith kicked her again. "Stop being a baby! I know what you and Nadia got up to!"

Valkyrie's smile lost its sincerity.

"I'm sorry," Tanith said, holding Valkyrie's hand. "I shouldn't have said that. It's kind of too soon still, isn't it?"

"No, it's okay," Valkyrie said sipping her coffee. "But we didn't go that far anyway. Since we already knew she was going away and stuff."

Tanith frowned. "Really?"

"Yeah. I mean, we didn't do _nothing_ , but we wanted to wait until we were certain of the future," Valkyrie said quietly. "But it doesn't matter now, I guess. Come on, we should probably get back."

**.*****.**

**_Tesseract's POV_ **

The Russian man, Tesseract, slowly perused his masks lining the inside of his van. He wasn't sure how he felt about today, probably because there was an angry, impatient, passed out woman in the passenger seat he had drugged to sleep. With the slightest creak of leather, he picked out a frowny face, something that looked almost confused but mostly angry. Switching it swiftly with the other, he attached it to the hooks in his face and made sure it was secure before going to the front and injecting the antidote to the sleeping poison he'd given the Boston woman.

He frowned at her behind the mask. He knew why he was confused and angry now. He was stuck with her and he had no idea why or how long.

But money was money and he opened her door and booted her out as she started fluttering her eyelids.

He didn't wait for Her Annoyance to stop stumbling, just went into the dingy, horrid bar and looked around. Other than the irritating little man, Scapegrace, at the counter that liked to brag about his kills, it was empty. Ignoring that same man, Tesseract opened up the hatch and went straight down into the dark, nasty little hole.

"Tesseract," The Torment said in his gurgled, barely used voice. "Did you kill Ravel?"

He said nothing for a long moment, thinking of how to phrase the answer. "The mission was compromised. The American entered ahead of time and alerted the whole house. I could not kill him. But I may have killed the scarred one."

" _May_. _May_ have killed the scarred one," The Torment said, coming a little out of the shadows. "You do not know?"

He hesitated. "No. The mission was compromised and I had to save the American, as per your instruction to keep her alive."

"Not at the cost of killing the Dead Men!" The Torment screamed.

There was a long silence and the American fell down the stairs into a heap at Tesseract's feet.

The Torment came forwards slowly. "No, no. No," he was muttering to himself. "No. I shouldn't kill the Russian. Kill the incompetent."

He began to shift to his Spider form.

**.*****.**

**_Craven's POV_ **

Cleric Craven held his breath as the Remnant searched through the future in Finbar Wrong's body, seeking out a future in which the brat Cain was Death Bringer. He knew it wasn't true. Wreath was just trying to cause attention. But perhaps there was _a_ future, somewhere, where there was a Dead Bringer, someone real and vibrant and obedient…

The Remnant infested man started to bleed from the nose and grinned. "I see the girl," he said. "She is using death magic. She is a young woman, perhaps twenty years of age. She wears a ring. Two rings. A black one and a silver one. She's fighting. There are spiders everywhere."

"But is she the Dead Bringer?"

"So much damage," Wrong grinned blissfully. "So much death."

"From the Dead Bringer?"

Wrong opened his eyes abruptly. "I think I'd like to see this for myself."

Wrong's mouth opened suddenly and the Remnant shot out.


	69. Remnants are free!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 69**

**_Tesseract's POV_ **

Tesseract got back to The Torment's home in the early morning, exhausted and exasperated. The Spider mage was incapable of using a phone and called Tesseract to repeatedly tell him what to do, greatly increasing Tesseracts chances of being recognised or captured as he was constantly coming back to the same place on The Torment’s orders. He eased his mind with the knowledge that he hadn't been to Ireland except to visit when he was still in training meaning no one knew his masks. He had time.

He had dumped the idiot American's body before catching a mere four hours sleep. He was incredibly irritated he'd been ordered to save the woman over getting his kill, and not only that but The Torment had immediately told him that was wrong, and then killed the American anyway. It had been a disturbing pleasure to watch, but exasperating also.

The Torment was standing at the bottom of the stairs waiting, grinning madly.

"The Remnants!" He cackled. "The Remnants! Do you know what the Remnant's mean? The _Remnant's_!"

Tesseract frowned behind his mask. The Remnants were bad news. Bad for business. What use was an assassin if everyone was dead?

"This is our chance, you Russian dunce," The Torment snarled suddenly, disgusting little fangs pultruding from his mouth. "The Remnants have been caught before and can be again, but in the chaos, you will strike. You _must_ kill Ravel this time. You must _crush_ him."

"When?" Tesseract asked blankly.

"As soon as you see the Dead Men have split. Kill as many as you can get your hands on. Those men – the Dead Men destroyed my empire," he said, his face drifting to a distant, far away place. "My perfect, beautiful empire."

"There are women with them," Tesseract stated.

"Women? Wives?"

"I do not know. There is an Englishwoman and a teenage girl. You wish for them to die also?"

"They have joined with the Dead Men," The Torment snarled through his disgusting grin, spraying spit with each word. "They deserve to die."

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

Valkyrie slept in that day, a strange dream swirling in her mind. The light was filtering through her curtains right onto her eyes and she scrunched them without meaning to and the dream scattered away before she could work out what it was about.

Sighing, she threw the covers off her body and got up before she could overthink it and annoy herself. She got dressed quickly and went downstairs, knowing she had a full day of man-hunting ahead of her.

"Hey," she grunted tiredly.

Tanith turned from her place at the sink and gave her a smile. "Hey. You look a bit pale."

"I think you look worse," Valkyrie said, getting the orange juice out the fridge.

"I threw up," Tanith said. "If you hadn't said I would, it never would have happened."

Valkyrie smirked. "I just said it was likely. The bugs did the rest."

She got soppy water flicked at her for her troubles and grabbed a few pieces of fruit, not feeling like anything else, and went to the living room where the others were, including Gordon.

"What are you talking about?" Valkyrie asked, sitting and pealing a banana.

"The Bonebreaker," Gordon said, hovering on the sofa as if sitting. "I believe I know who he may be. I once interviewed a man in Kazakhstan who told me about a man with the exact same description. His name was Tesseract. I don't know if that is his full name, but that's all anyone knew about him. He has to wear masks which are infused with magic to stop him from dying. Too long off, and I mean minutes, he'll die. So long as you can pin him down, all you'd need to do is keep him away from getting any other mask and he'd die just like that."

"I don't think it'll be that easy," Crow muttered, tapping a finger on his knee. "He showed great fighting experience. With Ghastly in recovery and Tanith not feeling well, I do worry about our chances. And we still have to worry about a Remnant being free."

"We don't know it's free," Weasel said in a disgruntled voice, rubbing his forehead painfully. Ever since he hadn't detected Tesseract the day before he'd been overworking his magic and trying to work out if he had a blind spot. So far it simply looked as if he’d "just not seen it". It was a pretty rubbish answer but Weasel had admitted before he didn't understand exactly how his magic worked so they could never be certain of anything even if he did get it right more often than not.

"We have to act for worst case," Valkyrie said quickly. "I say we act as if the Remnant is being used the exact same way it was with me and Kenspeckle. We need to find out what it's being used for before even worrying about Tesseract. It's the bigger problem. One assassin is bad, sure, but the Remnant could cause more damage than him."

Crow nodded. "I think Valkyrie's right. We'll focus on the Remnant, and perhaps we'll get lucky and take down Tesseract in the process. So, who feels like going to China's?"

Valkyrie, Crow and Wolf all decided to go, Weasel deciding to go to Kenspeckle's to look over the recovering Panda, and Snake stayed with Tanith just in case anything happened while she was trying to rest up. Bear had to go set up his hotel for the next few days, as it was about to fun out of places to go and he had no choice but to return. The trip to China's library was short, and it looked as if everyone was driving or busy rushing from place to place.

When they parked outside the apartment complex, Valkyrie undid her seatbelt and they all froze as they heard screeching, cars colliding and screaming. It cut off quickly.

Moving fast, they got into the library and sprinted to the third floor and opened the library quickly.

No one there.

"Something's wrong," Valkyrie muttered to Crow and Wolf.

Wolf pulled her into a hug and kissed her forehead – she could see he was nervous and made sure she kissed his cheek – and Crow pulled his gun out and knocked on China's door.

They waited a moment as Crow checked the air. He nodded. She was there.

A moment later she opened her apartment door.

"China," Crow said. "Why are you hiding?"

"Hiding?" China laughed. "I am not hiding. I was merely busy. Would you like to put that gun away and come in? Oh, hello Dexter, Valkyrie."

"Hi," Valkyrie said.

"Actually, we'll be on our way," Crow said suddenly, grabbing Valkyrie by the arm and pushing her along the hall. They got to the staircase and China laughed suddenly.

"Oh Skulduggery?" She said.

"Go," he whispered to Valkyrie. She started running down the stairs but waited right out of sight with Wolf. "Yes?" Crow answered China.

"It's already started. I do so hope your boy toy stays alive," China laughed and leapt back when Crow started shooting at her.

Valkyrie and Wolf raced down the stairs and almost ran outside before they saw the black streaks that were gliding around the building, blocking them in. "What do we do?" Valkyrie asked sharply.

Wolf looked at her. "Keep an eye on each other. We can never be sure if the other gets infected. Here," he said, reaching around and pulled a gun out along with a spare magazine. "Keep this on you. Do not hesitated to shoot. Even if it's me or your other brothers. We'd never forgive ourselves if we hurt you."

He helped her put it on but she didn't agree to what he said. She knew she'd have to shoot, she was already terrified of the Remnant's, so much so her heart was beating dangerously in her chest. The idea of not being in control of herself, of a disgusting little shadow forcing its way into her body and doing things with her she’d never remember was abhorrent to her.

But at least she knew she had a way of protecting herself against other infected people. She'd aim for their legs – they all wore Panda's specially made shoes or else she'd have done that. Once shot, they'd be useless to the Remnant's and hopefully left alone. And they wouldn’t be dead.

"I might be sick," she said quietly.

"Don't be," he said seriously and held her. Crow felt to the floor in front of them with his jacket in tatters.

"The Remnant's free!" He shouted, and opened the doors to the outside.

They ran.

But they weren't faster than the Remnants.

At least a dozen Remnant's dove at them from the sky, swirling around them. Valkyrie put a hand over her mouth and ran next to Crow into the car, closing the doors. Outside, Wolf was caught in the frenzy, trying to hold them off as they tried prying his arms apart and his mouth open. He looked at them, Valkyrie staring back in horror.

"Drive!" He screamed at them, and a Remnant forced its way down his throat.

Valkyrie screamed as the Bentley screeched and practically flew around the corner at a neck-breaking speed. She knew there was nothing they could do but inside, she wanted to scream and sob and rage. It hurt to leave him behind. She felt like a traitor.

Without saying a word, Valkyrie pulled out her phone and called Tanith.

She never picked up.

"I think Tanith and Snake's been possessed too," Valkyrie told him.

"Call Kenspeckle."

She did and Civet picked up. "Kenspeckle's Hibernian Cinema Hospital–"

"Put it on lockdown!" She shouted. "The Remnants are free!"

"Stentor! Put us on lockdown!" Civet cried. There was a sound of a crash and a humming as the specially crafted wards went down. "Doctor?"

A moment later Kenspeckle came raving and ranting into the room and picked up the phone. "Who is this?"

"It's Valkyrie," she said quickly. "The Remnants have all been let free. You need to stay hidden and don't, under any circumstances, let anyone in. Even if I go there. I'm staying away, so if I come, I'm possessed. Will those wards keep them out?"

"It'll keep every living and dead thing out so long as they're up," Kenspeckle said quietly. "How has this happened?"

"The Necromancy Temple had the one Remnant that possessed you," she said. "But it got free after Tesseract stole it a day and two nights ago. He's the one that hurt Ghastly. Are him and Saracen still there?"

"Yes, they're here. Mr Bespoke is recovering nicely by the way. I will keep both here as long as I can. But I have to warn you – if the power goes out, my wards have a generator, but that will only last for eight hours at most."

"We'll try and get them contained before that. Remember, just don't take them down, let anyone in, or talk about where you are or the wards with anyone at all. I have to go."

She hung up and called Raven.

He didn't pick up. She didn't tell Crow.

She tried the Sanctuary next and someone, not the Administrator, picked up. "Irish Sanctuary."

"The Remnants are free."

"We know," the person laughed.

Valkyrie hung up.

"Tell Fletcher to hide," Crow said as he tried to avoid people in the street running at them and accidentally ran down a possessed person in the road. There was minimal chance that person was now alive. They were probably innocent when they were themselves.

"I'll try. Do you think they've gotten to Australia by now?"

"I would take a guess, and my guesses are usually right," he said, looking out the window, "that they've been free for at least four to five hours. With how quiet they have been slowly possessing people, staying hidden, I don't think they would have reached Australia by now, but Fletcher is one of the two last Teleporters so I'm certain they're looking for him and Peregrine equally. At any rate, we don't know where he's been in the last five hours, he could already be possessed."

Valkyrie rang him and he picked up.

"Hey, look," he said quickly, talking in quiet tones. "I'm kind of a little busy right now."

"The Remnants are free, you need to hide," Valkyrie told him quickly.

"What?" He said. "How?"

"We don't know, but we think they'll be coming for you, you're one of the last Teleporters after all. Just hide. Don't come to Ireland. Stay out of sight. Tell no one, not me, not a mortal, not a girlfriend, not anyone whatsoever, where you go. Just do it. Stay hidden. Okay?"

"Okay – but what do I do with–"

"I don't care who you're with, you cannot get possessed Fletcher, we'll all be fucked if you do! Just hide. There's nothing you can do, they won't even remember when they wake up!"

He swore. "Fine. Stay safe."

"I'll try."

He hung up.

"Is that everyone?" Valkyrie asked Crow. She wanted to call Nadia. Her hands shook and she pressed them firmly into her lap to stop the urge to call her, although she knew Nadia would never answer. Like the other thousand times she’d called at the start of their break up.

"I imagine so," he said, driving wildly and using another hand to bat away the possessed mortals from the road. "This won't be easy to cover."

"Let's just focus on closer problems," Valkyrie said, eyes widening. "Like the Remnant crawling through your window!"


	70. It's a mess

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 70**

Valkyrie woke with a start in the back of Ghastly's van. She groaned, remembering flying out the Bentley at over eighty miles an hour, and Remnants being everywhere.

Her whole body felt bruised and battered. Sitting up carefully, she knew why – she _was_ bruised and battered. Even her beloved jacket was gone, and that had been her favourite with the blood red sleeves!

"What's happening?" She asked groggily. "Have you stopped the Remnants? How long was I possessed? How'd you get the _van_?"

"Erskine drove it with Tanith," Crow said.

"You okay?" Tanith asked, making Valkyrie jump. She'd been so silent next to her, Valkyrie hadn't noticed.

"I feel bruised to hell but I'm okay. Do you actually know why I'm like this?" Valkyrie frowned.

Crow nodded, the back of his skull shining slightly, just visible to Valkyrie around his headrest. "You were possessed for roughly an hour, running around the city and very difficult to catch. It took all three of us to block you in and catch you."

"The Remnants thought if they hurt you enough it would crack Skulduggery and he'd go into a rage," Tanith told her. "They were throwing you around the shop, you nearly went through a wall. We were possessed too but we woke up outside the mansion for whatever reason. I saw Tesseract but he was running away so I suppose he got possessed."

"Weird," Valkyrie muttered.

"Yeah, very. We came to find you and, well, that's when we started chasing you, etcetera."

"Do you know where the others are?" Valkyrie asked.

"Haven't heard from Dexter, I believe the phone lines are down for the Hibernian but I think that's to save additional power. Anton hasn't called either. Fletcher is hiding as you told him to, and if he is possessed, we'll find out eventually anyway. Same story for Peregrine. The Remnants won't give him up if they find him," Crow said darkly.

Valkyrie nodded. "How are we meant to deal with them then?"

"We're going to MacGillycuddy's Reeks," Crow told her.

"But we'll make a stop on the way," Snake said, turning back to smile at her. She smiled back.

They drove on for nearly an hour, Tanith falling fast asleep on Valkyrie's lap looking quite pale – Snake told them she'd been sick twice on the way so she was obviously not feeling better – and when they came to a stop, Valkyrie gently poked Tanith's nose a few times to wake her up.

"You're so strange," Tanith muttered as she gathered herself up.

"Thank you."

They were at a large, flat building in the middle of nowhere. "Hurry," Crow told the girls, and they did, passing through an invisible, cold, forcefield into the area.

"I remember this place!" Snake said suddenly.

"We've been here before," Crow said to no one in particular. "This is the original forcefield Kenspeckle made around an old Sanctuary the first time they escaped. It won't hold long, maybe an hour at most, but it will stop all Remnants, including possessed people, from coming in. I'm hoping some people have decided to join us."

"Detectives, Dead Men, Miss Low," Frightening Jones boomed from the building. He came walking out in an orange top, almost blindingly bright in the dark. At least they had someone, and Frightening also had his sword. "I was quite surprised to find myself waking up in Ireland, but even more so to see you kept this forcefield active."

"Frightening," Crow said, coming in and shaking the big man's hand. "It's good to see you. I'm afraid I didn't actually know if they forcefield was working, and I didn't expect you. Were you the one to activate it?"

"I was. Miss Low," he said, giving Tanith a hug. She looked even paler and a little dazed now. "Tanith, you don't look well at all. You've come down with something horrible."

"She saved a kid and it infected her with all sorts of germs," Valkyrie said helpfully.

"Ah, that would explain it. But this is not good. Not a good night for you to be ill."

Tanith shook her head and rested against him pitifully. She let out a weak moan of pain and almost fell before Frightening simply picked her right up and held her in his arms like she weighed nothing.

"I think it may be a little worse than a mere bug," Frightening said, looking over Tanith's sweaty face. "Tanith, have you been overexerting yourself?"

She nodded.

"I think it best you hide and stay out of the fight," Frightening told her.

Tanith still had the energy to glare at him.

"You know you don't have the strength. I'll put you in the old Gaol room inside, you should be quite safe if you stay still and silent. Here, give your sword to Valkyrie. I'm sure she'll have fun with it."

Tanith glared but did hand it over which Valkyrie knew was all down to the sickness and she'd smack Valkyrie silly in their next training session when she realised what she'd done. Frightening took her away, and when he was back, there was already a swarm of Remnants outside the forcefield trying to get at them, all in human forms and shouting at them to come out.

"What do we do?" Valkyrie asked.

"We need to get them to MacGillycuddy's Reeks," Crow said. "Valkyrie, can you call Fletcher?"

"I told him to hide and not to come even if I said!"

"Call him anyway – actually, there's no need," Crow said, staring into the crowd. Valkyrie looked where he was and saw Fletcher standing there in short and t-shirt, grinning madly with black veins and eyes.

"Idiot."

"If we get him back, we can have him transport everyone to the Receptacle," Frightening suggested.

"What's that?"

"A giant Soul Catcher," Crow said quickly. "I agree, but it'll be work getting him back. Hopefully, a few shots to the knees will do the trick."

"Don't kill him," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "Anything else?"

"We need two pieces to open the Receptacle," Crow explained.

"One," Frightening said, giving half a golden circle to Crow without the crowd seeing.

"Good thinking," Snake said with a big nod.

"Thank you," Frightening replied pleasantly.

"Just one more to go then. I know where it is too. Erskine, you remember we hid it in that church?"

"Yes!" Snake said, snapping to proper attention. "I'll get it and meet you at the MacGillycuddy."

"Good. Go out the back, and we'll hold this lot off. Hopefully we can draw them all in there without them knowing what we're up to and trap them like last time. And it looks as if we only have a few more moments."

He was right – Valkyrie watched as the forcefield started to become more visible, little cracks and holes in it that were growing with every passing moment. She unsheathed the sword, bargaining on her added height to make up for the extra weight Tanith's sword had for the stronger woman, and held herself ready. Thank god for sword training!

The forcefield broke like the shattering of glass, and the possessed people came running at them. She immediately had to start slicing shins and arms, avoiding necks, trying her hardest to get them to back off her. It was hard though, at least a dozen had crowded around her and didn't want to leave. She swung violently, very nearly taking off someone's head, but just managed to stop herself and chopped the poor possessed woman's arm off instead. The Remnant screamed and crawled out the woman's body, which fell to a heap on the floor probably to bleed to death, but it was hardly something for Valkyrie to think of right then.

She ended up dropping the sword and stuck with her handy magic after that, using shadows to sweep several people at once far away from her, and air to dislocate legs instantly, fire to scatter them and then her purple energy to shock them unconscious, the Remnants shooting out each time.

Valkyrie was sweating furiously, her hair all over the place, when a possessed Fletcher teleported in front of her.

"Val," he said, his black lips grinning at her. It wasn't his grin, though, it was a crazed, unnatural smile that held no place on his face. "Where have you put Tanith? I wanted to speak with her tonight."

"I don't know!" She shouted over the fighting. The other Remnant-people had backed off now Fletcher was there.

"Don't you? That's too bad. I'd have enjoyed possessing her," he grinned. "How about I have fun with you instead?"

He punched so fast Valkyrie nearly didn't dodge in time, and she still felt the speed of his fist against her cheek. She tackled him to the ground, hoping to punch him hard enough the Remnant would flee, but she underestimated how much stronger he was with the extra Remnant power.

Fletcher flipped them again and Valkyrie was pressed to the concrete, him punching her again and again, trying to get past her arms to her face unsuccessfully.

A bullet bounced off the ground next to them and Crow ran at them, and Valkyrie was able to flip them and sit on his chest and hold his arms down. Crow shot at Fletcher and nicked the inside of his leg. Fletcher grunted and threw Valkyrie off him, and she rolled as Crow shot again and again at the young man, until finally he shot his shoulder and Fletcher screamed as the Remnant left his body. Crow swooped in and grabbed him, putting him over his shoulder.

"Let's go!" Crow roared into the chaos. Frightening shouted his confirmation and they fought their way to the van, jumping in and driving at a manic speed as the others hopped into cars and started chasing them.

Valkyrie worked on reviving Fletcher tensely – they couldn't be certain Frightening wasn't being possessed and hiding it, and she was sure Crow was worried about her being secretly possessed again even if she knew she wasn't. At least she could be sure Crow was safe.

She prayed Tanith was okay.


	71. What's the cost?

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 71**

Their game plan had been simple – use a massive distraction, helped by Fletcher in the countryside, to gather all the Remnants.

To be fair to Crow, he'd orchestrated it perfectly. The Remnants worked out where they were, decided the placement wasn't dodgy, and all inhabited bodies of all descriptions came to meet them. Hundreds and thousands, perhaps even a hundred-thousand, Remnant-people showed up, and they had to trust it was all of them.

They created a fight, got it so the Remnants were attempting to crush Crow in the middle to see if they could pull him apart, separate him, to make him go into a rage – into Lord Vile, though they never said it.

That part went well also. They expected the attempt to get Crow angry. It didn't work. Fletcher teleported them to MacGillycuddy's Reeks without being possessed, and Snake was already there and turned on the Receptacle without a hitch.

Then the Remnants started screaming. They started lashing out. And they struck in a way they hadn't anticipated.

Valkyrie used her shadows to protect herself, wrapping them tightly around her body with Fletcher next to her, protecting him and herself from the desperate Remnants. Her arms shook and one of her eardrums were bleeding from a punch to the side of the head, but even through the mayhem and the somehow working shield, she still heard Crow scream.

She opened a little peephole in the shield and looked – Crow had an arm extended towards Raven who was passed out and Remnant free on the ground. Another Remnant-man had Raven by the throat and a knife to his temple, threatening to kill the Necromancer. Whatever he was saying was getting to Crow, and his bony hand was shaking.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, shit," Valkyrie muttered, getting the gun out the back of her trousers – not Wolf's, that was gone and lost forever – and wondered what to do.

"What is it?"

"They have Solomon," she said quickly. "I have to help or he'll die."

"You said if you leave me they'll possess me and I could break them out!" Fletcher said in outrage. "You can't just leave and ruin everything we've done! So many people have died already!"

"And so will Solomon if I do nothing!"

"It doesn't matter if he dies so long as those Remnants don't get free!" Fletcher shouted in her good ear. She turned and glared at him nastily. "If I get possessed we're all fucked and you know it! And I can't teleport out without risking bringing one of those things with me! If a Remnant possesses me, I bet they'd kill Solomon first!"

She felt the panic bubble in her and looked back at them. Remnants were shooting and swirling around Crow, all being slowly sucked away but still trying their hardest to destroy him first. She couldn't even see Raven or the Remnant-man anymore, and she couldn't let Raven die! He was meant to be with Crow and make him happy!

She turned and shot Fletcher.

He went down like a sack of flour and Valkyrie made a beeline for Raven and Crow, hoping like hell she could do what she wanted.

She kept the gun close and barged right into the Remnants, who tried to claw at her and hold on. The Receptacle was just at its peak and hundreds were going at once but still there were more around them, and they needed to get the last Remnant's out of the bodies if they wanted them all gone. It was this unknown man or Raven, and she knew what she needed most.

She felt her mouth get pried by the creatures but the machine was too strong and sucked them away before they could possess her, and she finally saw the possessed man, fully black in his veins, eye, mouth, even his hair, as the Remnant strained the keep control. It was playing with Crow and Raven, playing with killing Raven, and she knew what to do.

She shot three times, and on the last shot, the Remnant used its strength to jerk its hand out and stab the unconscious Raven in the neck. She screamed as the possessed man, Remnant as well, fell and died from her bullets. Crow roared and dove through the last of the Remnants and grabbed Raven, holding a hand over the wound and being careful not to pull the blade out as they both knew that would kill him– if he wasn't already dead.

Valkyrie felt suddenly weak and fell to the floor in a slump. How many people had she killed that night? Killed in her own skin, with her own conscience? She watched as the last Remnants were sucked into the Receptacle and Snake came outside and gave them the thumbs up. They were gone. What was the cost? What had they lost today?

The Sanctuary came barely twenty minutes later with Saracen at the head, running straight for them through the sea of bodies. Cleavers started moving the people and mages started setting up a stage and littering beer cans and spraying alcohol everywhere, getting out gas canisters and spraying gas, not enough to be harmful, but enough to keep everyone asleep, and staging it so people thought they'd been at an event.

She watched, even as Snake greeted them worriedly, and him and Weasel helped pry Crow off Raven and get him on a stretcher to the hospital. With a start, Valkyrie started crying as the shock really took over and the three men looked at her.

She pointed at Fletcher.

He was the next to go, and she truly hoped he'd make it. She didn't even want to ask. She didn't want to know. Weasel picked her up and they slowly made their way to the van that was, miraculously, where they'd left it, looking familiar, smelling exactly as it always did, and they sat her gently in the back.

She must have drifted off to sleep, because she woke up in Wolf's arms back at the mansion and he gave her a small, tired smile.

"Solomon?" She asked.

"He'll be at Kenspeckle's by now," Wolf said softly. "Get some rest. You need it."


	72. Visitation

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 72**

Valkyrie didn't sleep much that night.

She kept waking from her nightmares, and each time, she'd work herself up until she was crying and felt sick, and fall asleep with tears on her cheeks, only to wake an hour or less later to repeat the painful dream of shooting Fletcher, shooting that innocent man, of Raven being stabbed. Nadia was a constant presence through it all as well. She'd dream of other people. But every time she closed her eyes her thoughts would be about her. Was she safe? Had she been affected? Had she been killed?

She went downstairs at barely six in the morning, giving up on finding any rest, and almost flinched at her own reflection. She was pale with almost black circles under her eyes, her hair flat and nasty looking. Even her clothes, clean, ironed and stored on hangers until moments ago, looked grubby on her because of how awful she looked. She barely had the energy to scowl at herself but she stood there and took that time to make sure she looked at herself with as much hatred and guilt as she felt and deserved.

After a moment to really feel that emotion, she went back to tired and numb and went to the kitchen.

Wolf and Weasel were there.

"Cub," Wolf said with a small smile. He had his arm over Weasel, massaging his shoulder one-handed and had his phone in the other. "You look like shit."

"I feel like shit," she said, looking at the food already on the table. Her stomach clenched with hunger but she only poured herself a glass of water and sat opposite them. "You don't. You never do."

"I know," he sighed. "I am truly cursed."

"You don't have to make jokes for me," she told him.

He lost his smile a little but he still looked at her with the kind eyes of a big, protective, loving brother. Weasel was smiling a little more, so much more genuinely than he did just a handful of years ago and it was lovely to see. His eyes were brighter. A little dimple was on his cheek. Having family around him so often had helped, it seemed, unlike the more erratic visits before. Plus he had Wolf now, again, so she supposed he felt quite good about himself.

"I just want you happy," Wolf said quietly.

She pushed her glass away from her a little and stared at the table. "Is Fletcher dead?"

"No," Weasel said immediately.

"He's in critical condition," Wolf added. "He's had an operation, but he needs another. Kenspeckle had someone else do some of the work to keep him alive while he worked on Solomon. Fletcher gets his second op in a few hours after Kenspeckle gets some sleep."

"How's Solomon?"

"Delicate but stable. Crow's still with him," Wolf said, tapping his phone on the table. "I've got to be honest, I didn't see that coming. He's hated that man since before I met him. I never knew they dated before his wife."

Valkyrie nodded, though she wasn't sure at what bit. She hadn't known for certain, though she had thought it was kind of obvious. "I'm glad he's okay."

"He is. Fletcher will be too, it'll just take a few more hours," Wolf said caringly.

"He'll hate me."

"He won't."

"I think he will. No, I _know_ he will. I shot him. I shot him from barely a few inches away and blew half his chest off. He's going to really, really hate me."

"I mean, I doubt he's going to _like_ you," Wolf said dubiously, "but I don't think he'll hate you. He'll definitely forgive you one day."

"When I'm dead," she muttered, standing up to pour her barely touched water down the sink. "What am I meant to do? I ran rampant around Dublin and then shot two people, one of them dead, without any Remnant at all. How am I meant to do anything? Neither of them did a thing to deserve it. That man was innocent, he didn't need to die."

"Solomon would have been killed," Weasel said quietly behind her.

She kept looking out the window blindly. "But that didn't mean I should have murdered an innocent mortal."

"You can't put one life above another," he said slowly. "Yes, he died, but he was going to kill Solomon. And then Skulduggery would have killed him. You know he would have. And then he'd have killed every other person in that field. He'd have killed every Cleaver. He'd have killed you, and us, probably."

Valkyrie looked out the window and didn't say or think a thing. It sounds a lot like Weasel knew about Lord Vile. Like he knew what it would turn Crow into if he had to see one more loved one torn from under his feet – but she threw that thought away. It was impossible. Even if it was possible, it was a silent knowledge. Never to be said aloud. She wouldn't mention it.

"He was mortal," she said instead.

"He was about to be a murderer, and murdered," Wolf said with an air of finality. "You saved Solomon's life. The Remnant couldn't kill him outright, and you saved the rest of us from dying, just like Saracen told you. You didn't have a choice and it was the right thing to do. I would have done it too. So stop you're moping and get ready, we need to collect Tanith."

"How is Tanith?" She asked quickly, turning around. "Was she left there last night?"

"No, Erskine had the sense of mind to tell us what happened," Wolf said, standing and grabbing his keys and wallet from his space on the side where most of them lined up their valuables as to not lose them. They'd be screwed if a thief got in the house, though that was an unlikely event now. It still didn't seem safe to her. "She wasn't in good shape, but she hasn't been possessed which is good. Or at least, not when she was left in the old building. We reviewed the camera's to make sure, and everything's fine. Honestly though? I don't think she's just sick. I got her out with Ghastly and Erskine, and she looks like hell. She threw up twice in there, once on the way back, and god knows how many times yesterday before that. I don't think she's got a bug anymore."

"Wouldn't the Remnant have made the sickness worse?" Valkyrie asked as she followed him out the house with Weasel. "I mean, she was already pretty sick, maybe it just intensified it? I can't think of anything that could make her that sick."

"There's always something," Weasel said darkly and got in the car.

They didn't have an answer to that, and Weasel drove Gordon's old car – the car anyone was allowed to drive, unlike certain other cars parked lovingly outside their house more often than not – in silence. They got to Kenspeckle's without a problem, but the signs of the 'riots and other drug-induced violence from contaminated water' were clearly evident on the roads and buildings. It was probably time to work out exactly how to kill a Remnant, Valkyrie thought. She wasn't the one to do it. She never wanted to see one again.

"Valkyrie," Stentor greeted tiredly when she and the others got up the steps. "It's good to see you whole for once. I wanted to thank you for giving us the warning. I – I doubt we would have both made it through the attacks. Thank you."

She smiled at him tightly. "It's fine. It's over now."

He nodded quickly. "Yes, yes it is. Come in then, I bet you want to see your sister, right?"

He led them quickly through the ward to a private room Tanith was being kept in while Kenspeckle had Civet, and only Civet, look after her. No one wanted whatever she'd caught to spread to everyone else, after all, and Valkyrie could only agree.

If Valkyrie looked like hell, Tanith was Dead himself.

She looked almost as if she'd lost weight overnight. Her cheeks seemed hollower, her face and even her hair looked pale, her eyes were tired and there were purple bruises under them. She gave them a shaky smile when Valkyrie came in. There was a beautiful bouquet of flowers on her bedside table.

"I like your flowers," Valkyrie said, coming into the room bravely. Civet left through a door to the lab – as to not infect everyone if it was infectious – to do some tests, and their brothers went to see whoever else there was in the hospital still. "They're very blue."

"They are. Ghastly got them for me," she said with surprising strength to her voice. "He just left."

"Has he been here all night?"

"Yeah. He tried thinking up things I could be sick with too, but we haven't worked anything out. I don't think it's just a bug, Val. It feels different, you know? You know when your body knows what's going on? That's how I feel. But I've never felt this feeling before, and I just can't put my finger on it. It's annoying me."

"You'll work it out," Valkyrie said supportively. "I'm sure Kenspeckle will work it out as soon as he's finished with everyone else."

"I'm sure. Have you seen anyone else?"

"No," she said quietly. "I don't know if I want to yet. Solomon will remind me of killing a mortal, and I shot Fletcher from an inch away, so I doubt he wants to see me very much."

Tanith smiled. "I'm sure he'll forgive you. Once the pain goes away."

"I doubt he'll forget this pain quickly."

"Me either. But he will. He thinks the world of you," she assured her. "Could you help me sit up?"

"Sure." She did that, pulling her older sister gently up in her arms to lean back on a few pillows, reaching under the bed for a few more. When she was happy, she sat down. "So what have you ruled out then?"

"It's not a disease, at least not one they can test for," Tanith recited, drinking heavily from her water. "It's also not a bug bite or any other poisoning from the outside. There also isn't any physical clue, so they want to scan me for an internal swelling or infection or cists or something along those lines, but only Kenspeckle can do that and he's a little busy so," she held her water up, "I have to wait."

Valkyrie nodded. "At least they're trying."

"Yeah, Civet's really nice. He's done at least thirty different blood tests I think."

"Is that healthy?"

"He's a doctor, so probably, yeah," she shrugged. "I'm alright anyway. I just keep throwing up. Gave myself a headache."

Valkyrie smiled at her. "Do you want me to get you anything?"

"No, I'm fine. I'll call you if I get anything back."

Valkyrie nodded and went to see if there was anyone else about that she knew. She wasn't sure why she had tried to convince herself everyone would be really busy or asleep. Almost everyone was awake and slowly healing or else slumped on chairs waiting for friends and loved ones to do their healing. But it was better than thinking, wondering who else could be dead.

Crow and some of her brothers were crowded around at the end of the ward and they waved her over.

She went and saw Raven was awake and smiling in his bed, a bandage around his neck but otherwise healthy. He was no less pale than usual and didn't even have the decency to look tired.

She frowned at him. "You're meant to be just out of an op. How come you're so happy?"

"I like treeees," he laughed. "Woosh!"

"Solomon has been put on a few drugs," Crow said calmly.

"Hold my hand," Raven demanded, grabbing Crow's hand. Crow held it. Raven grinned and looked up at Crow with a mix of cheekiness and adoration. "Yay."

"I see," Valkyrie said slowly. "I assume it went well then?"

"It did. Kenspeckle should be awake in three hours or so and then it's Fletcher's turn," Crow informed her. "Valkyrie, I – thank you. Thank you so, so much."

Valkyrie lowered her head. She didn't want to say she didn't want to kill that man or hurt Fletcher, because that was like she regretted trying saving Raven, even if he had been stabbed anyway, and that wasn't wholly true. She wished she hadn't, but would she have changed it? It was hard to say. She just shrugged.

Crow sighed and pulled her in for a one-armed hug, holding her securely and placing a kiss on her head. "I couldn't have lost him," he muttered almost silently to her. "Thank you. Thank you."

She almost cried, but held it in and pulled away to smile at him. "It's fine. All worth it to see this."

"I like blue," Raven smiled at her. "Blue is like yellow."

"Yes," she told him.

"I can't feel like feet. Do I have to get up?"

"I don't think so."

"Good. I don't like blue."


	73. Dragon Diamond and Mr Vinay

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 73**

Tanith got home barely two days later looking shaky and concerned but declared healthy of anything contagious. She wasn't allowed to do any serious activities, had to sit down any time she felt tired and someone had to be with her at almost all times to make sure she wouldn't faint.

She hadn't told Valkyrie what was making her sick but had promised it wasn't important. Panda was staying with her.

Solomon didn't have any more strange drug-related epiphanies to the colour blue and healed quickly. Quickly enough to go back to his own home at the same time as Tanith, much to Crow's very vocal displeasure. They were all expecting a new family member to be living with them in the next year or so.

Almost all her brothers had gotten drunk when she pointed that out to them.

Finally, there was Fletcher.

He spent much longer in hospital, almost three whole days extra to the other two. On that third day, the one he was released on, Valkyrie had gone to visit him.

He had told her to bugger off. She had left quickly.

**.*****.**

Going back to work was much easier than she expected, and much more people were there than she thought would be – a heavy sum of Irish sorcerers had been killed during the fighting. But it seemed to be just the non-Sanctuary employees, though their Administrator had once again been killed.

A new man called Tipstaff, that Weasel told her had once been a woman in relation to a story he told her, was Administrator and he had stormed in on his first day and cleared up practically all the confusion and miscommunication and idiocy in the first hour of work.

Even Corrival fell prey to his cleaning up and had been ordered to organise his office immediately so Tipstaff could file his paperwork, and had actually done it too.

Meritorious was incredibly pleased he'd hired the man.

"Cain," a man called from behind her. She turned and saw Detective Bermuda Sickle, an annoying man but only in that he could only talk about his most sickening cases and cats. He was otherwise a bland and boring person. "Where's Skulduggery Pleasant?"

"He's on a call at the moment," she told him – there had been a sighting of Tesseract the day before at a bar. "What do you need?"

He tutted. "I got told to open the damned Sanctuary Puzzle Box and I can't figure out. Tell me when he's done, right, he can have his bloody go."

He went to walk off and Valkyrie glared at his back. "Let me have a go."

He stilled and turned back to her. "You? You're a kid. Look, I know you're all big and glorious with the Dead Men and all, but Puzzle Boxes are not easy things, and this is _The_ Sanctuary one," he stressed. "I've been practising my whole life and I still haven't got the hang of them. This is no ordinary Puzzle Box to play with, it's–"

"I'll do it," she told him and pushed passed him to his desk, the annoying man following behind with his negative opinion.

She looked over it quickly, noticing all sides had puzzles and in every corner of each side was a little signal. No, not a signal, she realised, but a crest, a tiny little crest of a badger with a lit candle in its mouth and a hissing snake wrapped around its middle. One of the sides had three glowing crests. She finished the little puzzle Sickle hadn't completed and the fourth started glowing.

Moving around the box, she started completing the puzzles, noticing a pattern in how they had to be completed and that she would have to break them and redo them in a new way to get another badger lit. It was all number based, just like a dice. Or, even more accurately, a maths based game and she was pretty good at maths.

She finished the last one and the box started glowing and floated an inch from her hand, spinning gently. She poked it with her other hand and it crumbled away, leaving just the content inside. A gigantic diamond. It fell into her hand.

"It's heavy," she said quietly, inspecting it. It was a cut diamond, shaped into its traditional look, and had a slightly pink look to it. She rubbed it slightly. "It's changing colour wherever I touch it. Why's it doing that?"

She looked up at Sickle and noticed practically the whole department trying to get a look. They looked shocked.

"What?" She asked.

"You opened it," Sickle breathed, his mouth wide opened and hand over his heart. "How did you open it?"

"I completed the puzzle, obviously," she said, raising one eyebrow at him. "I told you I could, but oh no, Mr _I-Know-Everything-Because-I'm-A-Grown-Man_ knowns better. It doesn't even matter now, it's open and it's gone. What's this rock?"

"It's not a rock," Crow said from behind her, making her jump. "It's a Dragon Diamond."

"That sounds like one of your stupid stories I'll believe and you'll call me stupid for believing."

"It's not a joke," Sickle said heatedly. "We've had that box for nearly three hundred years. Who knows how old it really is! That is the most expensive Dragon Diamond I've ever seen!"

"It's merely the biggest," Crow said, leaning in for his own inspection. "It changes colour when it's owner touches it. See, how it's turning that dark pink colour? That's the colour it's picked for you."

"So it'll change colour for other people?"

"Exactly. But only one other. These diamonds are scarce and hundreds of years ago they were used by the rich to declare their love, and I believe they're coming back into fashion. They'd send it to the person they wanted to marry in place of a ring since some people couldn't wear them depending on their magic. It would change colour for them too if the sender truly loved the one they sent it to. If the receiver equally loves them, it would change to a whole new colour so everyone knew."

"Fun," she commented, inspecting it closely. It was foggy on the inside, not quite translucent. She had a feeling that was more to do with the magic it held than the quality of the diamond.

"Just about," Crow said. "They're usually sent down the family line. See, whoever holds it first gains ownership of it. After they die, even if the partner is alive, it'll change hands. The partner can't own it, as it believes one cannot be without the other, as the saying goes. But they're expensive, so it goes to the next in line."

She glared at the pink Dragon Diamond. "Why're we all trying to open it if it connects to the first person that holds it then?"

"We didn't know what was in it until now," Sickle groaned. He kicked his desk and howled in pain, glared at Valkyrie and stormed off.

"I didn't know either," she muttered, looking back at the stupid Diamond.

"Finders keepers," a young mage grinned at her, and the group started to disperse, though they did give her the occasional glance.

She sighed and pocketed the stupid rock. What type of bad luck was that? Almost five months of having a broken heart and she gets a dumb love stone. "How was your call?" She asked Crow as they wandered back to their join office.

"Good. We have a lead," Crow said and told her he'd called the others to come over. "I'll explain it then."

"Sure," she shrugged.

They walked in silence for a moment before he spoke again. "Valkyrie, I wanted to talk to you. About Nadia."

Her heart sank again. Every time she thought of just the girl's name it would do that. "What about her?"

"About how you've been since you broke up. You haven't been yourself."

"Of course I haven't. Most of the time you've known me I've been dating her," she pointed out. "Maybe this is the real me and before was the fake me."

"I think we both know that's a lie," he said immediately. "You loved her. Truly, you loved her, just as much as I loved my wife I expect. And now she's left you."

"Gee, thanks Skul, that's really helped me," she told him sarcastically. "I'm so much better now we've had this talk."

"Valkyrie, I'm not finished."

"I don't want to listen," she muttered and rushed through a crowd of people to get away from him, or at least that conversation.

It didn't exactly work.

In the lobby, which they had to go through to get to their office upstairs, was Mr Vinay. She almost crashed into him but stopped herself at the last moment, and it felt as if that crowd suddenly dispersed and it was just the two of them and Crow. She stood up straight and put on a blank face before he could see her pain and dismay.

"Mr Vinay," she said quietly and walked past him quickly.

"Miss Cain, I need to speak with you," he said suddenly. She stopped but didn't turn, putting a hand over her stomach as her nerves and anxiety kicked in. "Valkyrie I – I wanted to apologise for my behaviour last summer."

She took a deep breath and turned around. "You've had six and a half months to apologise," she said without, she hoped, emotion. "Why now? Why here?"

He cleared his throat a little and avoided looking her in the eye. "I felt guilty for how I spoke to you. I shouldn't have acted out the way I did when I was so stressed and angry."

"But you're not sorry for what you said," she noticed. "You're just apologising for how you did it."

He hesitated. "No. I'm sorry for what I said also. I was not in the right mindset to tell you what I did."

She shook her head. "I know you pressured Nadia into breaking up with me. I know she didn't eat when she was at home, and she never wanted to be moved to India. She doesn't enjoy being around her grandmother because she gets pushed around by her. You're not sorry, Mr Vinay, or else you wouldn't have pressured your daughter to do all the things you wanted her to."

He looked angry but was holding it in, now. She knew she was right. "Nadia is ill."

"Nadia broke up with me," she said quickly, feeling her stomach turn. "I love Nadia. I always did, and I still do. But so long as she doesn't want me, I can't do anything. What do you want me to do?"

"Talk to her."

"She doesn't want me to talk to her or else I would have by now," she told him angrily.

"She can't talk to you, I took her phone away," Mr Vinay growled, storming up to Valkyrie. They were almost the same height now.

"And whose fault is that?" She spat. "Because it isn't mine. None of this is my fault. This is all on you, Mr Vinay, so when you get your fucking act together, maybe me and Nadia can work it out. Without you."

She turned and stormed up the stairs, not daring to wipe the tears bleeding down her cheeks for fear he'd know he got to her.


	74. Tanith's sick because...

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Dedicated to Lonelygirl703 once more.**

* * *

**Chapter 74**

Valkyrie cried almost hysterically in Wolf's arms in their office as he rocked her gently and stroked her hair. He muttered that it'd be alright, but all she could think was that Nadia was sick and she didn't know why, and that she missed her so, so much, and she loved her even more, and couldn't decide if she should go see her since she didn't have a phone or if she didn't want to see Valkyrie regardless of not having a phone.

It felt like one big punishment for something she barely even understood.

Corrival decided to join them and slammed the door shut behind himself. "What's this?" He growled loudly. "Which one of you lousy dick-bags made her cry?"

Valkyrie laughed a little through her tears and looked at him, sitting herself up. "It's not them," she told him, wiping her face roughly. "Nadia's father visited me to pretend to apologise and told me Nadia's sick."

He glared at her. "Well, none of this crying business in here, understand me? Either you go to Nadia and cry, or you suck it up and move on. Understand me? Good. Now, Skulduggery, what lead do you have?"

Valkyrie moved carefully onto her own chair and gave Wolf a grateful smile when he put an arm over her shoulders still. She'd be strong, which was what Corrival was trying to say. Nadia had to make the choice herself. If Valkyrie went to her, Nadia may never come to Valkyrie to apologise and work through their problems and Valkyrie didn't want to be the only one trying. Even if it did make her physically sick to think she might never come to her.

"I had a call from a woman in Roarhaven about a Russian man in a mask. He goes into a bar in the village several times a day and drives away in a black van. I believe he's Tesseract and whoever he keeps visiting is either a prisoner or his employer."

"Why'd he keep visiting an employer?" Weasel asked.

"My thoughts exactly. Someone hiring a professional killer like Tesseract wouldn't have him visit so often. I think he has a prisoner there, and if we go when Tesseract is gone we can break them out," Crow said. "When Tesseract realises what's happened, he'll try and kill us or flee, either way, we need to be ready to catch him."

"Agreed," Corrival said. "A killer like him needs to be held accountable. If we can catch his employer out at the same time, all the better."

"That's the hope. I want to have us spread around Roarhaven, and we'll watch for a time he's just left. He comes every few hours, so we must time it like that. Everybody needs to eat and prepare."

They nodded and Corrival gave his luck. He left after giving Valkyrie a pat on the shoulder.

"Cub," Wolf said quietly as they left to get some fast food. "Do you want to do this? You can go home and stay with Tanith if you want?"

"I want to," she said resolutely. They got to the stairs and she saw Mr Vinay pacing by the door and looking at his watch and felt herself stiffen.

"I think you need to take the day," Weasel said kindly, putting an arm around her. "We can go out the back."

Valkyrie nodded as a few tears leaked down her cheeks silently. "Okay."

They drove her home and let her in without a fuss from her as her mind was stuck on Nadia and didn't even consider Tesseract or anything else. Panda left with them to fight, and Valkyrie was left in Tanith's arms as they both cried.

It must have taken at least ten minutes before they calmed down.

"Why are you crying?" Tanith asked her.

"Mr Vinay came to see me and made me cry," Valkyrie sniffed. "Why are _you_ crying?"

Tanith began crying again and fell into Valkyrie. Valkyrie held her sister tightly, knowing whatever it was couldn't be good. They stayed on the sofa and Tanith cried almost to sleep before she pulled herself together and announced she needed to wash her face. They both went to their bathroom upstairs and used the Jack and Jill sinks to wash their faces.

"Come on," Valkyrie told her resolutely and took them to Tanith's room. She sat them on the middle of the bed cross-legged and held her hand. "You need to tell me, or someone else, what is going on. I don't care who, but someone has to be there to help you."

"I don't need help," she said quietly, holding her stomach.

"You look like you need someone to talk to at least," Valkyrie said slowly, tucking a piece of hair behind Tanith's ear. "I won't say a thing if you want. I just want you to be okay."

Tanith smiled. "See, if we had never met or become sisters, I'd have wanted to date you so badly. You're super cute. Is that weird?"

Valkyrie grinned. "I am pretty awesome. But that didn't answer what I asked."

Tanith lost her smile and squeezed Valkyrie's hand. "You might want to prepare for it."

Valkyrie nodded and held her breath.

"I'm pregnant."

"Shit," Valkyrie breathed out with wide eyes. "Like, you're having a baby, pregnant?"

Tanith smiled tightly. "That's the only pregnant I know about."

"Oh my God," Valkyrie said. "Who have you told?"

"Just you. Civet knows but hasn't told anyone, obviously. Because it's a doctor thing and everything. But I haven't told Ghastly or my brother or anyone else," Tanith told her. "I was trying to tell Ghastly all morning, but I just couldn't do it. I've taken six pregnancy tests, Val, and Civet did a blood test, and all of them are positive and I still barely believe it."

"God," Valkyrie breathed, rubbing her eyes. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm keeping it," Tanith said slowly. "At least, I'm ninety-eight percent sure of that. But I don't know about anything past that. Me and Ghastly have been great and all but we still barely just got together. A few months is nothing compared to a lifetime commitment and a baby!"

"I don't even know what to say. Do I say congratulations or sorry?"

Tanith shrugged. "I'm not sorry I'm pregnant. I'm just sorry I got pregnant _now_. If this was four, five years down the line after dating Ghastly I would be all excited and would have said it to him first and would have jumped on telling you as quick as possible. It's just that it's so soon and I don't know where I'm going or if Ghastly will want a baby, or who I'll have helping me. I don't know if I want to live with Ghastly or see him if he doesn't want to help with our baby. God, just calling it that is so strange."

"It's weirder to hear, I promise. Is it bad that I'm kind of excited?"

"It's not bad. If I wasn't stressed about Ghastly and all the shit I've been through before finding out, I'd be excited too."

"Oh God, yeah! All the fighting and training and everything," Valkyrie said.

"It will probably be nothing, but there's a chance I'll miscarry," she said quietly. "Civet said it was unlikely since it all happened and there hasn't been one yet, but it's why I can't so much as lift a box now. It's why I've been so sick. The pregnancy itself isn't the issue, it's my body straining too much to do all the work _and_ have a baby."

"Damn," Valkyrie whispered with wide eyes. It was so weird to think of her sister as now a vulnerable person because of a _pregnancy_. She was never vulnerable. "You know you can stay here, right? This is my house and you're my sister. Ghastly can leave if he has a problem. And you know, I think I have all my old nursery stuff here too, so you don't have to buy a ton. And I have a house in France if you'd rather get away."

Tanith smiled. "I don't think we need to think that far ahead just yet. Ghastly might prefer for us to move into his shop."

"His shop has a one bedroom apartment above it and you're having a baby, what's he going to do with the kid?" Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "Either he's getting a new place, you're both staying here, or it's France."

"Or living with my parents," Tanith groaned. "I am not moving in with them. Not a chance."

"You can stay here, it's fine. There's a room at the back of the house with massive windows that are joined to two other rooms, it's meant for parents and kids or a massive office or something. You can have a playroom and a bedroom and a babies room, all close together but still not falling over the other idiots that could wake the baby up."

"That's not an _awful_ idea. And I'd give me and Ghastly space since we're still a new couple and all," Tanith said in slow consideration. "I don't want to move too quickly just because of the baby. I'd rather sleep separate and us not be fully together for the first few years of its life than be too quick and break up."

"That's true," Valkyrie nodded. "Come on, I'll show you. Since it might need changing, I can't remember how outdated it is."

They took the long way to the rooms – Valkyrie knew the way through the walls from when she was little and those rooms had been a massive playroom for her – and Valkyrie opened the one door into the three rooms.

It had dark yellow walls and dark oak floors that were deeply scratched, and there were no curtains for the massive wall to ceiling windows, the same as in Valkyrie's room on the other side of the house. It was a gigantic room, especially as a bedroom, and it had open archways on the left and right into identical little rooms. There was built in storage next to each arch, leaving a short hallway into each room which made it difficult to make a door, Valkyrie imagined, but not impossible. Opening the built-in storage doors, Valkyrie found boxes and boxes of her mother's things.

"This was my Mums," she said quietly, grabbing a box and pulling it down. "It's got all my old stuff in."

Mostly it was old clothes of every age Valkyrie had been at whilst her mother was alive, alongside a million and one pictures of each age. Valkyrie didn't actually feel a massive attachment to it as most of it was just her by herself, but there was one box that had been gone through likely by Gordon that had everything of herself and her parents up until the age of two. She decided she'd keep that but the others were kind of boring.

"Why did Gordon and your mum keep so many clothes?" Tanith asked.

"I have no idea. I didn't know they'd kept it. I'll go through it later, but look," she said, pointing in the cupboards, "they're wardrobes. So you'd have lots of space in here."

"True," she said, shutting the doors. "There isn't a bathroom, is there?"

"Don't think so, but there's one across the hall. But I already know that needs a serious makeover."

They went into the rooms on the left and right and she could see Tanith's eyes brightening as she considered her life in those rooms. She started talking about furniture, and adding a small vanity into the bedroom to make it easier to handle a young child, and which room would be the child's, and even made a small comment about siblings. She stopped using the term 'it' and started talking about 'my baby' instead.

With a potential future in her mind, she seemed to see exactly what would happen and how she wanted it.

"Now you just have to tell Ghastly," Valkyrie grinned.

"Yes," she smiled. "I think I'll do that tonight." She bit her lip suddenly. "Do you want to be there when I do it?"

"And see his face? Yes please!"

.*****.

They chatted and spent the afternoon talking about Valkyrie's new Dragon Diamond and the baby, looking online and in the loft for some of the baby furniture. They, or rather Valkyrie, brought it all down from the loft and they were quite confused as to why there were quite so many sets of nursery furniture up there, but chose the nicest nonetheless.

Tanith wanted to paint them, but they were still so pretty, with intricately woven pieces of wood and carvings on the cot, and it also had a matching bedside bassinet for when the baby was very little. There was a changing table and wardrobe and chest of draws, as well as a rocking chair and a box for the toys. It was a lot of furniture, especially to paint, but it was all Tanith needed and they brought it downstairs to the garage to deal with.

They decided to let the boys do that as their contribution to their nephew or niece.

Those boys got back mostly unharmed that evening to the dinner the girls had made.

"This looks great," Panda told Tanith softly as he walked past, giving her a peck on the lips. Tanith gave her a thumbs up and they all had a hearty dinner. When it got to after desserts, Tanith made her announcement.

"I need to talk to Ghastly with Valkyrie for a few minutes, and then I think we all need to talk," she said quickly, standing up. Valkyrie noticed she was holding in her stomach ever so slightly even though she was only two months along and didn't have a bump yet.

Panda looked confused but Valkyrie avoided his eye and did her best not to grin until she'd left the room. They went to a seating area away from the boys snooping and sat down, Valkyrie next to Tanith and Ghastly opposite them.

"What's this about?" Panda asked Tanith slowly.

"I'd say it's nothing serious, but it is," Tanith said slowly, her confidence seeming to dwindle. Valkyrie squeezed her hand and she sat up straighter. "I have something very important to tell you Ghastly. I need you to listen."

He nodded. "I am."

"Good. You see, I – I'm pregnant."

He stared at her without moving for a good, long few seconds. "Pregnant?"

"Yes."

"With a baby?"

"That's what pregnant means."

"With me?"

"Yes."

He suddenly went very pale and started swaying.

"Don't you dare faint," Valkyrie told him and he looked at her and took a deep breath, leaning back into the sofa and held his hands over his face.

They let him think it over for over a minute and looked at each other slowly. He could be stubborn, and they'd gone over every scenario, including not wanting to talk about it, but it was harder when they were waiting.

"I'm not getting rid of the baby," Tanith said suddenly to her knees. Panda dropped his hands and looked at her though she didn't see. "I'm having it and I'm staying here. I don't have another home and Valkyrie is my sister. I'm going to need her help."

"You don't want to move in with your parents?" Panda asked her.

"I'm not leaving the country so you can forget about me," Tanith snarled.

"That's not what I meant!" He said quickly, sitting up. "I just thought – it's your family, I thought you'd want to be with them."

" _This_ is my family," Tanith said, squeezing Valkyrie's hand. "My parents don't want me living with them, or a newborn. I'm barely two months along, so we have time to sort ourselves, but I've already made my decision. I'm not leaving this country or the baby, and I'm definitely not leaving my home just because you're unhappy. Please don't make this more difficult than it's already been."

"How long have you known?"

"Only since I was discharged."

"That was six days ago," he said quietly. "You could have said something."

"I wasn't sure what I wanted to do then," she said fiercely. "I do now, and it's take it or leave it."

"I'm not going anywhere," he growled back. "And I'm not going to stop loving you because you're pregnant."

Tanith went red, and after a moment Panda went red too. Valkyrie just smiled.

"We'll work this out," Panda said slowly, looking at her hopefully.

"That's what I want." Tanith smiled tentatively. "And we have to tell the others too."

Panda groaned. Valkyrie grinned more broadly. This was so _exciting_!

They went to the dining room where the others were bickering about what it could be but went silent when they came in. Tanith and Panda were holding hands and Valkyrie sat down to give them their moment.

"Right," Panda said, rubbing a hand over his eyes. "Don't have a fit." He said and glared at them all slowly. "Me and Tanith are expecting a baby."


	75. Snake's past

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 75**

All hell broke loose.

Snake started screaming, Wolf and Weasel began laughing and pointing mockingly at Panda, Crow nearly broke the table standing up, and Bear nearly broke his chair and the wall when he stood up too quickly and it went flying back.

Valkyrie laughed at them and didn't help even a little when the Idiots started chanting and trying to hug Tanith, slapping a disgruntled Panda right out their way.

Tanith swatted them away but couldn't run as she was on bedrest. She crossed her arms as Wolf, Weasel, Snake and Valkyrie ran loops around her and sang about the baby. In the other room, Panda had been flattened to the wall by Crow and Bear and looked to be being interrogated.

"Alright, stop it!" Tanith shouted, smacking Weasel and Snake harshly. Wolf and Valkyrie jumped out her way as she stormed over to the others. "You can stop that! There's no need to interview him about it."

"He got you pregnant," Crow growled, not taking his eyes off Panda's stubborn look.

"It's the twenty-first century, Skulduggery," Tanith said with exasperation. "It's both our fault. So instead of lecturing a grown-ass man about conception, you can congratulate us so I can sit the hell down before I _fucking feint_!"

Valkyrie jumped forwards and helpfully added: "She really will faint."

Crow sighed and they backed off Panda. "Fine. I am sorry Tanith. Congratulations on your pregnancy."

"Thank you," she told him. "I need to get some sleep."

She turned and left at a slow walk, looking altogether paler than before dinner. Panda followed before Crow could threaten him again.

"Aren't people meant to be all radiant and lovely when they're pregnant?" Snake asked as they sat back down at the table.

"Tanith's not exactly been keeping safe since she got pregnant. It's taken a toll on her body and that's why she was getting so sick and is tired so much," Valkyrie explained to him. "She might get better in a few weeks with all the weird things Civet is making her drink."

"Can I have some?"

"They're for pregnant women, so no," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "You can have alcohol."

"I like vodka," he agreed.

"What happened on this mission then?" Valkyrie said quickly before he offered her some and Crow banned alcohol from the house forever. She had to keep her options open!

"That was a strange turn of events," Wolf said with a huffed laugh. "Saracen knew before we got into Roarhaven that someone was under the bar, but it wasn't a prisoner. Idiot barkeeper nearly got himself killed and we had to drag his sorry arse to the Sanctuary in cuffs. Thinks he's the Killer Supreme."

"Aside from him, we didn't find Tesseract at all," Weasel said, putting them on track.

"The Torment was waiting for us," Crow said.

"Whose that?" She asked quickly.

"He's the leader of the Children of the Spider," Snake said in an oddly far away voice, looking at the table. Wolf put a hand on his shoulder. "He's ancient and been missing since the middle of the war. He rescued me in battle after I escaped Mevolent's castle after being tortured for weeks. They healed me in secret and tried to convince me to join their army to kill all mages."

"He nearly managed to brainwash Erskine too," Crow said darkly. "Until The Torment tried to stab Dexter and Larrikin and it set Erskine on the path back to us."

"They wanted to create an army to bring the Spiders into the leaders of the living world," Snake said quietly, reaching up and holding Wolf's hand. "We went after them and they knew I'd brought soldiers to their doors. Many of their people died that night, and so did The Torment's wife. He's blamed me since."

"And he was there when you went under the bar?" Valkyrie concluded.

"He's been living there for years," Crow said, rubbing his skull. "All reports said he went to the African rainforests decades ago. We fought him but he got away. We weren't prepared."

"And did Tesseract turn up?"

"No, but The Torment made it very clear that Tesseract is working for him. So at least we know," Crow ended. "We'll have to go looking, but we can't do this alone. We have no idea how many Children of the Spider there are any more, and Erskine doesn't like to be reminded of them."

Snake nodded and got up from the table, holding his arm like a small boy and leaving the room.

"Is he okay?" Valkyrie asked them quietly.

"He will be," Wolf assured her. "He just didn't expect the reminded. He blames Larrikin's death on himself."

"It's not just that," Weasel said even quieter, leaning into her. "He has almost no recollection of his time in the castle, at least consciously, but he does remember the Spiders and their brainwashing and the torture they put him through after telling him they were family and all he had to do before he was able to leave them fully. He really, truly believed they were family and always had been. It broke his heart and I think a little more of him too. We love him. He's our brother. But they did something that's made him act differently since."

"He used to be like you when you were a little kid," Wolf said with a sad smile. "Always laughing and loved everyone. Him and Larrikin were so close. But then all that happened, and that side doesn't often happen now, and when it does, he turns a little, I don't know, goofy."

"Like he's a small child, not a full loving man," Crow explained. "He was the best of us."

"After you of course," Wolf winked to her.

She smiled a little and they finished their conversation about The Torment and Tesseract, agreeing to get Corrival to give them some help which they knew he'd do since he'd all but raised Snake apparently, and she went upstairs to her room to think.

Sitting with her door closed firmly behind her, she fiddled with the lock and turned it closed after a moment.

She wasn't sure why she hesitated. After having them open up to her, and Tanith being ill and Snake surely upset, it didn't seem right for her to lock her door. She knew she needed her time, though, and she lay down on her bed.

There was so much to think about.

She wasn't altogether worried about The Torment. He was an old man that had isolated himself for decades, it wouldn't be too hard to find him in the modern world even if he was an incredible fighter. Tesseract was a worry, but they could handle him just like everyone else. She couldn't stress too much for Snake, she would just be there for him like he was for her, like she would always be there for him regardless of the situation.

What was really pressing on her wasn't any of that, or even Tanith or her impending niece or nephew. It was Mr Vinay and Nadia.

He had said she was sick earlier that day, so long ago as it was. How sick did he mean? It could be a small sickness that was just sticking around, or it could be that she was so upset over Valkyrie that she was making herself sick.

Or it could be that she wasn't eating like the last time Valkyrie saw her. She sorely hoped it wasn't that, but she knew that was how Nadia dealt with stress. Valkyrie would not eat much too when she was really stressed, but only until she'd tidied everything, then she'd eat and find something else. She could regulate it. But she wouldn't put it passed Nadia to not stop, simply because Nadia hadn't had to deal with stress the way Valkyrie had with her parents and Gordon dying and having no friends at school and using those deaths against herself for so long.

Nadia was a mature girl, but she didn't know hardship like Valkyrie, hadn't had her family help her learn to regulate it. She’d had the threat of everything she loved removed by her parents, which was somewhat traumatic in itself as it had been so stressful, and it had pushed Nadia to break up with her which had surely been hard on her mentally, and then been uprooted hundreds of miles away with, apparently, no way to communicate with anyone.

That was a lot on someone who’d previously been handed the world on a silver platter.

She just couldn't understand why she would do that though. Was she just upset about the breakup or was it more? What if she was struggling at her school? Or it was her parents? They had proved they didn't care about Nadia's interests when they sent her to India, and more so Mr Vinay had admitted they hadn't allowed her a phone.

But that in itself brought Valkyrie another problem. She would have just text Nadia or tracked down a friend and made them start forcing Nadia to eat and stop her stressing about it all, but she couldn't do any of that. She couldn't pretend and help, and if she was realistic, she couldn’t force Nadia to get over her inability to eat and however many mental health issues she was struggling with right now.

So her only option was to either go to Nadia's parents and force _them_ to give Nadia a phone and stop pressuring the girl or she'd have to go to the school, break in and find Nadia herself. She quickly reminded herself that none of that answered what the illness was or if Nadia wanted to see her whatsoever.

She groaned and covered her face with a pillow.

She wasn't sure what she wanted to do let alone what was the right thing. Nadia broke up with her, but she loved the girl to bits. She'd run to India in a heartbeat if she was certain Nadia wanted to see her even if just to cry on her. But without that confidence, she didn't want to go. It would kill her all over again to be rejected by Nadia.

What would she want Nadia to do?

 _I wouldn't expect anything,_ Valkyrie thought to herself, _but I also wouldn't have broken up with her because my family said so._

But Nadia's family was everything to her. Valkyrie couldn't forget that. Nadia loved her family as much as Valkyrie and she knew the stress of everything could have caused it. And that was Valkyrie's biggest problem. She couldn't compete, and that held her back from trying to see if Nadia wanted her.

That realisation made Valkyrie sit up.

If it was just a lack of belief, she had to think around that.

It didn't stop the pain of rejection, but was Nadia still worth trying to convince even if she didn't succeed? Yes. Valkyrie knew that wholeheartedly. She'd do it every day if there was even a glimmer of hope. So if that was the case, if she forgot about the parents pressuring, what did she do?

She still wasn't sure. But a yearning to see Nadia was deep in the pit of her stomach and she had to look out her window as if that made them closer somehow.

She just didn't know if she could do it. The same way Nadia hadn't been sure she could deal with her parent's pressure and had succumbed. Put like that, she wanted to go see Nadia and prove to herself all that pressure couldn't control Valkyrie. But it was harder when her heart was aching. Perhaps they weren't so different. It made it a lot easier to not blame Nadia but not enough to take away the feeling of rejection.

And the feeling of betrayal from Nadia’s words about her.

She bit her lip and sat still for a moment when her door was knocked on. Sighing, she unlocked it and saw it was Bear on the other side.

"Hey," she said in surprise, letting him into the room. She closed it behind him. "I didn't expect you."

"You have a lot on your mind," he said, pulling a chair over to her bed and sitting on it. "Tell me."

She did, going through all her conflicting feelings and her realisation about Nadia's pressure. He nodded and said nothing, listening carefully to her.

"I understand," he said after a few minutes silence when she was finished.

"You know what I should do?"

"No," he said, putting a hand on her knee. "But I know how you can know."

"Well, how?" Valkyrie asked eagerly.

"You must wait. Nadia will and can come if she wants in the meantime. But until then, you must explore for yourself what you want. You are not sure if you can cope with her giving in to parental pressure. You are not sure you want to see her strict parents and deal with their policies. You are very independent, and this is a conflict of interests between you. Your answer will come when you have explored yourself and know what you want long term and in this, you can work through your feelings of rejection and come to your answer. It is okay if that is not Nadia. It is okay if she remains sick. You cannot look after her if you cannot look after yourself."

Valkyrie nodded slowly, mulling over his advice. "So I need to wait basically."

"You must do things for yourself. The answer will not lay itself on your lap."

She bit her lip and nodded absentmindedly. He leaned in and kissed her forehead and left her room to let her think over what she could possibly do to explore what she wanted.


	76. Twins!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 76**

It took a good week for things to settle in their house and get a meeting with all three Elders to explain Tesseract and The Torment. They had numerous interviews with Scapegrace, the owner of the bar, but he had nothing useful to tell them. In the end, they had to send him to a psychiatric ward for his strange behaviour. He was utterly and totally convinced he was a mass murderer.

Valkyrie had wanted to just let him go as he was harmless, but the Sanctuary said they had to protect him from his own idiocy. They found a nice lady to take care of him and be his 'assistant', a blue-haired girl called Clarabelle that was eager to convince him not to kill people.

The Torment himself hadn't been easy to track. So hard, in fact, they hadn't found him at all.

"He must know more about the outside world than we thought," Crow had grumbled when they were driving away from yet another false lead.

"He's had centuries to learn to blend into all cultures," Valkyrie had replied grumpily. "He could probably fit into any place now."

Tesseract had been even harder to find. Whereas The Torment was had been calling him every few hours, he was now absent and they couldn't be certain he was even in the country.

Tanith was certain she could track him down but she was fainting every day and falling over a lot and had doctor appointments every few days to keep on top of her symptoms and was in no shape to work. Panda was the full-time caretaker of her as well as doing his tailoring and spent much of his time convincing her to not get worked up about it as that was what led to the fainting. It was kind of funny except for the fact they were all so worried for her.

The Sanctuary had to put the Dead Men on hold for that particular case and put others on the search as other problems came up. Corrival had to give them almost three cases a day, sometimes more, to keep up with the crime wave that hit them. They weren't hard crimes, but there were way more than their department could handle and even Bear had been called in to help with a riot and get some peace.

Needless to say, the crowds dispersed quickly when he arrived.

"So, Valkyrie," Raven said with a smile.

She stared at him over her cereal. "What are you doing here so early?" She asked him quietly.

"I was here all night," he said, his mouth twitching as he tried not to smile.

She let a pause go by. "Okay."

"Me and you have to talk."

"About how you're dating my dad?"

"You don't call him that," he pointed out.

"He essentially is though."

"Yes, I suppose so. But you have to talk about that with him. No, I wanted to talk to you about your month at the Temple," he said, diverting the conversation easily. "The High Priest and Clerics are getting restless waiting for an answer."

She put a spoonful of oats and blueberries in her mouth and took her time eating. It was nice to feel as she was wasting even more of their time. "I'll do it."

"That is good to hear," Raven said, a smile finally blossoming onto his face. He truly brightened up when he was happy, a little twinkle of excitement in his eye. "When would you be comfortable moving in?"

"It's just for a month," she pointed out and thought about her plans. She had none. "What about I start on the first and leave at the end of the month? So we could do the whole of March? That starts Thursday next week."

"And ends on a Saturday, that sounds good," Raven smiled. "I will tell the High Priest. And where do you want to sleep? You can have a student room or stay in my spare room."

"I'll stay with the students," she said resolutely. "God, it would be too embarrassing to sleep with you, they'd all taunt me!"

"They won't taunt you."

"They will if I have to stay in your room like a little kid."

"They might taunt you a little if you do that," he conceded. "But other than that, you'll be fine."

"I hope so. Is there anything I have to do before I go?" She asked, scooping out the last of her cereal quickly.

"I want you to get up to grade twelve. You're on grade ten at the moment, which is acceptable, but I believe some of the students and teachers will be expecting more from you considering the Temple is making special circumstances for your continued education. If they decide you're lacking, they may give the High Priest a negative perspective of you."

"What do I have to do to get up there?"

"Well, I brought some books," he said and led her to the study room. Her desk was piled precariously with many, many volumes of books on Necromancy and Death and further ancient death magicks. "You'll need to read these and pass a few tests, as usual. Since you have almost two weeks, I think you can do it."

She glared at him. "There are at least fifty books on that table."

"Fourth-eight," he said. "And fifty-three journals and articles."

"How are you expecting me to get through all that? We're in the middle of a crime wave, Raven, I have to deal with that too."

"Well, I was thinking that we'd have you and Tanith work on this while myself and Skulduggery work on cases," Raven suggested.

"Okay, Tanith is not going to want to study Necromancy with me, and there is no way you get to have all the fun without me."

He shrugged, tapping his cane on the floor. "It's okay if you don't do it, or even if you just get to grade eleven, but the students your age are going to expect you to be at grade eleven at the very, _absolute_ least if you don't want to be taunted as you said."

She groaned and hit her head on the doorframe. "Really?"

"Really. I am happy to stay and tutor you," Raven offered.

"Happy to stay with Crow," she muttered, going into the room to have a look. He'd split the books into the grades at least, and there weren't many to get up to grade eleven, she noticed. So it was very, slightly possible she could do that part. "Okay, so if I just had the bare minimum, what books would I be left with?"

"This is the bare minimal," Raven responded, coming into the room. "This is the necessary reading to get up to the next stage. This will only get you a passing grade as well, you'll need to do three times the work to get higher. You've had many years less learning than the other students which is why you are barely on par with them in terms of theory."

"Considering I've had less years, I think I'm doing pretty bloody well."

"You are, but not well enough to escape a scathing from children who grew up believing education is the one and only path to social acceptance and good job. If it will help you in keeping your training in Necromancy, this is how to do it. You're very talented, Valkyrie, and I don't want you to go to waste."

She waved him off and sat down. "Fine, fine, you got me. I'll start reading. But you have to give me that stack of stuff over there. It's my Necromancy study pack. It comes with added Vitamin D."

**.*****.**

Those two weeks were gruelling and hideous. Books, dust and more dust. She had to get three massages to help her poor back and neck from all the strain. But she did do it. Barely. She read every single one of those books and took both tests and passed by a single mark into grade twelve, high enough to be considered just a little better than average for her age. Enough she wouldn't be mocked even if she was laughing at herself for putting so much effort into a magic she was getting surer and surer about not taking in the Surge.

It was a nice distraction from everything else though, and that was what counted to her.

The day before she was set to leave, she got her suitcase out from under the bed and had to start packing for the trip. She'd be barely an hour away, but she was not going to be allowed out of the Temple except with Raven who was going to be on Cleric duty, and so unable to allow her to do her normal activities. It sucked, but there was a little excitement too.

Her new Temple robes were at the Temple ready for her in her new Temple student room, so all she had to do was pack the basics. No shampoo or body wash – that was provided. No bedsheets or towels – that was also provided. All she needed was enough clothes for a week and then it was wash day and she'd start again. She was allowed a phone since she wasn't a full student but it had been 'strongly recommended' by the High Priests favourite Clerics to not use one at all.

She also brought her own hairbrush. She wasn't sharing one of those.

She sighed and closed the suitcase and took it down to the door for the next morning when she'd leave. She didn't know what to do now.

"Hey Cub," Wolf said from the doorway. "What are you doing all sad and stuff? I thought you wanted to go?"

"I do, but I'm going to miss you," she said, giving him a hug. "When I get back you'll be off on adventures all over the world and I'll be alone."

"You'll have Skul."

"Well, _Skul_ has Solomon," she grinned at him and they laughed.

"Still blows my mind," Wolf sighed and kissed her cheek before letting her go. "But who knows, maybe you'll meet some lovely new young lady you can date while you’re in the death hole."

"Don't call it the death hole," Valkyrie snorted. "And maybe, I guess, I wouldn’t mind making some friends."

"You know, it would be okay if you got with someone else," Wolf said as they started wandering around the house. He seemed to be as bored as her. "You don't have to _date_ them. It's okay to do that."

She shrugged. "I still like Nadia. I'd rather get back together with her than try with someone else."

"You can do that too, you know. You don't have to have sex with them, but talk them up a little, maybe a kiss or two, just have a little fun. It is allowed," he smirked, bumping his shoulder to hers. They were almost the same height. She was five foot nine now.

She smiled. "Maybe, maybe. I doubt I'll find anyone in the Temple though."

He shrugged. "Hey, I've dated a few Necromancers in my time, and I assure you it's not all doom and gloom. Anton's last serious girlfriend was a Necromancer."

"I though the last person he dated was that fire throwing dude."

"It was, but this is the last female, there's a serious difference in that."

"I thought it wasn't meant to be serious."

"It's not. My point is, Necromancers aren't bad, so you can flirt with one, date one, even become one yourself. We love you and if Nadia does, she will too no matter what."

"Well, considering _she_ broke up with _me_ …"

"Also irrelevant."

"I think that's slightly more relevant."

"Valkyrie, shhh, stop questioning my authority."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "Authority?"

"Yes."

"You?"

"Hey, Saracen seems to think I have some of that," Wolf winked.

"And are you two properly dating yet, because people are still asking about that?"

Wolf grinned and shook his head. "Me and Saracen are very happy. No need to put a label on it."

"I'm not, I just want to know if you're dating?"

"I wouldn't call it _dating_ per say," he began.

Valkyrie waved her hand quickly. "I've changed my mind, don't tell me."

"Sure thing," he said and kissed her temple before jumping into another room and shutting the door behind him, Valkyrie barely getting a glimpse of Weasel's grinning face before he was gone. She shook her head and walked quickly to the kitchen.

"Hey," Tanith said, putting plates on the counter so Bear and Panda could start serving lunch. "Done packing?"

"Yep. And I'm out of things to do for the day," she said, throwing herself onto a chair. "What are we having?"

"Leftover sandwiches," Panda said over his shoulder. "Fridge was getting full of them."

"Mac and cheese sandwich sounds pretty good."

Tanith gave her an apologetic look. "Sorry. I already had that."

"Tan, you are two months pregnant, you don't get to call dibs on food until you get to at least five!" Valkyrie complained. "What's next, going to pee all the time?"

"I peed eight times today already," she admitted. "I don't understand why."

"Maybe it's the six litres of water you had since half five this morning," Panda grumbled as he put some bread on the kitchen table.

"It might be that."

Valkyrie shook her head at them. "You two are doing really well at be an old grumpy couple."

"They are old and grumpy," Bear said as he threw a half-eaten packet of salami on the table, almost taking Valkyrie's eye out. "Sorry."

"You know, I'm suddenly not so upset about leaving this crazy house for a month," Valkyrie smiled. "No food thrown at me. No cooking. No washing up. No annoying brothers. No annoying sisters. It'll be great."

"I'm going to visit you," Tanith said.

"I think that was a threat," Valkyrie said, pointing at her with a slice of meat. "Don't do that."

"Okay. But I'm still visiting you. As soon as I notice a bump I'm coming over and we have to admire it," Tanith grinned.

"I would agree but I looked online and you won't get one until twelve to sixteen weeks," Valkyrie told her.

"It could be a big baby," she said hopefully.

Valkyrie snorted. "Maybe it's twins. Maybe that's why you're so sick."

Tanith winced and she was pretty sure Panda didn't look so healthy anymore. "Please God don't let it be twins."

Valkyrie laughed. "You'll be fine, don't worry. Unless twins run in your family. Do they run in your family Panda?"

"No," he said.

"Tanith?"

"Yep," she said, biting her lip worriedly.

Valkyrie shrugged. "I'm sure you're fine. Every fourth birth is a twin in our family. It's why there's so many of us. You have a good chance of not twins, but _I_ might be in trouble. Anyway, you can have your ultrasound scan now you're roughly eight weeks and they’ll probably be able to tell you then if it's twins."

"You have to be there!" Tanith cried, sitting forwards. "You are going to be there, right?"

"Of course I will," Valkyrie said, frowning her at. "What, you think a dusty hole in a graveyard will stop me seeing the baby? No chance."

"Good. Because if it's twins, I want you to strangle you immediately for jinxing it."

Valkyrie snorted. "Sure thing. Just text me when and I'll be there."


	77. Starting at the Temple

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 77**

"Hey Val," Fletcher said from her bedroom door. "Do you have a minute to talk?"

"Sure," Valkyrie said in surprise. Fletcher hadn't talked to her, or anyone except Panda, since his operations a month ago. "What can I do?"

"Nothing, I just," he started and huffed out a breath, running a hand over the top of his stupid hair. "I just wanted to say that I, I don't know, understand why you shot me. And I'm sorry I haven't been talking to you. It wasn't fair."

She pinched her finger nervously. "Thank you. But it's okay. I felt really bad when I did it. I still do. I _am_ sorry."

He waved her away in true Fletcher fashion. "It's fine, don't worry about it."

"That doesn't make me think it's fine."

"It is though. So don't worry. I, err, I actually had something else I wanted to ask you," he said more nervously, coming into her room a few steps. "It's totally unrelated to all that, and I'm not bringing it up after that to push you into doing anything or anything, but I just wondered what you'd think if I said I wanted someone to move in with me?"

She left out a breath. "I mean, you can. But if they leave your room the alarms will go off."

"I know, which is why I thought it would be okay if we added her to the system so she'd be safe? We won't get in your way, we'll just use the game room and watch movies and maybe the kitchen when no one else is about. She likes to cook, but doesn't like the tiny kitchen in the apartment thing."

"Butlers quarters," Valkyrie corrected and thought very carefully. "I suppose we can do that. But if anything happens, you'll be held responsible."

He grinned. "That's great! You can meet her now if you want?"

"Fletcher, I'm about to leave–"

"That's fine, it'll be super quick. She's mortal, so everything's good, right?"

"You can't tell her about us!"

"Don't worry, she already knew," Fletcher reassured her. "I've been dating her for weeks. Her house was ruined in the Remnant attack when there were riots and stuff, so I wanted to give her a place to stay."

"Fine," she said, letting him deal with all that himself. It wasn't her business. "But I need to be at the front in ten minutes to leave."

"Cool," he said, and touched her arm and they were gone.

They arrived in Australia, and Valkyrie only knew that because it was night time and by the most beautiful beach she'd ever seen. She breathed it in, thinking about how much closer to Nadia she was in that moment, and wondering if Nadia knew. It was stupid, but she really hoped she did and got some comfort from it.

She turned around and pulled herself out her thoughts when she saw Fletcher standing next to a girl. Maybe _girl_ was not quite correct though. She looked like a young lady, certainly not a woman, but older than Valkyrie. She might have been twenty, so two years older than Fletcher, and had mousy brown hair and light brown eyes, a short cut and was certainly shorter than any other grown female Valkyrie knew. She was probably only just five foot and had a small nose and mouth but big, girlish eyes.

She wore a blouse and skirt to her knees and a small bow in her hair. She was cute, but all in a demure, obedient way, like someone that had never said 'no' to their parents and had grown out of their home but not the habits. She didn't expect that to attract to Fletcher, since he'd shown such interest in strong independent women before, like herself and Tanith and Nadia. It was almost a pathetic anti-climax to see such a boring person.

"Hey," Valkyrie said neutrally. "Fletcher said you were his girlfriend. My name's Valkyrie Cain."

She laughed softly, not quite a giggle, some mix of mature and little girl, and held her hand out. "My name's Myra."

"Nice to meet you," she said, taking a step and shaking the very short girl's hand. It didn't feel right calling her a girl considering she was five years older and looked like a woman, but she acted like a bit of a kid and that was making Valkyrie confused. Why couldn't people be easy? "Fletcher told me a lot about you. He said you're a detective."

"I am. I work for the Irish Sanctuary with my partner, though I'm taking a month leave right now to study. I doubt we'll see each other again until then. I'm sorry, but I have to leave in literally two minutes."

"It's fine," Fletcher said quickly. He put a soft hand on Myra's shoulder and told her, "I'll be back in a few minutes."

Herself and Fletcher teleported back to her bedroom. "So what did you think?" He asked her.

"I think she's nice," Valkyrie shrugged, grabbing her bag. "She's like a little child and a young woman rolled in one. I didn't expect you to like someone like her, but she's not bad."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that I thought you'd be with someone a little more, I don't know, outspoken or something. I just wasn't expecting a girl in a skirt not making so much as a peep until spoken to."

"I think she was shy," Fletcher defended. "She's usually more talkative."

Valkyrie shrugged. "She's your girlfriend, you can like who you want. I'm sure the others won't mind seeing the two of you around the house occasionally anyway. She's adorable, they'll love her. Just make sure you stay out of Tanith's way. She's a bit loopy at the moment."

Fletcher grinned again. "Oh yeah, I heard through the walls. I cannot believe Ghastly got her pregnant."

"They did it together," Valkyrie sighed and held her hand out to him. "Downstairs."

They teleported to the door and Valkyrie let his hand go quickly. He stood back and Valkyrie quickly told Crow the plan to put little-girl-woman-Myra into the system and he nodded. She grabbed her bag and threw it in the boot of Raven's car before turning back to her family.

She put her arms out. "Hugs!"

Wolf was nearest and very nearly choked her before putting her on her feet and Weasel had his turn squeezing her. She made her way around the group, collecting her month of hugs to get her through whatever the trip entailed until finally she was in Tanith's arms and they held each other tightly.

"I'll see you for the ultrasound," Valkyrie whispered. "I promise."

"I know," Tanith said, pulling away tearily. "I put snacks in the car for you."

"You've turned into a mother hen," Valkyrie grinned at her and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "I love you."

"Love you too. Have fun," Tanith said.

She waved at them all and got into the front passenger seat of Raven's car. Raven was in after a few moments talking to Crow and sat down with a bit of a pink blush on his cheeks. They drove away to the others waves and Valkyrie couldn't help but feel both teary and excited.

.*****.

The Temple was as dark as it always was and there was no one there to greet them, as she expected.

It was barely eleven when they walked through the large doors and Raven led Valkyrie down to the student rooms which she had briefly walked past before but never to stop. He gave her the key to number thirty-seven silently and she opened the door.

It was as dark and unluxurious as she expected. She was good at this detective thing.

It had a wrought iron bed frame, a double, with a mattress, pillows and duvet, and the covers for all that folded neatly at the end. She had a small rug next to the bed, the floors were made of stone, and she additionally had a desk and chair, single door wardrobe with a small drawer beneath it, and several shelves in the cold, dark stone walls. It was a really chilly room but didn't look as horribly dark as she thought it would be. The sheets were a light purple which surprised her. It was kind of nice, in a gothic minimalist way.

She dragged her suitcase to the middle of the room and quickly pulled off her jacket and let Raven help her get one of the robes she had to wear and put it over her shoulders. She didn't much like it, but it did combat the cold. She wrapped it around herself for warmth.

"This isn't so bad," she whispered.

"No one can hear you," Raven replied.

"It's too quiet to talk."

"Hmm. Quick, collect your books for the day. Third period is about to start and you need to be present."

She gathered the books and other things he'd already told her was good to bring as well as her highlighters which student Necromancers were somehow not exposed to. She had brought several in neon pink and yellow to be extra obnoxious. Perhaps if she wrote 'Please be friends with me' on her forehead they'd think it was cute and like her?

Raven rushed through the halls with Valkyrie on his heels and they almost ran through the library, stopping finally at a very long hall that had a group of student in the middle of it all looking grumpy and irritable. They looked to be between fifteen and seventeen – Necromancers, not being as popular as other magics and liking to hide their children and students away, had several years in one class since there just wasn't enough students to fill a single year. She was fifteen and a half, so she was the third youngest for her class. There was someone that had been moved up a class recently when they got onto grade eighteen at age sixteen. She was more grateful for Raven's guidance now.

"How do I look?" She asked quickly, turning to him.

"Lovely," he said with a very small smile. "You have a bit of hair though..."

She sorted it and got a nod. Walking swiftly, she left him and joined the back of the group silently. They didn't notice her. They continued to be silent.

This was going to be an entertaining month.


	78. Boring

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 78**

The door to the classroom opened and they all trailed in without comment. Valkyrie glanced down the corridor before she went in, but Raven was already gone. She looked around the room as everyone else sat down and found a seat in the middle that had no person in it, the only chair free. Moving carefully around the desks, she sat down.

The classroom was designed to be somewhat spacious, so the desks were large and each had two chairs so everyone had a buddy. Valkyrie's buddy was a girl, someone she hadn't met before, and was tapping her finger on her lap irritably. She was glaring at the front of the room. Valkyrie gently put her books on the table, thankful that everyone else had the same and she hadn't messed up somehow and got out her pen from her pocket. The teacher, a very elderly man with wisps of white hair and a dark, heavy robe around his shoulders, looked over them condescendingly.

"Who has finished 'The Intimacy of Living' by Fang Swollen?" He asked in a croaking, slow voice.

The class raised their hands quickly, and Valkyrie followed suit.

"Good," he crooned. "Chapter thirty-two, page three-hundred and eighteen. 'The soul is irrelevant to the bodies ability to move'. Who here can tell me how that is correct?"

All the hands went back up, but Valkyrie's didn't. She was halfway to putting her hand up when he put his small, milky eyes on her.

"You." He asked, pointing a very wrinkled, pale finger at her. "Tell me, how is Swollen correct?"

 _Firstly, he has a stupid name_ , Valkyrie thought. "His theory is based on the idea the soul and body are separate, which is a concept not yet proven. We can't know for sure either way if he is correct because we don't know enough about the soul within the body."

He smiled meanly. "Theory? Miss Cain, Cleric Swollen is one of the most respected Necromancers in our culture."

"That doesn't make him right. He might be, but we can't be certain until we know how the soul and body are connected."

He smiled a little meaner. "Do not talk back to me, Miss Cain. No, Cleric Swollen is correct because when a person dies, they lose life. When life is lost, as is the soul. The soul has to be irrelevant to the body’s ability to move because if was not, the body would not be able to do what?"

Hands went back up, and he picked another. "Miss St. Clair?"

"The body would not be able to come back as a zombie if it was not able to act without a soul, sir," Melancholia St. Clair said. Valkyrie knew her and didn't like her that much. She was fun to wind up.

"Correct. Students, without a soul, a body can still move. It can be possessed, it can grow, it can have conscious thought. But it is not alive. For instances, a zombie. It no longer has a life, so it no longer has a soul. But it can move. Another example."

Valkyrie raised her hand. He picked her. "A reflection?"

"Are you asking me, or telling me?"

"I'm asking. It was not born and never had a soul, but it can be possessed, it can turn into a vampire, it can become a zombie, and it can move all on its own. But I wonder since it never had a soul to begin with, can it be considered a human body or is it still an image?"

He looked at her for a long time, considering her more so than the question. "It is not a human, so it is not a true body."

"So if it isn't a true body, why is it moving?"

"Please do not try and poke a hole in–"

"I'm not," she said and quickly added "sir" when he glared. "I'm just curious. If it isn't a body, and is just a reflection, an object, then how come it can move?"

"It is made of magic, Miss Cain."

"So is Skulduggery Pleasant, but it is agreed that he is kept animated by the presence of his soul. Without that, he'd fall apart. He's kept together because he has a soul. But you can take his soul away and he'll fall apart and not move. Assuming that theory is, again, correct."

"Yes, assuming so," he said slowly.

"So his magic has nothing to do with his ability to move or anything else for that matter, you can take it away and he's fine, but not so with his soul. The same surely wouldn't be so for a reflection. So how come it can move if you put magic binding shackles on them? Surely it should fall to the floor if the thing making it animated, like Skulduggery's soul, is taken away?"

"If you remain after class I will explain how a reflection works, Miss Cain," he said with narrowed eyes. "However, this class is not a seminar. It is a lecture. I wish now to go back to my original question of asking for another example of how a soul does not make a human, lifeless body move?"

**.*****.**

Lunchtime felt like a lifetime away in Mentor Baniti's classroom, and when she finally could leave, she packed up slowly to see if he really did try to tell her how a reflection was kept animated. He left before the whole of the class had fully packed away.

She sighed in her head and got her stuff together, pocketing that pen before she lost it, and followed the quiet group to the Dining Hall which she had been in before but only in the high ranking tables as Raven's apprentice since he was a Cleric and so allowed all those high table privileges. Now she was a mere, boring student and had to sit on the student table, right in the middle as her class was a middle-ageing compared to the other classes. The elder students were further to the right, the younger ones to the left. A seat had been left between each class, and Valkyrie escaped being left out of the table altogether by being fast enough to sit down.

She had sat at the very right of the class, which continued to ignore her in union, and looked over at the elder class. A red headed girl was already smiling at her over the chair between them.

"Hey," she said quietly, getting glared at by her classmates. She didn't seem to care. "You're Valkyrie Cain, right?"

"I am," she nodded. "It's nice to meet you."

She laughed softly. "And yourself. My name's Militsa Gnosis. I've seen you sitting way over there a few times."

She was pointing to Raven's spot on the high table, only a few seats from the middle where the High Priest and his three High Clerics would usually sit. They weren't there that day. They usually only ate breakfast with everyone, Raven had told her, and would have meals brought to them at other times. "Yes, I have," Valkyrie said. "I'm good friends with Solomon now. I don't think the other Clerics like it when I sit there."

"Why not? Other apprentices do," Militsa questioned.

"It's because I don't stop talking, I think," Valkyrie smiled.

Militsa laughed. "Oh, I'm exactly the same. I've gotten kicked out of the library so many times for talking too much. You'll have to tell me if I start annoying you because if I think I am I'm not going to be able to stop talking, it's like a downward spiral of words for me."

"Don't worry, I can handle it. Say, you don't know if there's a pact saying no one should talk to me, do you?"

She hesitated. "Why'd you say that?"

"Because no one but you has spoken to me and I thought they'd all be telling me to leave by now."

Militsa shook her head. "I wouldn't know. They have the same pact for me if they do though. I came here eight years ago and almost no one talks to me still."

"Did you come from Scotland by any chance?"

"Yes. I have a patriotic voice," Militsa grinned. "Oh, it's your turn to get food."

Valkyrie turned and noticed all the food coming her way on bowls. It was being passed down the table quickly, and Valkyrie was quick to grab herself two sandwiches before they were shoved by the girl in front of her down the table, the same happening for Militsa. Both of them came away with just their meagre sandwiches which everyone else had rather high plates of fruits, vegetables and sandwiches that definitely weren't bread and butter like her and Militsa had.

"See?" Militsa said. "They have the same pact against us."

The mood for the day had been set after that, and although she seemed to have found an ally in Militsa, who she saw in the halls between class and sat a table away from in free study period, as well as during dinner, no one else spoke to her and the other teachers didn't so much as let her answer a question. Valkyrie blamed her first teacher of the day for spreading rumours. She’d genuinely had questions!

But, she could put her hand up for everything and pretend she understood like everyone else and it didn't matter if she didn't. No one even looked at her.

By the time it got to the very end of dinner and they had no more classes, she was worn down. She hadn't dared try to talk to someone or show it on the outside, but it was frustrating. At least if they were telling her to leave she'd be able to shout at them. As it was, she was just being left to stew. They were too good at it.

She spent most of the evening going over a book she found in the library. Books weren't her thing, usually, but she knew she wanted to get into being a Necromancer student for a month, so she had taken one out. The others had taken two or more. She barely got more than a few chapters in before she slammed it closed and rubbed her eyes in frustration.

It was only day one, she comforted herself. She didn't have to pass anything but her exams, which she could do. All she had to do was prove she wasn't stupid and she'd be allowed to stay.

She went to sleep with that comfort.


	79. Militsa

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 79**

She woke in a panic to the sound of someone knocking on her door, rushed out of bed and wrapped her robe around her shoulders to open the damn door.

Raven was there.

"Good morning Valkyrie," he said pleasantly, stepping into the room. "I see you've made the room your own."

She kicked the pile of dirty washing under her desk and closed the door. "It's fine. What are you doing here? You nearly gave me a heart attack."

"I'm very sorry," he said with a smile. "I am here to begin your morning tuition."

"Morning tuition?" She asked. "What's that?"

"It is the private tutoring an apprentice receives every morning and Sunday when the other students have free time. You will want to get dressed for the day now for our activities," he told her. "I did warn you about your busy schedule."

She sighed and gathered her clothes together, getting a look at the clock on her time as she did and gasped in shock. "Solomon Wreath, it is five in the bloody morning!"

"I know."

"This is not an okay time to wake me up," she glared.

"Temple students are more adjusted than you to our times," he said with a slight frown of consideration. "Students must wake at five each morning, and they get themselves dressed and ready for the day. They then self-study until seven, when they go to the Dining Hall for breakfast at a quarter past seven. Then they have a dedicated time slot for library studies. This is how students are able to complete at least one book a day, though I know your class has a lot of high achievers in it. It is the seventh best class we have had since this particular Temple was built in fourteen-seventy-nine."

"Whoopie," she muttered. "Turn around."

He did and she quickly got herself ready – thankfully remembering deodorant at the very last moment – and Raven continued to lecture her. "After morning library study, students begin morning class at nine, which follows until quarter to eleven, a short break, and next class. That leads to lunch, a further class, a break, and another class. That last class leaves us at quarter to five, where students have a half hour break and then dinner, and then the library time once more before students have free time to do as they wish until morning. We did go through this several times."

"I know," she sighed. "Do you know why no one's talking to me?"

"I did notice the other students were being particularly quiet yesterday."

"Well, they're ignoring me. And another student, Militsa, the one from Scotland? She says she's been ignored since she came here eight years ago. She doesn't have a single friend," Valkyrie told him and she searched through her drawer for where she'd dumped her socks. "I sort of thought everyone was going to either hate me or be super interested in the outside world. Literally no one cares and it's so frustrating."

Raven sighed. "I'm sorry Valkyrie, but there's nothing I can do. Although I am a Cleric, I am not a very well-liked or respected one. If I said anything about your treatment, or Militsa's more importantly as a permanent resident, it would likely cause more humiliation than good."

"Why don't they like you?"

"Because I believe in the outside world. I believe we should be open about our expectations and our lives and goals. I don't believe our students get a full, nurturing childhood. They need at least one parent or caregiver to love them, not a room full of other children and many busy teachers that only care for their continual good grades."

"I never knew you were trying to improve Necromancer kids' wellbeing," Valkyrie said in surprise. "I'm ready by the way."

He turned around. "I have been very interested in the children's wellbeing. You see, in the war, we suffered immense losses despite not having a side in the war. Of course, many of us still chose to fight, including our High Priest though he didn't have that title at the time, and you know I protected Serpine as I thought it was best for Skulduggery's health, but the Temple itself did not pick one or the other. Despite that, we suffered greatly. We actually abandoned this Temple in the eighteen hundreds, but the new one was destroyed, as well as almost our population. We had to return here with barely a hundred members, most of which were suddenly childless, parentless, friendless and none of us had a single possession but the clothes on our backs and this Temple."

He led them out into the hall after grabbing the library book from her desk and led her down the halls.

He continued the story. "There was a suggestion, after a few years of struggling to get ourselves and our resources together, that we send groups to other Temple's in order to begin our repopulation. Of course, most of us were widows or had suffered a serious tragedy such as the death of a child. I myself had lost an apprentice I'd had since he was barely six. None of us wanted to remarry or have new children. So, it was I that suggested we begin adopting the children of sorcerers that had been abandoned or orphaned in the war."

"How many did you get?"

"It was a slow process. We began with three brothers, ages ten, eight and two. They were nice boys but unhappy. They never liked the Temple, but when we brought in four new boys about their ages, they perked up and we realised they needed more children their age to help their social and mental wellbeing. I pushed, successfully, for more children and after fifty years we had gone from barely a hundred Necromancers to six hundred with another forty in our care."

"That was pretty quick," Valkyrie said. She was more horrified by the sheer amount of children that had been orphaned or left because of the war. So many young lives affected.

"It was. It was too much too fast, and many of our young ranks showed it. They were not interested in wholesome lives, some barely even cared about their own lives, and many committed suicide in their teens or went on to commit crimes. We had over twenty sexual predators, which we believe is because they did not know how to process their emotions and never received counselling for their time in the war, or times in orphanages which had as many problems with sexual predators as mortal ones were rumoured to at the time. Almost none of our children had been taught how to process or deal with emotion. We had damaged the children by looking at numbers and expecting them to look after each other instead of thinking of their primary care. They did not need a hundred friends. They needed companionship and guidance, someone to tell them right from wrong. And we failed to see that."

"Which created criminals," Valkyrie concluded in horror.

"Yes," he said. "But more than that. It created unstable adults with a lot of magic and power. They were highly intelligent. But if they got angry, as a child they were sent away to be quiet as there were so many other children. We cannot send away an angry adult. They began to lash out. We created people that were worse than criminals if only because we cannot fully blame their actions on them. We knew exactly what had caused it when we looked away from our own unstable lives to see what we'd done. Which, ironically, meant we went to a lot of Temple's across the world to work one on one with the new Necromancers to help them. Now we have many of those orphans in our numbers and around the world, and we look after any new orphans a lot better, as we do still take in orphaned children since we do not have particularly high birth rates."

"Are they better? The old orphans?"

"Much better. And any that committed serious crimes, such as the predators, were punished for it as well as helped. They were not allowed back here, of course, but they now understand what they have done, which we are happy with," he explained. "They have never, and likely never will, commit such crimes again. I don't like to lessen what they did, but most of them truly didn't understand how what they were doing was wrong as they were acting exactly as had been as children. We had never told them adults didn't act that way with each other, that _children_ shouldn't act that way. We cannot leave children alone with nothing but their trauma and expect them to grow out of it."

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "Well, at least they aren't like that anymore. Even if it's really horrible. For everyone."

"Exactly. And that is the story of how I began trying to help our students achieve better welfare. I realised our mistakes and I've encouraged the Education Council and our High Priest to bring in fewer students to give us more one on one time, and to assign permanent caregivers to the children that do not have parents to help again with their emotional upbringing. It's helped a lot, but some outside time would also be good, I think, to help them be more well-rounded. But, although I enjoy giving you a history lesson, were needed at the library at five fifteen in the morning for something else."

She groaned. "Don't remind me of the time. I was actually enjoying that history lesson."

He grinned. "We're here for a study on Necromancer objects."

"We've been through that."

"But at a grade _twelve_ level," Raven reminded her meanly. "You'll enjoy it."

"I beg to differ," she gripped, taking a seat heavily.

.*****.

Valkyrie spent the whole day getting ignored, once again, by her class and found herself thankful for the early start despite how tired she was because she'd at least had a bit of human interaction that day. Though, that wasn't entirely fair. One of the Mentors they'd had that day, Mentor Emblem, was much younger and even had a little colour to her light skin which indicated time in the real world, and had chosen her a few times in class and given her, and everyone, equal praise when they were correct. She very much liked Mentor Emblem.

Thinking about it more, she had spent both lunch and dinner talking to Militsa, who'd even waved her over for food and had been ready to continue their lunchtime conversation as if they hadn't been split up for several hours. She sighed to herself in bed, knowing she wasn't being fair. She had made an ally, and she still had a friend in Raven. She'd even been able to have a short talk with Tanith that evening to talk about what had happened so far, which had been nice.

Now all she had to do was get her body clock in order so she could work on her Necromancy books. Excitement.

.*****.

**_The next day, library time, after dinner_ **

"Hey," Militsa said quietly, a stack of books in her arms. "Can I sit with you?"

Valkyrie looked at her for a moment, a little too long perhaps, and then quickly nodded and pulled her stuff out the way of the other chair. "Sure, of course."

"Thanks," Militsa said. "I always get so bored in library study period. I like to work next to someone. What are you reading now?"

Valkyrie picked up the book Raven had helped her pick out that morning. "About the psychological connections Necromancers have with their Necromancy objects," she said, putting it back down. "It's really interesting."

"You quite like phycology, hu?" Militsa observed, looking over Valkyrie's stack of books. "I guess you need to be to be a detective though."

"I suppose. I've just always been interested in how people work and why they have certain emotions," Valkyrie said. "But I couldn't be a councillor. I'd get frustrated too quickly with the patients."

Militsa laughed quietly. "Same. I wouldn't mind being a teacher, maybe, but not to very little ones. I guess that's not got much phycology though. Sorry."

"It's fine. Why do you want to be a teacher?" Valkyrie asked. She praised having a distraction from her books.

Militsa bit her lip and looked around quickly. "Do you want to get a drink with me?"

Valkyrie hesitated. "So we don't distract people?"

Militsa nodded quickly. "Yeah, yes, exactly. I know a little tearoom we can go to."

They packed up quietly and rushed from the room before a teacher saw them. They walked to higher levels of the Temple, getting to a place Valkyrie recognised, and then cut left down a deserted hall where Valkyrie knew the security room was, even if she'd never been in there.

Militsa opened a door to an empty room with sofas and a small counter and a kettle with a shelf of mugs.

"They have a new staff room at the other end of the hall," Militsa explained. "It's a student room now but not many people use it."

"It's a little far away, I guess."

"Yeah," Militsa said, putting her books on the coffee table. She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear and looked around somewhat nervously. "Here, I'll make some tea. Sit down."

Valkyrie did what she said and took off her robe too as it was starting to itch around her neck and feel a little too heavy on her shoulders. She was just wearing regular clothes beneath, though she knew she was meant to be wearing smarter things. She had picked black, tight jeans and a pair of lace-up black shoes that she really liked, and a black t-shirt Tanith had got her that was low enough at the front to draw attention but still somewhat modest and was tight all the way. Not too much attention, obviously, because she lacked boobage. She hadn't picked those clothes for any purpose other than their comfort, but now she was suddenly faced with exactly what her family and friends had been saying about.

She was alone with another girl, who happened to be really pretty and very nice.

It didn't necessarily mean anything, but it did make Valkyrie a little more conscious of her looks and she flattened her hair while Militsa had her back turned. Just in case.

Militsa came back with their tea a few moments later and nearly spilt it when she tripped over her own bag. Valkyrie jumped and reached out to catch her, stopping her from burning them both.

Militsa blushed and smiled at Valkyrie, handing her a mug. "Thanks. You're even stronger than you look." She went a little redder.

Valkyrie took a breath and smiled. "Thank you. I couldn't let a pretty girl get hurt."

Militsa smiled. "What about an average one?"

"They might have fallen a little further," Valkyrie smirked. "You were going to tell me why you wanted to be a teacher?"

She sat opposite Valkyrie and blew on her tea. "Yes, I am. I think I want to be a teacher because I enjoy being with people. And I guess I want to make sure kids don't get left out as much as I am."

"Do you think you'll stay in the Temple?"

Militsa slumped a little. "I don't know. I don't much like it here. The other students don't talk to me, there's no support, no one to talk to. They all just say once I've finished my education and get a job I'll be happier, meet new people. They even tell me I can go to other Temple's if I'd rather. But I love Ireland, you see, I specifically asked to come here instead of Australia or America when they asked, and I don't want to leave now. But it's just so hard when no one even cares."

Valkyrie nodded, considering what she was saying. "You could just defect from the Temple. You have all the knowledge you need and you can still be a Necromancer if you want, and be a teacher in Ireland. There's nothing stopping you leaving."

She shook her head. "I don't have any money. I don't even have qualifications. If I leave, I won't have a single thing to live off of."

"Do you not have parents or other family in Scotland?"

"No one," Militsa said sadly. "I used to, but they died when we had a small explosion in the night. In the Scottish Temple, they keep families together and parents raise their own kids. Here, it's so much more… unemotional. There's no real investment in the kids. I think after everything that's happened to the Irish Temple, everyone just likes to disassociate from the kids just in case something happens. I don't have a single friend to lend me any money, or any family in Scotland. That explosion I said about? It turned into a fire. Luckily, it was contained, but the blast killed some people. My family was already dead, but the fire was so horrible. I was in the hospital for weeks before they told me they were dead at all."

"Why didn't anyone say?"

"The High Priest lost his daughter," she explained, picking at her robe and revealing her black blouse and skirt. "I think everyone was so devastated that no one really wanted to tell me more bad things had happened. So they left me. It's kind of always been the same since."

Valkyrie watched her in concern as she picked at her robe and stood, moved around the table, and sat next to her. Militsa looked up at her with a sad smile.

"I'm sorry, I got a little carried away," she said. "I didn't exactly mean to bore you with all that. I guess, what I really want to do, is help people. Sort of like you."

"But with less punching," Valkyrie smiled.

"But with a lot less punching," Militsa agreed with a laugh. She had a really pretty laugh, Valkyrie found herself noticing. And really pretty red hair, with little golden streaks. Sort of like how Nadia had almost black hair with subtle red strands you could only see in the most perfect lighting. "What made you want to be a detective?"

Valkyrie blinked and sat back a little, realising she had been leaning into Militsa. She swallowed. "I like to be active. I like to use my head. I guess, with all the crazy things and people being a detective brings, I just really enjoy it all. Plus there's the psychology element in there. It feels really good to finally get someone after searching for weeks and getting really emotionally invested in the victim and witnesses."

"Will you tell me about one of your cases?" Militsa asked excitedly.

Valkyrie laughed. "Sure, I guess. Well, one of my favourites was a man we had been hunting for eight weeks on and off. Sometimes we, that being me and Skulduggery, had to be pulled for another dangerous case as the other detectives can't always do them, so we'd put other people on watch duty and our suspect would get away every time that happened. It was so frustrating I wanted to just give up, but Skulduggery kept pushing me to do it. Well, we found him eventually. He was about to kill all these mortals, a couple of tourists he'd rounded up without us knowing. We had _no_ backup. _No_ plan. We just had to start talking and hope for the best."

"And you got him?" She asked with a grin.

"Yes. We got the bombs disarmed–" Militsa grinned excitedly "–and then he took off and I had to chase him myself as Skulduggery was stuck in one of the stupid traps. I got him up to the roof and he turned around with a gun, but I tackled him so quick I didn't realise he had one until we were falling off the building. We both would have died if Skulduggery, somehow, hadn't gotten free and jumped out a window and caught me right before I hit the concrete."

Militsa laughed. "You really like to cut it close."

" _I_ don't. He does. I think he finds it exciting since he's dead and all," Valkyrie said, rolling her eyes. "It does get the blood pumping, I can tell you that."

"I bet. I would love to do something like that. Run around like a crazy woman and arrest people," Militsa said. She laughed suddenly. "And I bet the pay isn't half bad either."

"It's not, but we do risk our lives every day, so I guess we deserve it," Valkyrie grinned. "Even the paper pushers get good money. You could start out there for cash and then get your qualification."

"I'll have to think about it. I still don't know what I want, I guess. But I'll get there."

"I'm sure you will. No one could turn down a cute girl like you."


	80. A beautiful moment

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 80**

The first week of being a Necromancy student was tiring but eye-opening.

The tight, strict schedule opened Valkyrie's eyes to the wonder of basic organisation, better time management and honestly, it made her feel like a different person. She spent a good half hour one evening tidying her temporary room and spent the time thinking of how to make her own room more manageable, and even went as far as to write down ways to do that. She enjoyed the idea of an always clean room so much, she admitted her lack of skill to Militsa who, after laughing at her, helped her write down a few more things she could do to help herself. It was a strange thing to get excited about, and she knew that, but a manageable room _would_ be a blessing.

Other than learning some general life skills, she was also keeping up with the class. She quickly learnt which Mentor's liked what, who she could talk with and who she couldn't push the buttons of, and also began to make some headway with her classmates. She could sit down without being glared at now. And she was even able to finish a book a day, making her a little less different to them. It was all the little things that made a difference, Valkyrie knew.

Raven was proud of her and had told her, that Wednesday morning, that he had a meeting with the High Priest about her alongside a few Mentors. She was a little nervous, but she knew she had done well. She had done a mock test with the others and had been rated forty-seven per cent knowledgeable on grade twelve content despite only being at that level for a handful of days.

She'd surprised herself and Raven as she hadn't thought she'd been trying to learn. But it all went towards convincing the High Priest she could not only stay but also be allowed to go visit Tanith.

She would find out the next day, unfortunately, so Wednesday had to be spent working as usual. It threw her off to suddenly have something happening outside the dark walls. It reminded her of the oppression.

Lunch was the second high point of the day, the first being Raven in the mornings, made all the sweeter by a new, strange seating arrangement. The two classes, that being her own and Militsa's, had deemed the two of them unworthy and had pushed more space between themselves, so Valkyrie and Militsa could sit properly next to each other to talk. It also meant the plates couldn't be passed down as quickly from then on, so they could have more food. They'd grinned and giggled like little schoolgirls all of lunch.

The next high point was when a classmate that hated her guts fell flat on his face.

Then was dinner and more Militsa. Then library study, also spent with Militsa, where they studied hard and then ran off to the old staffroom for tea and gossip.

That part of the day was one of Valkyrie's favourites.

The conflicting feelings were not.

Militsa blushed. "Valkyrie?" She asked her, snapping Valkyrie back to attention. "You alright? You looked a little spaced out."

"I was just thinking over the week," she smiled into her tea, thinking more of those conflicting feelings. "And us."

Militsa licked her lips nervously and sat a little closer to Valkyrie. "Will you tell me what you're thinking?"

Valkyrie swallowed, trying to not let her nerves get the better of her. She shrugged. "I guess just how we've become friends. And how we're spending a lot of time getting to know each other."

Militsa nodded. "I was thinking of that yesterday."

"How do you feel about it?"

She hesitated. "I'm not sure."

That surprised Valkyrie. She'd been pretty forward in her actions towards Valkyrie in terms of liking her company, flirting and she certainly blushed a lot. Perhaps Valkyrie had been too hopeful. "In what way?"

"In that, I'm four years older than you," Militsa said, brushing hair behind her ear. "I mean, there has to be a rule against a fifteen and nineteen-year-old being, err, together, right?"

Valkyrie thought about it. "Probably," she conceded slowly. "But I'm not sure that's quite the same in the magic community. I mean, we live for hundreds of years. Ages aren't the same."

"Yes, but an adult and minor still can't date," Militsa said.

Valkyrie nodded. "Yes, that's true. But I don't think nineteen is necessarily considered an adult. Since mages live so long, you just aren't considered a real adult, so to speak. You're nineteen. It's legal age in Ireland but it's not considered _real_."

Militsa considered her words. "I know you're right, but I just can't shake the feeling off."

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "The thing is, I'm not exactly in a position to be in a real relationship right now." She saw Militsa sag a little and bit her lip. "But I do want to continue what we're doing."

"But you don't really like me," Militsa said sadly.

"That's not true," Valkyrie said quickly, louder than she meant to. She lowered her voice a little at Militsa's shocked face. "I just – look, I really love my ex-girlfriend. I'm utterly in love with her. But she broke up with me last September."

"So you're single?" Militsa asked slowly.

"Yes. But I'm not sure if I want to get back with her or not. She was kind of pressured to break up with me, and I'm just trying to work out if I want to try and work us out or if I'd rather not since she chose pressure over me, because I really, really adore her but she said she wouldn't do it and she did and it's been hurting me for months. I don't know what to do."

Militsa nodded. There was a frown on her face, and it made Valkyrie realise Militsa had really nice eyebrows. Her head was not in the right place. "What do you think you'll do?"

Valkyrie shrugged. "I don't know yet. My brother Anton said I need to just do things and eventually, I’ll just know exactly what I want. It's why I decided to come here. And my brother Dexter said I should see someone else, just a little bit, to make me less, I don't know, unhappy. I suppose that's why I met you."

She smiled. "You think it's fate?"

"I don't believe in fate. But it's definitely a happy coincidence. I'd like to spend time with you like I would if my ex didn't exist, but I don't love you. I think you're beautiful, kind, fun and really attractive, but I don't want to pretend like I want to be your girlfriend when I don't exactly know what I want myself. I just don't want to make it seem like just because I'm not sure that I'll suddenly want to be with you. Not because you're not good enough, because I do like you, but because I don't want to stay in the Temple, for one, and also because I can't forget Nadia. I'm going to need a lot longer than this even if I decide not to try again with her."

Militsa nodded. "I understand."

"You do?"

"I do. I don't like it, but I understand," she said, a sad but considerate look on her face. "I kind of hoped we could be a thing, so thank you for telling me the truth."

Valkyrie hesitated. "Can I give you a hug?"

Militsa said nothing for a moment. "You said you didn't want a relationship."

"I want a friendship at the least, and I've made you upset. That calls for a hug. But if you don't want to, that's okay too."

Militsa hugged Valkyrie, innocently enough at first, but then Valkyrie felt her smile against her cheek and she lowered her head into Valkyrie's neck and she jumped onto Valkyrie's lap. Valkyrie grunted under the sudden weight, but after adjusting a little, she was alright.

And it felt damn good to have someone on her lap.

She held Militsa tightly, almost possessively, for long minutes, breathing the smell of her hair and skin. It was a subtle scent of warmth and books, but it had something personal in it that made it Militsa. She found herself comparing Militsa and Nadia once more, noticing how she felt Militsa was a comfort smell while Nadia was so different from anything else she knew, was so intoxicating and beautiful even in smell that poor Militsa was honestly nothing in comparison to Nadia.

But right there and then, Militsa was with her and Nadia wasn't. So Valkyrie ran her hand up and down Militsa's back and breathed her in.

**.*****.**

"Are you ready?" Raven asked.

"Very," Valkyrie said seriously. They were making their way up and out of the Temple to meet with Tanith for her first ever ultrasound scan. The two of them were very excited.

Panda was too but he was more stressed than anything as far as Valkyrie could work out from her and Tanith's texting in the evenings.

Raven just smiled and led her up to the doors. There, they paused and looked at each other in the sun, breathing in the fresh air with gratitude.

"I'll see you in a few hours," Valkyrie said, moving in for a hug.

He hugged her back tightly. She was loving his hugs. She'd gotten a few in now and they were almost as good as Wolf's. "I know. Stay safe and have fun."

"Sure thing, _Dad_ ," she grinned sassily. He blushed a little but grinned massively and waved at her as she ran for the white van parked at the curb.

Tanith jumped out the van as she came up and wrapped her arms around Valkyrie as they squealed. Valkyrie was so excited she even picked Tanith up and twirled her around.

"It's so good to see you," Valkyrie grinned.

"You too," Tanith said. "And I'm pretty sure you grew again."

"No, I didn't."

"I think you did. Do your trousers still fit?"

"Yeah."

Tanith hummed in disapproval.

"You sound like a real mum," Valkyrie said as they got in the back of the van.

"I am a real mum," Tanith laughed, and then laughed some more because it was so weird.

"Hi Ghastly," Valkyrie said, waving at him.

He waved into the mirror. "Hey, Cub. How's the Temple treating you?"

"It's been good. I, err, made a friend," she said, blushing.

Tanith gasped dramatically. "You have a girlfriend."

"I do _not_ have a girlfriend," Valkyrie quickly and perhaps a little harshly. Panda raised a non-existent eyebrow at her in the mirror as they set off. "She's just a friend. We haven't so much as kissed."

"Ah," Tanith said knowingly. "She's a pet."

"She's not a pet either," Valkyrie grumbled. "She's just my friend."

"That's you'd like to bang," Tanith said knowingly.

Valkyrie held in her laugh. "That I'd like to get to know."

"And then bang," Panda said with a grin in the front seat.

"And that's what got you both here," Valkyrie said sweetly.

"What, in a van?" Tanith asked, getting a packet of crisps out from Valkyrie didn't know where.

Valkyrie just rolled her eyes. They chatted about the set up for the baby’s room and how Tanith and Panda were part-time living together in their new, joint room as well. It seemed to be working out nicely and they were spending at least four nights a week sleeping together now as well as going on lots of dates and Tanith was helping in Panda's shops most days also, helping them grow together as a couple before they suddenly had the baby and were expected to work seamlessly.

She was impressed they had worked so hard to make a plan. Of course, Tanith was only three and a bit months pregnant, so they had lots more time.

Valkyrie really hoped they stayed together. Not just for her niece or nephew, but because she thought the two of them were adorable.

The mortal maternity place they were using, a private one in the countryside halfway between Gordon's and Dublin centre, was warm and pretty, with a big, flowery garden, a wood fence and large windows. It had a small communal dining area and a large living area for expectant and new mothers. It was honestly really lovely, and if Valkyrie had been pregnant, she'd have felt as comfortable with the place as Tanith obviously was. She wondered vaguely how much it was costing them. Well, likely how much it was costing Ghastly seeing as how Tanith made very little money from her job and tutoring Valkyrie.

"Miss Low?" A middle-aged woman asked kindly as they walked in. "It's so lovely to see you again, we have the room ready for your scan. Would you like a cup of tea?"

"I'd love one actually," Tanith said, suddenly intense. "And some biscuits if you have any."

"Oh of course," the lady said with a laugh. She sounded genuine and nice. Valkyrie knew _why_ Panda was paying the surly hefty price tag at least. "Oh, and Mr Bespoke, it is nice to meet you. And who are you, Miss…?"

"Valerie Edgley," Valkyrie said with a slight stutter. "I'm Tanith's half-sister."

"Oh, it is lovely to meet you, Miss Edgley. You must be as excited as the new parents," she smiled. "Would either of you like a cupper too?"

Valkyrie and Panda both said yes and the nice lady went off to do that while the three of them sat down. A mother with a newborn was there, her head back with a relaxed look on her face as she breastfed, only opening her eyes when her phone buzzed. Whatever it said made her smile.

"This place is great," Valkyrie said quietly to Panda who she was sitting next to. Him and Tanith were holding hands, Tanith's other one on her stomach.

"It is," he said back. "Tanith will get a private room for the birth, and we're allowed a bunch of people in the room if we want, and all our brothers can wait in here."

"And my other family," Tanith piped up. "They still exist, remember?"

"I remember."

"Have you told them yet?" Valkyrie asked.

"No," Tanith said, shrugging. "I'll tell them soon, but I don't want them to freak out yet. I want to send the ultrasound pictures."

Valkyrie grinned evilly. "I bet your brother will beat up Panda."

"No, he won't," Tanith argued. "But he _would_ win in a fight."

Panda looked concerned.

"Miss Low?" The lady said, coming into the living area. "Do you want to come this way? I took your teas to the scan room."

The three of them followed her to a nice, spacious room with the scanning equipment in as well as a table with their drinks and a big plate of biscuits. Tanith got straight onto the bed and blew on her tea a few times before putting it down and taking on the snacks.

"How have you been, Miss Low? Has there been any more spotting or discharge?" The nurse asked, putting on gloves.

"Everything's fine now," Tanith assured her. "Our family doctor helped me before I came here."

"That is good," she nodded. "And now about the fatigue?"

"Still awful."

She nodded some more. "It's to be expected. You said you were very active, and did you say you were doing professional fighting? At any rate, whatever it was wasn't for a pregnant woman, no matter how much we preach we aren't delicate during pregnancy. The fatigue will be a mix of generally being busy, stress, and physical exertion in a time your body is working extra to begin growing the baby. It all adds up, you see. Could you sit back for me? There we go, I'm going to put this gel on you and it’ll be a little cold."

The nurse did just that and Tanith didn't so much as flinch at the cold. They all started staring at the screen as the woman, who Valkyrie assumed was also a midwife but could have been a doctor or nurse, she never had said, started running the scan prob over Tanith abdomen.

It took a few moments and some twists, but soon the woman was smiling. "There we are." Valkyrie didn't know what she was looking at. It was all black and grey fuzz. She started pointing. "Right here is the baby. See, it has a little head, and that's the start of its legs."

All at once the image took shape and she stared at it in awe, little tears pricking her eyes. That was a real, live baby, inside of Tanith's belly. It had a head! A torso! Itty-bitty legs! A teeny baby butt! It was perfect and Valkyrie felt her heart lurch for the baby.

She smiled as a tear went down her cheek and she acknowledged the fact she'd give her life for this baby and it didn't even have toes yet.

She looked at Tanith to see her reaction, but her sister and Panda were holding hands and looking at each other. Tanith was grinning, her eyes watery, but Panda was opening sobbing on Tanith's hand.

"It's not every day I get to see the Daddy crying too," the nurse-midwife person said kindly.

"Thank you," Panda whispered through his tears. "She's so beautiful."

Tanith laughed softly and stroked his head. "We don't even know the sex yet."

He sobbed louder and nodded, simply overcome with joy. She caught Tanith's eye over his head and grinned, a tear falling down Tanith's cheek.


	81. A turn of events

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 81**

"How was the scan?" Militsa asked her as they walked to the old staff room after study time once more. Their daily routine. It was nice.

"It was good. Ghastly cried about his beautiful baby and Tanith did too, and I did a little as well, and the doctor laughed at us all and we got to eat all their food and tea. It's such a nice place, honestly, I don't know why all maternity places aren't so pretty, it was so relaxing. I couldn't even hear babies crying but I know there at least a few there, and there was a common room and babysitters to help mums recover and a playroom for any older kids. It was amazing," Valkyrie grinned, a hop in her step. Every time she thought about the baby recently, she'd get excited and walk really bouncy. "I'm so excited. Tanith said she wants me to be there when she has the baby."

"Will her mother not be there?" Militsa asked, opening the door for Valkyrie since Valkyrie was carrying her bags for her.

"I guess so, but she hasn't told her she's pregnant yet. I just hope she says something before they find out from a rumour or something. I'm sure Tanith knows what she's doing. She's acting like she's super pregnant, always eating, super emotional, always tired, forgetful. She's only three and a bit months."

Militsa grinned and shrugged her robe off at the same time as Valkyrie. "Different people act differently for each pregnancy. But it is funny, I suppose."

" _I_ think it is. It's driving Ghastly around the bend," Valkyrie laughed. "So, what did you do yesterday while I was out in the open air?"

Militsa's smile went away a little but she held it just in time. She had a sad little look on her face. "It was alright. I just studied and spoke to one of the teachers and went to my room."

"Sounds like there's something else."

Militsa shrugged, flattening the folds of her pleated skirt carefully.

Valkyrie sighed and walked directly in front of her so Militsa's knees were on Valkyrie's shins. "What's up?" She asked. Militsa looked right up at Valkyrie and blushed. Valkyrie put her hands on her hips.

"I, er, I spoke to some other students. They weren't very nice so I went to my room. Don't worry about it though, I can handle it," she said quickly. "Really. Because if you get involved it'll be even harder once you go. I've had this happen since I got here. I don't want it to get worse."

"I don't want it to happen at all."

"Well, neither do I," Militsa said bitterly. "But this is how it is now. And I don't want to make it worse, alright?"

Valkyrie hummed and sat down on her knees and rested her chin on Militsa's leg. She blushed harder. "If you say so. But you know I'm always there to start a fight."

Militsa smiled. "I know. Trust me, I always remember."

"I'm glad."

There was a moment where they said nothing, just looking at each other, Valkyrie through her eyelashes up at the older girl, admiring the little strands of hair that were so vibrant she could see the fiery colour in each one. Slowly, Militsa reached out a finger and pushed Valkyrie's own hair out her face behind her ear with a little smile. Before she really thought about it, Valkyrie turned her head and placed a kiss on Militsa's palm.

She didn't move her hand. Valkyrie didn't look at Militsa, she just lay her head in her lap. Moving slowly, Militsa started to stroke Valkyrie's hair. She lay like that for who knows how long, enjoying the feeling of long, thin fingers running through her hair and the soft warmth of Militsa's legs. Eventually, the silence was broken by Militsa.

"I've been thinking about what you said. About not staying at the Temple."

"Yeah?" Valkyrie said softly, enjoying the attention.

"I was thinking I'd go to the Sanctuary and see if they'll get me some work. I thought, maybe, if you helped me..."

Valkyrie sat up to look at her, breaking the wonderful spell she'd been under from the stroking. "You want me to put in a good word for you?"

"Well, kind of," she said nervously. "I just thought they'd listen to you, since you’re working for them."

Valkyrie smiled. "I can do my best. I'll ask them when I'm done here and get Solomon to tell you what they say."

"Thank you," she grinned, looking relieved. "I've been wanting to ask you all day. I was so nervous at lunch I thought I'd just say it right then, but I didn't want anyone to overhear. And then at dinner, I thought the same thing, and we got to the library and I sat next to you–"

Valkyrie leaned up and captured Militsa's lips in a kiss. It lasted less than a second, barely a peck, before she leant back and smiled. "It's okay."

"Yeah," she whispered and then blushed violently. "Sorry, that was–"

She kissed her again.

**.*****.**

When it turned five in the morning a few days later, Valkyrie was ready and opened her door quickly to see a smirking Raven with his hand up about to knock.

"You're getting slow," Valkyrie said, walking past him with a smile.

"And you're getting the hang of things," he replied happily.

"Did you see Crow last night?"

"Is it that obvious?" He laughed, a big grin brightening his features.

"Just a little. You look happier after you've seen him," Valkyrie commented. "So what are we doing today?"

His smile lessened and he got serious. They stopped their walk to talk. "Cleric Craven came to the High Priest last night and informed him he believes a girl in your class, St. Clair, is the Death Bringer."

"Melancholia St. Clair?" Valkyrie asked dubiously. "That pipsqueak is the most annoying, easy to anger girl I know. And I've sparred with her before and won by a million miles and with a thousand times more power. There is no way she could be the oh so amazing Death Bringer."

"That's what I thought. But he's begun raving about her and got the High Priest to make her his apprentice. He wants the two of you to fight again. This morning."

Valkyrie gave him a look. "How bad am I allowed to hurt her?"

"Just a little."

"Rubbish," she muttered and kept walking, this time to the sparring room.

Down there was indeed Craven, standing as if to say to the world 'I am the best and the rest of you can rot for all I care.' She doubted that was far from how they felt about her and Raven, but she wondered how Melancholia was feeling about them all considering her hood was hiding her whole face and she was standing straight but didn't have her shoulders back the way Craven did. Maybe she was nervous? She swore in her head when she realised how close Raven and Craven's names were. Then she wondered if she could maybe throw her classmate into Craven and take them both out. That would make life easier.

"Miss Cain," Craven said slowly as they came up as if he'd turned to royalty overnight. "Has your Mentor explained the reason for this test?"

"You want to see if Melancholia is still weak after you told her some bullshit, yeah," she said, dropping her books and robe to the floor. "Luckily, I'm always dressed prepared to fight."

She threw her top off, leaving her in her trainers, thick leggings and a sports bra suited to the fight she was about to get into. It was funny because it was the first time she chose to wear something so completely not allowed and it worked out so very well.

Craven looked down at her from his nose. "I see. I feel obliged to tell you that Melancholia has improved significantly over the last few days, and as her Surge approaches, her strength is becoming more and more obvious. Are you sure you're up for the challenge?"

"Get over here, St. Clair," she grinned, standing on the other side of the room with a big grin. Craven's lips tightened and he used a finger and thumb to pull Melancholia's hood down. She didn't look happy. Actually, she didn't look anything. She was blank and didn't react at all to Valkyrie. That didn't seem right, she thought, right before Melancholia sent a thick wall of shadows at her.

She ducked and rolled to her feet, throwing shadows in Melancholia's face to obscure her vision before sending shadows at her knees. Valkyrie grinned somewhat meanly when Melancholia fell on her face. That faded as she had to watch the girl very, very slowly raise herself to her knees and then to her feet. She looked so pale.

"Something's wrong," Valkyrie muttered, looking closely at the girl. She glanced at Wreath and he looked equally concerned but Craven was just smirking, watching Melancholia with big eyes. It made the hairs on Valkyrie's whole body stand on end. What was going on? Why was Melancholia just doing what she was told? She'd never acted like that before.

Despite her obvious issues, Melancholia _did_ seem to have great control over her magic as she sent another wall of shadows at her, this time lower and higher, more solid and certainly unavoidable. Valkyrie was slammed into the wall on the other side of the massive room.

She felt her vision go when she hit her head and her body lost all feeling. She hit the floor a moment later.

It took some time for her senses to come back to her, and she was able to move her head before anything else. How had she been taken out of the fight so quickly? She watched Craven and Raven shout about something, probably her, and Melancholia slowly walking over to her. She looked so slow. Her hood was up again but the skin she could see was pale as death. Her eyes were half closed and she had almost black bags under her eyes, her lips were nearly blue, and there were little cuts on her face and neck up close. She had obviously been hurt, but Valkyrie wasn't sure how or why or even if it was Craven who did it or if Craven was just using her new powers with no regard to Melancholia's health. She needed answers.

Valkyrie picked herself up just as Melancholia came up to her but she didn't stop walking, and it surprised Valkyrie when the girl was pressed up against her and didn’t move.

At first, Valkyrie figured it was something wrong with her brain, thinking she just couldn't see or feel how close Valkyrie was. But then she felt Melancholia's hand reach hers and wrap around her index finger like a small child, and she knew there was something seriously wrong with Melancholia more so than just her injuries and lack so sleep. Something mental was going on. She was hardly a doctor, but the normally quick to anger, annoying girl was not herself in any way.

She looked over at their Mentor's and saw they were both still wrapped up in arguing with shadows wrapping around them as if they were both ready to lash out so she'd have an opportunity to help Melancholia at least. She wrapped her arms around her and, scrunching her eyes, thought of where she wanted to go, feeling the cold of the shadows wrap around them and take them away.

It took a long time before they reappeared in her room as she was not an experienced shadow walker, and Melancholia had her eyes shut and her body swayed, but they were there and had at least a few minutes before they would have to worry.

"Melancholia?" Valkyrie asked, holding the girl's shoulders. "Melancholia, can you hear me?"

She didn't say anything or react in any way.

"Oh God," Valkyrie whispered, looking at the girl’s face. She couldn't imagine what trauma she could have gone through to switch her personality out so quickly. She needed to work out what to do. She needed help.

Without Raven around, she knew only one other viable option.

It was about to turn six in the morning, so Valkyrie quickly donned her other robe and helped Melancholia lie on her bed to rest. She locked the door, knowing she was really risking the girl being found, but not daring to take her along. The student rooms were not all together as there were so many, but Valkyrie knew vaguely where Militsa's room was. She sprinted down the hall, nearly knocking into someone, and down the correct area the room was in.

"Thank God," she breathed, when she saw Militsa's long, red hair halfway down the hall. Militsa spotted her and started to smile before frowning in concern. Valkyrie sprinted to her. "Quickly," she said, grabbing Militsa's hand.

"What's going–"

"Not now!" She snapped harshly, and they walked quickly back to Valkyrie's room. She unlocked the door and Melancholia was still on the bed, now with her eyes open and staring blankly at the wall. She pulled the girl into a sitting position, her head lolling.

"Valkyrie, what's going on?" Militsa asked nervously.

"Cleric Craven was telling everyone last night that Melancholia is the Death Bringer and wanted me to fight her because last time we did, I won. Solomon agreed, because I'm more advanced at combat than Melancholia and Craven's talking absolute bullshit, and we got there and Melancholia was looking like this. She hasn't said a thing all morning," Valkyrie explained. "Look, she's got all this cuts, and her hair looks chopped."

Militsa came over to the bed and pulled Melancholia's hood down, showing clearly that the hair had been chopped, badly, and was also greasy and unbrushed. Her face was even paler in the horrible lighting, and Valkyrie unclipped the robe to show she was in a black t-shirt that let them see the many, many little wounds on her arms and neck.

"Someone did this to her," Valkyrie muttered. She noticed a darker patch on her shirt and swore before gently lifting the girls top. "She has a massive open wound. We need to take her to a medic."

"Where?" Militsa asked with panic in her voice. "If - If Cleric Craven did this to her, we can't let him get to her."

"I know," she said, wrapping the robe back around Melancholia. She found herself a new top and shoved it in a bag for later - she hadn't planned on taking off her robe that day and had planned on the scars acting as shock factor but not for Militsa - and shoved her phone and purse in there too. "Are you coming with me?"

Militsa bit her lip. "I don't know Valkyrie," she started.

"Just stop them from stopping me alright?" Valkyrie said as she picked Melancholia up. "We need to go before she dies."

Militsa looked pale but nodded and they left the room. People were starting to mill about, making it difficult to get places and to stay unnoticed. After just a few minutes of trying, she swore in Militsa's ear and started running down the halls with her not-girlfriend on her heals right up to the front entrance.

"Hey!" A man said, rushing up to them and holding a hand out. "You can't leave here! You need a pass!"

"I'm leaving," Valkyrie growled out.

"Where's your pass?"

"I don't have one. This girl's going to die if I don't leave and get her medical attention. You stopping us could cost her life. Do you want to be responsible for that?" Valkyrie asked him.

"No," he hesitated. "But you can't–"

Shadows suddenly hit him from behind and he fell forward with a thud and didn't get up. Militsa smiled at her. "Saving people is kind of violent," she said quietly.

"Yeah, it can be. Do you want to come?"

Militsa bit her lip again.

"I need to know now, Mil, I have to go."

She blushed at the name and nodded quickly. "I'll come."

"Good. Now lose the cape."


	82. They're coming for you

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 82**

"Do you know what's wrong with her?" Valkyrie asked Kenspeckle. As soon as she and Militsa got to the Hibernian Cinema and took Melancholia upstairs, his eyes had bulged and he'd had Valkyrie to put her straight onto a bed. After shooing her out, he put Melancholia into an induced coma to give him more ability to work out what was wrong and fix it without her being in pain or whatever was wrong kill her before he could fix whatever that thing was.

"Not yet," he muttered, going to his lab. Valkyrie followed him and Militsa followed her like a lost puppy. She was skittish outside the Temple, and if they hadn't been trying to save Melancholia's life, she'd have probably found it funny and endearing. But they had been, and it had just been irritating and slowed them down. She'd stopped herself from showing it, just, but it was a close thing when they crossed the fifth road. Kenspeckle started rummaging through his drawers. "I have evaluated her exterior for injuries, and her magic for any signs of defects or manipulating, and I have found multiple of each but I am not yet sure what it is that continues to cause her harm."

"Continues to cause harm?" Valkyrie asked with a frown. "So it's like a parasite?"

"It could be," Kenspeckle agreed as he pulled out large tubs and little pallets for tests. "Or it could be an infection or a disease or it could be a spell. I'm having Civet and Stentor look at her internal injuries, as I'm sure she has a few. No, I'm most worried about the damage that could have been caused to her brain."

Valkyrie bit her lip. "She was acting strangely before we got here when I noticed something was really wrong. She came up to me and held my hand – but she couldn't actually do that, so she just held my finger. She was acting like a little kid and was unresponsive after that. She was standing and doing stuff, but she couldn't talk or move."

Kenspeckle muttered something things under his breath and got under the counter and got out a large bowl and began weighing out ingredients or whatever medical powders and herbs and medicines were called when being mixed. He began mashing and then spoke. "There is a chance, although small, that the damage has only affected her brain in so far as to make it protect itself. It is much like what people with depression or other mental illnesses may do. Her brain simply switched off, so to speak, and St. Clare only did the minimal she needed to survive. As you said, she went to you for help, and when she knew you were helping, she did nothing else. Or perhaps her brain is not shutting things out but reverting to a childlike state of mind as a defence against the actions."

"What do you mean?" Valkyrie asked seriously.

"Well, if it were the first option, she may be effectively shutting her thoughts and actions down in order to escape the pain. She cannot feel if she cannot _think_ , so to speak," Kenspeckle explained. He put down his big bowl and started rifling through draws for something again. "Or there is the possibility that people around her have done her harm and she finds that hard to cope with and that is making her act like a child because when she was a child, that did not happen. I have seen it before, but if you say she was acting like herself and it is just this morning all this happened, I do not know how likely that scenario is. I do not, unfortunately, know everything."

"People have different reactions to violence and harm," Militsa spoke up quietly, glancing at Valkyrie. "I mean, you said Cleric Wreath told you that Cleric Craven only started talking about Melancholia yesterday. Maybe it's like, a really big shock to the system?"

"That is a possibility," Kenspeckle said, using a dropper to put some purple liquid into his bowl. "And also true for all the possible things that could have happened to her. A massive shock of poison or trauma, or even witnessing something horrific, can cause people to act strangely and very different. Now, I must think about what caused her physical injuries. You must leave me."

Valkyrie nodded and waved Militsa out the room before closing the door behind them and breathing heavily.

"At least she's in the right hands," Militsa said quietly, fiddling with her top. She didn't like not wearing a robe, it seemed. Valkyrie was enjoying it.

"Yes, I think so. Come on, I need to call my family."

They went downstairs and Valkyrie dialled Crow's number. After a few rings, he picked up.

"Valkyrie," he said. "I didn't expect you to call at eight in the morning. You aren't usually awake."

"There was an emergency," Valkyrie said, sitting on one of the cinema seats and watching Militsa walk around the stage. "You remember I told you how annoying Melancholia St. Clare is and how she's really fun to annoy?"

"The one that gets very angry with you?"

"Yeah. Well, Craven decided she's the Death Bringer yesterday and she's been acting really weird. Not usual weird either, I mean, acting really strong and violent, and then she held my hand and blacked out. Craven and Solomon started arguing about her so I've brought her to Kenspeckle's."

"My, you have been busy. I'll tell the other's and we'll meet you there."

"Okay. But Crow, can you not tell Solomon?" She asked. "I know you're like, kind of with him but haven't really said it and everything, but if he comes, so might the rest of the Temple and Melancholia needs help, not a parade."

Crow hesitated and then sighed. "You're right. Give us a few minutes."

They hung up and Militsa looked at Valkyrie. Valkyrie didn't know what to say, so she closed her eyes and let herself rest for the twenty minutes it took the first of her brothers to arrive.

"Cub!" Wolf shouted into the large hall. Valkyrie jumped up and grinned at him. "Look at you, all grown up and Necromancer-y!"

She laughed and ran at him, so he ran at her and they collided in the middle and fell to the floor in a winded heap. "Love you," she wheezed.

"Love you too, babe," he grinned. He looked behind her and gasped dramatically. "And who is this?"

They stood and Valkyrie looked at Militsa. "This is my friend Militsa Gnosis. She is a real Necromancer, unlike me. So don't go telling everyone I'm a Necromancer now or they'll get confused."

"Sure thing Necro-Cub," he said playfully and strode over to Militsa. She blushed a dark, dark red and tried not to smile at Wolf, the reacting of almost all females around the globe. Valkyrie tried to hide her laugh as Weasel wrapped her in a hug. "Hello, Miss Gnosis. Do you happen to be my baby sister’s girlfriend?"

"Oh. My. God," Valkyrie said into Weasel's shoulder, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

"Err, no, I'm just her friend," Militsa said with a nervous laugh. "We met at the Temple. Well, you probably know that, what am I saying? We're good friends now. We talk after class and have tea a lot."

"That sounds cosy," Wolf commented hopefully.

"It is," she said before her eyes got wide. "But we're just friends. Only friends. Good friends. I swear."

Valkyrie decided then was a good time to intervene as Crow and Snake came in. "We really are just friends," she said calmly. "So stop trying to interrogate her. It's her first time out the Temple, why don't you just show her stuff instead."

He gasped dramatically again. "First time out the Temple? That sounds like a celebration!"

"Dexter, we need to focus," Crow said, putting a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Valkyrie, tell us what happened to Melancholia."

Valkyrie did, and also said what they'd discussed with Kenspeckle. After agreeing it was highly suspicious and that Craven was either the cause of the damage or else he was using it for his own gain, so he may yet know where it came from. They all also decided to believe she was not the so-called Death Bringer as, if she was, she wouldn't have passed out on Valkyrie. She'd have slaughtered her for how annoying she'd been to her. Even Militsa nodded.

And right as they were about to go upstairs and see if any more progress had been made, Raven turned up.

"Valkyrie, Skulduggery," he said quickly. They turned to greet him but stopped short when they saw how panicky he looked. "They're searching for you Valkyrie. You need to hide."

"What do you mean?" She asked quickly.

"You attacked Temple members within the Temple," he said, out of breath. "It's against our law to do that if you are our guest. They're searching for you and they'll put you on trial."

"But I didn't attack anyone," Valkyrie said and then slowly turned to Militsa. "Militsa did."

"No, Valkyrie. Craven has told the Temple as a whole that you attacked St. Clare and abducted Miss Gnosis. They're out searching for you."

Valkyrie looked at Crow and he nodded donning his hat. "Saracen, do you have any ideas?"

"Not really," he said. "But I'd suggest telling Kenspeckle to be on high security. If they genuinely believe one of their students, which he also probably said was the Death Bringer, is right here, they'll break the doors down."

"Agreed. Dexter, go tell them." Dexter shot off up the stairs. "Erskine, call Ghastly and Tanith and tell them what's going on. Valkyrie, could you call the Sanctuary and tell them also?"

She did as ordered and walked to the other side of the room to make the call, glancing at Militsa who was watching her from Crow's side as he and Raven spoke in hushed tones. The phone rang a few times and was then picked up.

"Detective Cain," Tipstaff said formally. It was nice having an Administrator that used a mobile, "what have you done now?"

She frowned. "Why would _I_ have done something?"

"Because you're not meant to be calling the Sanctuary."

She tried to find an excuse. "Okay, yes, that is true. But this isn't my fault. Or completely anyway." She told him the situation with the Temple coming out in hordes after her and the situation with Melancholia but didn't tell him where she was being kept, though she assumed he'd take a correct guess anyway. "I also have a friend from the Temple with me. They think I abducted her."

"Did you?"

"What did I do to make you think I'd do something like that?" She asked hotly.

"You didn't, I just like annoying you," he said with a smile in his voice. She scowled. "If you get your friend to the Sanctuary, we'll put her in a secure room and organise for her to go to a safe house until this is sorted. I'll also inform the Grand Mage and Elder's."

They rang off at the same time as Snake did with Panda and Tanith, and they met back in the middle, Wolf running back down the stairs at the last moment to be a part of the group. He had a massive grin on his face and immediately flung an arm over Weasel. He was too happy. It wasn't fair. She stuck her tongue out at him.

"We need to talk to the High Priest," Raven said to them. "If we talk to him, we can get him to tell everyone else what's going on. But Craven convinced him to put the Temple on lockdown. No one else knows. If they do, I expect they'll panic since almost all the Necromancers, even ones that have never left before, have already left to search."

"Is there another way in?" Valkyrie asked.

"There's the deliveries entrance," he suggested uncertainly. "But they know I know about it, and I doubt they'll let me near considering my connections with you all."

"And _what_ connections they are," Wolf grinned at Skulduggery, who didn't even look at him.

"We'll try and get in from there. Should we expect resistance?" Crow asked.

"I don't know. Craven was telling them I was encouraging Valkyrie to harm St. Clare, so I doubt anyone will be happy to see me. I only overheard what he was saying, I left before he sent them after us."

"You should stay with Ghastly and Tanith," Crow told him in a gentle voice, stepping closer to Raven. "I don't want you getting hurt."

Raven smiled at him with a twinkle in his eye. "I'll be fine. I just worried I wouldn't get to Valkyrie in time. I want to help fix this. If you, and I assume Valkyrie, are going into the Temple, I want to help keep people busy on the ground."

Crow looked as if he might argue for a moment, but Raven gave him a look and he stopped himself. It was funny seeing Crow attempting restraint.

"I suppose that would be useful," Crow admitted. Raven grinned.

They were so adorable.


	83. Oh God

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 83**

By the time they got to the Temple, they all had numerous phone calls from unknown numbers. They knew they were all Temple members that had somehow gotten them, but they were unsure where from.

To be safe, they had told Meritorious directly what they were doing and not mentioned it to any other mage in the hopes of stopping a spy in the Sanctuary if there was one. Elder Crow, a Necromancer herself, was also trying to calm the Temple members and had gathered over twenty as a support cross peace group. It wouldn't stop the other several hundred after them, but it helped to have a significant, popular and well-respected Necromancer on their side. They hoped more would join her.

"This is the hole?" Valkyrie asked in partial disbelief. "How do you get supplies down there?"

"I assure you it is a large enough space for a crate at a time, it merely looks dark," Raven told her comfortingly, even putting a hand on her shoulder. He stood next to Crow and when he did that, it looked almost as if they were her parents and she the child. It filled her with warmth and she had to swallow down some sudden emotion. She faced the hole instead.

"I don't think we'll fit," she said.

"You will. I can fit, so you surely can," he said.

"How do you know you fit?"

"I've used it before."

"Why?"

He cleared his throat and looked around. "I think it is time for you to go. I'll keep an eye out and stop anyone trying to get in. Try to disarm the building if you can and I'll send for Cleavers," Raven said and quickly made his leave.

They watched him go and then Valkyrie smirked at Crow.

"I don't know why he used the hole," Crow said.

"But you want to," she grinned.

"I do not."

"You do too."

"I do not. Get in the hole."

"You do. You want to hear the whole thing," she sang to him. He grabbed her shoulder and spun her to face the foreboding, dark, damp, horrible hole. She leant back to stop herself going in, but resistance was futile. He pushed her in and followed behind.

"I don't like this," she whispered, crouching low. There was height above her but her stomach was tight with anxiety in the tight space anyway. Only Crow's hand on her waist in support was keeping her moving, even if it was at a snail's pace.

"You've been in tighter places, you'll be fine," he said. "Just keep moving."

"I am."

"Well, keep doing it."

She muttered under her breath but did keep going, and though it probably took over ten minutes, they eventually got to the other side, marked by Valkyrie falling out the hole with a bloodcurdling screech. She hugged the floor and breathed in raggedly as she tried to relax and stop shaking.

"I thought I'd die," she said into the stone. She could feel her entire legs shaking.

"But you didn't, so it's alright," Crow said, stepping out gracefully. He turned the light on, easing Valkyrie's discomfort immensely, and went straight to the door to look out. Slowly, she got up and took some deep breaths to get herself feeling strong again. She felt as if she needed a lie-down and a meal before she'd be better, but duty called, unfortunately.

They turned the light out and snuck down the corridor to where they saw lights but no other sign of life. They glanced at each other and went deeper into the Temple, hoping to run into someone so they'd know where the High Priest was, but there was nothing but a spider and her millions of tiny newborns that Valkyrie ran passed so they wouldn't jump on her.

She heard Crow chuckle behind her, but spiders were no laughing matter. Disgusting creatures.

Valkyrie led them, once she knew where they were, to the Dining Hall, but there were only breakfast foods sitting on the serving table waiting to be handed to the tables – the breakfast bowls and plates were still laid out as the Temple hadn't even gotten to the meal by the time they were called on their manhunt. Or girl hunt, such as it was, though that sounded even less acceptable.

"This is really weird," she said, looking over the hall.

"Why's that?" Crow asked her.

"Usually this place is full of people. I know it’s dark and gloomy, but it usually has life in it, even if it is pale and miserable. I guess I was spending so much time with Solomon and Militsa I forgot how depressing this place really is," she said quietly. She pointed to her seat. "That's where me and Militsa sit. We had a seat between us before because we're in different classes, but since both our classes hate us, they put a space between _us_ and we sat together instead. That sounds even sadder, but at the time it was fun."

"Things are often very different in hindsight, or even just from a different perspective," Crow agreed. "But that doesn't mean you need to enjoy the experience any more or less than you did at the time. You had a bad relationship with your grandmother, for example, when she was rude at Gordon's funeral and after your mother's death. But your experience with her at those times goes not negate the good times you spent with her as a small child. It is just a new experience to remember."

Valkyrie nodded. "I don't think I want to stay for the rest of the month," she told him quietly. "Other than Militsa and Solomon, and maybe Mentor Emblem, no one spoke to me or was even a little bit nice. It was horrible. Sure, I learnt lots, but mostly I learnt how horrible it must be growing up a Necromancer. There's no love or fun or happiness anywhere. And I'd bet that's why they don't like me. I grew up with all that and it's so foreign to them, they've learnt to hate it."

"It can be easier for people to hate what they can't have, rather than crave it," he said quietly. Valkyrie smiled at him softly and held his hand. He smiled at her in his skeletal way. "I am sorry the other students were not kind to you. We'll collect your things on the way out."

She nodded and they made their way down the hall towards the offices this time, hoping to see the High Priest alone or perhaps in a meeting. They found something like that down the hallway – a gathering outside the High Priest's office of different high-ranking Clerics all arguing in hushed tones and looking at the door every few seconds. They jumped back behind the wall to watch.

Nothing happened. They were Necromancers, not a type of people known for doing things.

"Should we go to them?" Valkyrie questioned quietly.

"They might attack," he muttered back.

"I don't want to wait until they go to bed to see Ol' Tenny," she snarked, looking at the group again. What boring people. "I say we introduce ourselves."

A gun clicked behind them. They went still.

"Well, if it isn't Skulduggery Pleasant and his little bitch," a man said behind them. They both turned slowly around to see a hairy, manic looking Crux holding a sawn-off shotgun barely half a metre from them. He was shaking everywhere but his hands, keeping the gun level even as he laughed and his knees wobbled with excitement.

"I forgot you existed," Valkyrie said in surprise before she could stop herself. Crux laughed uproariously like that was the funniest thing in the universe and she and Crow looked at each other. Was it okay to kill an insane man? Valkyrie expected they might anyway. He was a criminal before he went insane, so it was fair.

"I searched high and low and high and low and high again to find a man that hated you as much as I do!" He screeched, stepping closer. They stepped back into the view of the already watching and weary crowd of Clerics. They didn't look as if they'd intervene despite believing Valkyrie beat up and kidnapped two of their students. "But I did it! It surprised me too, to know someone can hate as much as I do. But they do, oh yes they do!"

"Who hates us as much as you?" Crow asked him.

"A secret, a surprise, you'll never guess who!" He cackled. "Take a guess, skeleton."

Crow tilted his head in thought. "Is it Tenebrae?"

"No!" He laughed crazily.

"Is it that man from Iceland?"

"No, no, not from Icelandy!"

"What about The Torment?" He asked more certainly.

Crux's face went blank with anger. "You guessed."

"I did, you asked me too," Crow pointed out.

"You guess The Torment, but The Torment said not to let you speak about him. He said to keep it quiet and not let you know. But _you already knew_!" He screamed at the end. Valkyrie took half a step back from shock and he trained the gun right at her head and sneered. "You little bitch. You little, arrogant, nasty little girl. I hate you. I hate you more than him, and more than _any other person ever hated him or any other person ever! I hate you more than I hate anything!_ "

Valkyrie didn't say anything. The Necromancer's were gone.

"You'll pay for what you did to me. If you could have just died, they never would have decided to hunt me. I did nothing wrong. I only did that I needed to!" Crux spat. "You don't deserve to live, and you definitely should never have been given as much power as you have! Second Detective." He spat on the ground in the vicinity on her feet. "You disgust me. The Elders were wrong. Only Elder Guild knew what was wrong, and until we kill you and rebuild the world in a utopia for the strong and intelligent, we can only _crumble as a civilisation. We must rebuild! Rebuild stronger and better! We must rebuild and kill the weak_!"

He shot and Valkyrie flinched and fell to the floor. Crux screamed in anger and frustration as they both realised Crow had stopped the bullets with a powerful shield of air.

She had to shuffle back as Crow leapt on the man and threw the gun from his hands. Valkyrie kicked it down the hall away from them and jumped back to her feet, looking around for danger as the two men grappled violently on the floor. It looked as if Crux's only tactic was to pull Crow apart, which usually would have been stupid, but Crux was so single-minded he didn't feel any pain as he yanked free of holds and was hit multiple times, he just kept fighting back.

It was beginning to get funny watching Crow nearly restrain the crazy lunatic but then fail and get his arm yanked – it wouldn't come off thanks to the clothes not having enough give to pull it out – until she saw a shadow down the hall. It was of a large man, and as he got closer to the light, Valkyrie knew exactly who it was.

"Crow, gun!" She shouted, running forwards and booting Crux in the head as hard as she could. There was a sickening crunch, and Valkyrie knew there was a good chance he was dead as soon as his head smacked against the ground, but she had no time to worry as Tesseract stalked closer. As soon as Crow was on his feet and had pulled his gun out, the hitman ran at them at surprising speed for how gigantic he was, and they fell to the floor before Valkyrie could even scream.

She was shocked and felt the pain as Tesseract pressed his hand to her stomach and arm, tears filling her eyes. Still, she smiled as Crow pushed her arm off his own ribs that had nearly been turned to dust and there was the click of metal.

"Got you now," Crow growled. He'd snapped a shackle onto one of Tesseract's wrists. He couldn't kill them so easily now.

Still, Valkyrie knew she wasn't ready for a fight like this, and with her now broken arm, she didn't wait before crawling to the wall and catching her breath even as Crow began to fight for real. Her heart jumped for him, the fright of what this hitman could do to her adopted father nearly buckling her knees, but she growled and told herself to get a grip and pulled herself to her full height.

There was nothing she could do to help him win this one, but she could finish the rest of it for them.


	84. The Temple falls

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 84**

Crow's gun had landed somewhere behind them and Valkyrie's first thing to do, after wiping away a single tear from the pain of her broken arm, was to pick it up and pray Crow wouldn't need it. She ran to the High Priest's office and tried to open the door but it wouldn't budge. She knew he would know she was there by now, so she kicked the door with one solid kick and it fell open.

Revealing millions of spiders.

Valkyrie shrieked. "Spiders!" She screamed and ran further down the hall. Who cared if the High Priest was in there? He was in no shape to talk anyway.

She didn't stop for a long, long time, taking the path down the student halls and out at the storage and back around herself to near the classrooms. She stopped to pant and take in her surroundings.

She checked each corner of the room for spiders, trying to remember what The Idiots had told her about Children of the Spider. Wolf had spoken a lot about their fighting and that they liked to spy and learn before attacking, but also that they had been in hiding for nearly two hundred years and that could either mean they already know everything or they'd all gone mad. Either way, they were screwed. The Children were likely of simply turning into a spider or using spiders or another physical weapon to fight, so she needed to look out of spiders – as she was doing, she thought positively – and listen for many legs running in her direction. She could do that. The problem was, there could be millions of silent ones anywhere as she had already witnessed.

Weasel had talked about numbers, indicating he had a feeling there were a lot of the Children, but they all agreed that since their numbers had been decimated during the war, their main goal would have been to raise as many actual children as possible to be Spiders. When they reproduced, did they have one human child, or many, many horrible spider babies? Gross.

She shook her head.

Snake had spoken a little about them, mostly their relationships and way of life. Unfortunately, that didn't help her much. He had said that they tended to have one partner and were encouraged to never have another, like many cultures, however, they tended to take it to extremes likely due to their small, enclosed community. If she killed or seriously hurt one of them, she'd have masses of mages after her in an instance.

She took a deep breath and looked around the corner. And bonked heads with another person.

They both jumped back in fright and Valkyrie trained the gun on him. He squealed like a pig and she lowered it slightly.

"Cleric Sophron?" She asked.

He gasped and then covered his mouth quickly. He raised one finger to uncover part of his mouth. "Valkyrie Cain?"

"Yes, of course it's me," she said, coming closer to hear better. "What are you doing? Where's everyone else?"

"Oh, Miss Cain, I cannot tell you _that_ ," he said pleadingly. "Not after what you did to young Melancholia St. Clare and Militsa Gnosis."

"Sophron, I didn't do any of that," she said quickly. "Craven started talking to the High Priest and some of the other Clerics yesterday about Melancholia being the Death Bringer and convinced Solomon to let me fight her since I beat her before to prove her powers. But she wasn't stronger, and she looked really ill. Craven started arguing with Solomon, so I took Melancholia to a _hospital_. Militsa came with me because I asked her to."

He looked uncertain and Valkyrie quickly pushed them into an open room and closed the door. "I don't know," he said, pressing his fingers together nervously. "I don't want you to hurt anyone if your lying."

"When have I ever lied to hurt someone? Why would I come here to hurt someone? Actually, you know what. You're right."

"I am?" He asked with wide eyes.

"Yes. You are. You're right because since I got here, all I've gotten is ignored and segregated by everyone else. Only Militsa spoke to me and not a single person has tried to help me or Militsa be welcomed or happy here. I _should_ lash out. But you know what, I haven't, and I won't, but I'm still getting hunted down for it aren't I? By small minded people that would listen to a man that decided the Death Bringer was a sick girl that needed help and no one thought to talk to and see she was sick. I _hate_ this place."

Cleric Sophron looked a little shocked. "Well, Miss Cain, I am sorry you feel like that. But don't think this is a manhunt, we are just trying to find you and the other children. If you give yourself up, I'm sure they'll listen and we can clear your name."

"Clear my name? I'm sixteen and I saved Melancholia's life and I'm being hunted for it. Questions should have been asked before you started hunting. Why aren't you with them anyway?"

"I don't leave the Temple," he said quickly. "No, I never leave. I'm meant to help with stocking the kitchen and such but there isn't much point when there's no cook or store manager. I can't get food, I can't give it to someone. I like it here."

She deflated, knowing she was hitting a dead wall talking to him. She'd only make him upset and then he'd never talk.

"Look, can you just tell me where the others are so I can explain? Where's the High Priest?"

"He's in his office."

"No, only spiders are in there. It's infested."

He shook his head venomously. "No, the High Priest said he'd be having a meeting in there."

Valkyrie's heart sank. "Oh no."

"What is it?"

"The Torment," she whispered.

Sophron went pale and she knew he knew what she meant. "They're meeting in the back private meeting room. Go behind the back stairs that go up, and you'll see a storeroom door. Go in and follow it to the end and they'll be a door on your right. Don't go in – push on the left wall. You can't miss it from there."

She nodded and ran out of the room, sprinting the way he said even as her arm burnt in pain. She got through to under the stairs and pressed her back on the left wall, feeling it slowly give way to her weight.

Praying there weren't more spiders, she slid through the gap in the wall and followed the pitch black hall down to what ended up being a blackout screen curtain. She got in without anyone noticing because they were all sitting on the floor with their eyes closed, thinking or meditating or praying. She hoped they were praying. They needed all the help they could get.

She took a deep breath and held her good arm in the air. "Could I have your attention?" They all jumped and looked at her with gaping mouths. "Hi. Yeah, I'm sure you're wondering how I got here, but we have bigger problems. Where's Craven?"

A woman in the middle of the floor jumped up and pointed at her. "You! You kidnapped two of the students!"

"No! I didn't. One of them needed medical assistance and the other agreed to help me get her to a hospital," she said. The woman glared but lowered her hand. "I mean it. But there's something worse happening. The Torment and the Children of the Spider have gotten into the Temple and we need to get out. They're using you hunting me to get control and we really, really need to leave."

"Why should we believe you?" The woman asked.

"Why would I lie? Have I ever lied to you? Or the Temple as a whole? Or the Sanctuary? Or anyone else at all that you've ever heard about? No, I haven't. I have no reason to, I have everything I need without a lie! Now get up, they have a hitman working with them that breaks all your bones in an instance and I don't know how long Skulduggery can hold him off!"

They didn't move and it was very frustrating. "Who votes she is telling the truth?" She woman asked.

Valkyrie growled in irritation and turned to leave but saw something move. She cringed and clicked fire into existence and saw a giant spider, almost as tall as her waist, on its back legs about to strike.

Needless to say, she threw the fire at it and ran like hell.

Shouts and screams rang out as people ran with her or tried to fight the spider. Valkyrie would like to think they were successful, but she didn't look back to check.

The Clerics and whatever other Necromancers that remained ran for a door at the back and she followed them down a cramped corridor and up a staircase with a bad, bad feeling. They were too cramped, too enclosed, too open to attack.

There was nothing she could do at that moment but keep running with them even as people began to Shadow Walk away or fall behind. A door was thrown wide open above them but not by her or the Necromancers. No, she recognised his face even with shadows darkening his features. Before anyone could react, she darted to the front of the group and flung her hand out, shadows wrapping around The Torment's figure and pinning him to a wall she couldn't yet see.

Getting out that horrific stairwell, she saw The Torment wrapped up in shadows and a woman standing as still as a statue and dressed in black like a mourning Empress, a black veil covering her face. Something told Valkyrie she didn't want to know what was under the veil and she squeezed The Torment as hard as she could, trying to finish the man that had tried to destroy her family when something landed on her back.

She screamed, jumped and body slammed the spider to the ground. It squelched and she felt it try to bite her shoulder but her protective clothes saved her. She could feel its cold blood on her neck and hand as she pushed herself back up. She immediately started running, sparing a glance back at the creature. It was too fat to get back up and two of its legs had been crushed or torn off by her weight. More spiders, tiny ones, were pouring out of the veiled woman's clothes as if her every pore was vomiting them, and they were scrambling to encase the big, spasming spider.

She felt sick and her arm hurt so much worse than before, but at least The Torment was too busy spluttering and catching his breath to come straight after her.

She grabbed her phone from her pocket and phoned Raven.

"Val–"

"There's no time, the Temple's been overrun by Spiders!" She said with a bit of panic in her voice. "I've told everyone I can, I'm getting out!"

"Is The Torment there?"

"Yes, he's with a woman. I hurt him so he'll be after me soon. Where's the control room?" She asked.

"It's by the room you meet with Miss Gnosis," he told her quickly. "Do you know your way?"

"Yes," she panted. "You're going in my pocket."

She put her phone in there and used the hand to hold her broken arm that was now so badly damaged her forearm was flopping as she ran. She recognised the offices around her as low-level communications and remembered wandering this way with Militsa once, so she knew how to get back to the old staffroom. She got there feeling pale and ill from pain and exhaustion. She got the phone back out.

"I'm at the staffroom. Where now?" She asked.

He instructed her how to get to the control room and she told him quickly the last time she saw Crow before disarming the building. She had no idea if it would affect anywhere else, but she knew she'd be killed if she remained in the Temple. With the last of her strength, she Shadow Walked into the lobby.

Raven was there with the doors open and Cleavers flanking him. "Crow's still in there with Tesseract," she said faintly. "Can you help him?"

The Cleavers nodded and began sprinting down the hall in search of her adopted father. She hoped they'd find him and thanked Gordon mentally for aiding the Cleaver production so she could ask them to disobey their masters like that. It was cool and very useful.

"How did you do that?" Raven asked her with a frown, taking a hold of her good elbow as she started to shake.

"Magic," she muttered. "I need to sit down."

He took her outside to where at least fifty mages stood around, including Tanith and Panda, who looked mad and had his arms crossed. She got herself onto her feet without Raven's help and opened her good arm to Tanith who hugged her carefully.

"Hey sis," Valkyrie said into her blonde hair. "We need to go. The Torment and all his Children took over the Temple."

"Where's Skulduggery?" Panda asked.

"Fighting Tesseract last I saw," she said, turning to look at the Temple. "I honestly don't know now, it's been at least half an hour. God, it feels like a lot longer."

Panda looked at the Temple in concern and put an arm on both of their shoulders. "We should leave. The Spider's aren't good news."

"I didn't find Craven, and I think the High Priest is dead," she told him quickly as her vision went. She stood very still for a moment and it came back. They continued walking. "We all need to talk together."

"We need our family together," Panda said firmly, looking at Tanith. "Safe."

"I am safe," she snapped.

"Please not now," Valkyrie muttered.


	85. Boy, she'll kill you!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 85**

The Sanctuary formal hall was usually bare except for those lucky enough to walk through it from office to office, but for their needs they had placed tables in the shape of a large horseshoe within it.

Those sitting were the most important, and those standing were less important but still worthy to participate. There was a horde of Cleavers on guard and a mountain of mages in and around the Sanctuary waiting for news. The Communications room had all its staff sitting and waiting for the official notices and messages to send to other countries.

Valkyrie sighed and put her hand in Tanith's, the only of the ‘Dead Men’ to get a seat. Tanith had completely refused a seat and snapped and hissed at Panda furiously, and Tipstaff brought Valkyrie a chair. She'd sat before it was taken away, of course, and Tanith had settled into her own with a complete turnaround in mood once she was sitting.

It was busy in the hall. Valkyrie was sitting opposite the Grand Mage – one of the best seats but the tradition was that the most important sat next to him so she was also in the worst seat – and he looked regal and powerful in his robe and high backed chair. Elder Crow was elegant as always and Corrival looked harsh but had more nods of respect than Elder Crow, though that wasn't helped by the Necromancer led manhunt happening outside their doors.

Tipstaff came in and whispered something in Meritorious' ear and left the hall a moment later. When the large doors were shut, a hush fell over the room and they all looked to the Elders.

"Now that we are all gathered, we may begin," Meritorious started formally. "I'd like to thank everyone for attending this emergency meeting. I will have to skip the pleasantries as there is much to discuss and we may not have much time. Detective Cain, would you please tell the room your story."

Valkyrie squeezed Tanith's hand and sat a little straighter, thankful her family was standing right behind her. "I was recently asked by my Necromancy Mentor, Solomon Wreath, if I would live in the Temple for a month to experience being a Necromancer and give me a full picture of their way of life. I agreed, and have been there for two weeks. There was nothing out of the ordinary, everyone acted consistently, until yesterday evening. Solomon Wreath attended a meeting where Cleric Craven…" and she completed the story, going on about Melancholia and how Militsa came with her, them both being in safe hands as they tried to stop the manhunt, and then what she found in the Temple. No one looked upset when she told them her suspicions the High Priest was dead, but they all looked concerned that the Necromancers had no home, no one to pull them in they would fully trust, and that The Torment, another lady and an unknown number of other Spiders had taken the Temple. She finished by saying, "We've had reports back that the Spiders have not left the building, nor has anyone else as far as we know of. Every Necromancer in the Temple is assumed dead or being used as a hostage, but as we aren't sure what the Spiders long-term goal is so we don't know what for."

"What is their short-term goal?" A bulgingly fat man asked when there was a pause at the end of her story.

"We believe they want to kill the Dead Men as revenge," she told the hall. There was a muttering as they all spoke of how Snake had been the one to expose them centuries ago but Meritorious put a hand up and it silenced immediately. "As I mentioned, a hitman for hire called Tesseract from Russia attacked us some weeks ago and we encountered him in the Temple where Skulduggery was able to knock out and bring into the Sanctuary where he is now. Because he and The Torment were both in the Temple, I suspect he had an inside man, and I believe that is Cleric Craven."

"Tell us more about him," Corrival growled, his deep-thinking voice.

"Cleric Craven is an annoying _swine_ of a man that thinks he's on top and ought to be the High Priest but isn't anything like that at all. I suspect The Torment or another Child of the Spider came to him and offered to make that a reality if they'd let the Spiders take the Temple for a period of time. The fact everyone but the other Clerics, all of who could protest his anointment, were not in the Temple when it was seized and all those Clerics are likely dead now, I expect he believes he is going to be the High Priest by default rather than election."

Corrival nodded and sat forward on his chair and linked his hands on the table. "How long do you expect he's been working with The Torment?"

Crow spoke up from his place standing behind Tanith and Valkyrie. "A while ago. When the Soul Catcher holding the Remnant that ended up releasing them all was stolen from the Temple, Finbar Wrong was first visited. All he saw before he was possessed was someone wearing black. We had suspected Tesseract did that, but we now think Craven was asked to do it as he was less conspicuous."

"It's been a month since then," Corrival muttered. "That guy with the clipboard needs to write 'Catch Craven' at the top. Now get to the bit about why the Spiders want to use the Necromancer Temple."

Valkyrie nodded. "We have a few options to believe here. It may have been just to cause panic in the magic community, or it may be Craven has a further offer to give the Spiders, or maybe they've just known each other a long time and they owed Craven. I'm inclined to think they have common interests though. If the Spiders are going with their past goal of taking the Sanctuary and creating a new world, Craven might be using that to make his own New Temple, so to speak, to be in their new world."

There was a lot of nodding going around the room.

"Will they stay there then?" A lady in a nice suit asked from the standing area near the back. She got some dirty looks for speaking out when she was merely a standing person.

"We don't yet know. We need to more fully assess Tesseract and then we may have an answer, but I wouldn't get hopeful. If they're working with Craven, he might have already gotten them out of the building as it wouldn’t really help them to fight for the Temple as a location to work out of, but they _could_ be preparing for an attack."

**.*****.**

"That dragged," Valkyrie moaned as they made there was to the interview room.

"You did really well, Cub!" Wolf praised her, wrapping his arm around her shoulder. His other was around Weasel.

"You're really happy today," she said in concern. "Like, on drugs type of happy. Are you taking drugs?"

He laughed. "Maybe."

Weasel snorted a laugh from the other side of the loopy man. "He's not on drugs. He stayed up all night playing a game and had too much caffeine and sugar. He won't stop eating sherbet and hasn't slept in, oh, maybe thirty-six hours? It's frying his brain."

"So as good as drugs then," she said, looking at Wolf. "You're an idiot."

"But I'm your idiot," he said fondly, kissing her cheek. "I love you!"

"Love you too," she said just as fondly.

They got to the interview room and saw Tesseract chained to the floor with a dozen Cleavers, two Reapers and a Sensitive who was probing his mind for all his secrets.

"Only a few minutes now," Crow muttered, stretching the arm that had to be reassembled from eight different fragments. It turned out, this Bonebreaker didn't need magic to cause damage.

"To the Observation Room!" Wolf announced.

They followed Wolf's hyper ass to the Observation Room, which had quite a few people in it due to the seriousness of the investigation, but they parted like the Red Sea. Tanith was practically manhandled by Panda into a chair and Valkyrie was sure her sister tried to take a bite out of his hand – he moved away from her quickly and Tanith crossed her arms angrily. She needed a catch up with her sister and Tanith surely needed time away from Panda. In an attempt to make her feel less like a vulnerable victim, Valkyrie pushed between Tanith’s legs and perched on her. Her sister put a gentle hand on her back.

"Any news?" Bear asked.

The room looked at him much like how a dog does when they're doing really well at obedience. "Nothing so far," one of them reported. He kind of grinned at Bear like a dog too. It was so uncanny Valkyrie had to look away and stop thinking of dogs. Then again, maybe a dog was exactly what she needed to think about with all the stressful things going on.

They waited for barely ten minutes and the psychic finished her assessment of Tesseract. They left and met her in a quiet part of the hallway.

"Detectives," she said as soon as they stopped in front of her. "I searched the Russian prisoner Tesseract for information on The Torment, Children of the Spider and any plans, in general, he knows about. I have a great list of things."

They nodded at the lady even as Valkyrie tried to work out what her accent was. "Start with the Spiders and Torment," Crow commanded.

"The Torment is leading the Children of the Spider and had a safe house in Sligo where Tesseract thinks there are more Spiders, but he doesn't know for certain. He was being paid for his long-time service rather than by the job, and has made over three million with more of the same to come," she said. "And before you ask, he's been in contact with The Torment for nearly six years, doing small jobs, but he suspects The Torment was just pretending it was him once they met and it may have been someone else that had spoken to him for the smaller work before. From the messages and talks he's had, I'd say the same. The language is totally different."

"Which shows The Torment’s long-term contact with the other Children of the Spider," Valkyrie muttered. "They might never have been out of contact. Did you see where Divina Marr is?"

She grimaced. "The Torment killed her and her sister. He wrapped them up and ate them in his Spider form. Even Tesseract felt ill when it happened, and I saw some pretty disgusting things he did."

Crow asked her a few more questions about The Torment and the tasks he'd set Tesseract, but it was all fairly basic things they could have guessed. Some kills of people that would have been powerful oppositions, the attempts on them during the Remnant attack and both of them generally being sick people. He was being sent straight to the most secure prisons in the world, Coldheart, and Valkyrie felt a lot more comfortable knowing that.

Despite that task being done, they still had a long day ahead of them and Valkyrie could already feel the tiredness. They went to Corrival's office.

"Ah, Valkyrie," he said when they went in. She smiled at him. "I missed you these past two or so weeks. How are you?"

"I'm alright, just tired I suppose. Yourself?" She sat opposite him and accepted the tea. Tanith got one also and he gestured his head to the tea set in the corner for the others. Ghastly went to it sulkily.

He shrugged with his arms crossed. "The work is more than I expected and also far more boring. They send me everything to do with tactics, Cleavers and security wise, but it's all about rotas and checklists and codes of conduct. I’ve gotten my teeth into a few things recently, but they won't last me ‘til summer."

"When is the start of summer?" She asked suddenly.

"It'll be in July," Tanith asked, knowing she was asking school time summer. Nadia’s summertime break. It was already halfway through March, so it was barely another four months. Her stomach twisted a little and she sipped her tea. "Corrival, do you know any way of making Ghastly leave you alone for more than an hour?"

"Travel," he said immediately. "And if that doesn't work, burn all his tea bags and throw the kettle in the street until he learns his goddamned lesson. _Boy_ , why are you getting in the way of this young lady?"

Panda stood with his cup of tea like a small child holding a teddy getting told off. "I'm trying to stop her exhausting herself. She had another fainting spell a few days ago."

"And how is that _your_ business? Miss Low knows the risks and everything else that comes with her pregnancy, and if she wants to do something, even if could lead to a fainting spell, I’d imagine she knows exactly how far she’s willing to push. Standing, for instance, is within the realm of what she’s willing to do. Miss Low, have you been looking after yourself today?"

"I've tried but every time I get up I get another shadow. He stopped me going to the toilet six times before I screamed it at him and he stopped pushing me back into the chair. If he did it one more time I'd have broken his wrist," she said angrily, glaring at Panda and talking through her teeth. Someone was at their wit's end, obviously.

"My boy, if you want this lady to come anywhere near you with that baby, you might want to stop pestering her," Corrival said with all his wisdom. "It's like a live bomb. If you want to disarm it, you have to be careful. There are parts of it you mess with, and there are parts you leave well alone lest it blows you up. Stop annoying Miss Low or she's going to blow up on you, essentially. You won't get my sympathy," he laughed. "I'll make sure she goes free, actually."

They chuckled at Panda's flushed face and Tanith looked happier.


	86. Fustrations

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

* * *

**Chapter 86**

Their orders came from the Elders hours later after they'd all gotten a nap and some food. Search and destroy all except Craven who they wanted preferably alive. They didn't say it was necessary though, so they armed themselves to the T, this time letting Valkyrie in on their big boy weapons.

She'd chosen modestly, so to speak. She had her usual handy flip knife and had a pair of combat trousers concealed harnesses of both of her legs, both of which had massive blades in, but only for emergencies. Under her shirt was a holster around her ribs that concealed a small gun under one arm and another at her back. Her pockets were filled with ammunition.

Still, she looked under-armed compared to her brothers.

Tanith was having another conflict of emotion, and this time it was some sort of protective nesting where she'd help them and bring them more and more weapons to arm themselves with and all sorts of protective gear and magic that might keep them safe – and then she'd sour and go sit on her chair in the corner sharpening her sword moodily.

In one way it was funny to watch, but Valkyrie could see how conflicted and upset she was, and how sick she was of her own mood changes, so she made such she, and everyone else, just let her do her thing and didn't so much as smile or comment. Tanith didn't seem to notice Valkyrie silently threatening the others to be quiet.

But no matter what Tanith wanted, it was time to go and Tanith was pregnant, so she had to stay behind. She promised to get some snacks out for when they got back but also threatened them to be quiet because she'd be sleeping, so they all hugged her goodnight and then let Ghastly have his moment with Tanith alone. Hopefully he didn't fuck it up again or Valkyrie might let him get hurt.

She'd have to think of that later though. They were going back to the Temple.

**.*****.**

**_Craven's POV_ **

The cellar they were in was cramped, badly lit and smelled of damp. The rest of the Temple was dry, clean and although dark, it was always light enough to see everything they needed to. But spiders needed moisture to shed, and The Torment had put him in charge of finding a place that could happen. And now he was stuck in there with at least thirty Children of the Spider as they enjoyed the damp room and spoke about plans.

He didn't speak whatever language they were using. He knew some words because they were similar to other languages, but it didn't really help. Craven needed the Spider's to achieve his goals and would use them to get there. But he wasn't so stupid as to think they wouldn't turn on the other Necromancer's for fun, which would really ruin his plans.

After all, what sort of King of Necromancers would he be without disciples?

His phone buzzed and he pulled it out in hopes of news. After reading the messages, he cleared his throat to the group of Spiders and after a few more words between themselves, they looked at him like dirt on their weird, fluffy nubs that acted as spider feet.

He cleared his throat again. "I have received news from outside," he said formally. He was working hard on his King of Necromancers voice. "Some of my _disciples_ have been momentarily stopped by the death of the former High Priest, but are still searching for the St. Clare girl. The Sanctuary have additionally had a meeting concerning the Temple and Children of the Spider, and believe we are working together to take over the Sanctuary and form a new Kingdom of magic. They are sending their best in to stop us."

The Torment and all his Spiders grinned like the monsters they were. "Perfect," The Torment chuckled. "When they arrive, we'll be ready. After all, the Sanctuary has always believed the Dead Men are the very best."

The room was filled with disturbing laughs and clicks.

Then the door burst in and the upstairs alarm blared through.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

"That was a lot easier than I thought," she said as she waited for her broken body to heal under Kenspeckle's expert medical assistance. Civet and Stentor were working on all those that only needed a little help. The Dead Men were around her in the more serious ward as they had all been more seriously injured.

"Same," Wolf said tiredly, a yawn punctuating his words. "And we did worse than expected."

Crow mumbled something but they couldn't hear because Kenspeckle had wrapped bandages not just on his broken neck, but also all around Crow's face so he couldn't talk. Every time he tried, they'd smile and enjoy it.

"You know, I don't think I've ever been happier to hear you make a noise," Valkyrie commented happily.

Panda snorted from his bed. "You can say that again. Only good thing to come out of this bloody mess."

"We got Craven," Valkyrie said hopefully.

"Yes, but for how long?" Panda said irritably. Something was up with him, but they didn't exactly have the time. "They have the White Cleaver, and that's too strong for us right now, and The Torment and nearly all of his followers got free. And the ones we caught will probably be _broken_ free."

"They don't leave anyone behind," Snake said quietly. He looked so sad and despondent, her heart fell for him. She wanted desperately to go over and hug him, but she had so many broken bones and cuts she just couldn't move. She was lucky to be alive and she knew it this time.

Thank god for Bear though, who was strong enough to withstand his injuries and walk to the other side of the room and wrap his arms around his brother. Her heart broke more when she heard Snake start to cry into Bear's shoulder.

A tear slipped from her eye. He shouldn't have to relive his pain and nightmares all over again. He didn't deserve to be reminded of what they did to him.

The Spider's were a direct trigger to his PTSD and all his other mental health issues that were normally totally hidden. She felt awful for him having to relive this.

Kenspeckle and Civet chose that moment to come into the room. They stopped short at the scene and Bear glared at them, daring them to say anything that might upset his brother even more. He honestly looked like a Mama Bear protective his baby. Kenspeckle left the room and came back a few moments later with a packet of chocolate digestives and put them gently on Snake's pillow. He was too busy crying to see, of course, but Civet grinned at Kenspeckle proudly. Kenspeckle colours slightly but shook it off and got back to work.

After Kenspeckle had made his rounds on their injuries they could talk again. Bear had been able to settle Snake in that time also and he was now munching on his biscuits and even cracked a few smiles. Bear was in Snake's bed resting and Snake was sitting up and leaning on his brother's leg for comfort as he ate.

"As soon as we're better, we can deal with the rest," Valkyrie said tiredly, yawning herself. A snort rang out and they all stared at Wolf who'd fallen asleep. "Idiot."

Snake giggled. "Idiot," he muttered and munched another one.

They smiled at him fondly and tried to get some sleep of their own.

**.*****.**

They interrogated the Spiders before anyone else, and they didn't give anything up, so they brought a psychic in immediately who was able to find out bits of plans. None of them knew the full thing, unfortunately, but they knew a whole lot more than before.

Unfortunately, again, most of it became irrelevant as soon as they stormed the Temple because it was mostly safehouses and things that had happened in preparation to go to the Temple. Nothing for the future.

Of course, life couldn't give them everything, and when they opened Craven's cell, it had been remarkably empty. They had found out what happened within ten minutes of that and knew who his rescuer was, but that didn't fix the problem of him now being gone. It just gave them another target.

Being on the good side could be very frustrating.

So frustrating, in fact, that she told them she needed a break and walked out of their office.

It felt like sometimes it just didn't matter what they did, something would always get in their way. The man that accidentally tripped up her father and caused him to fall to his death, the woman that had turned to scream at her kids and had driven right into her mum's car and killed her, Serpine had killed Gordon, and never once did any of her family do wrong, it was all other people. It got worse as she got older but less grievous, she supposed. Nadia's parents got in the way of them, Fletcher spent months getting in the way of family time she desperately wanted as just them, and every few weeks it would be some random person, whether they meant to do it or not, that got in between them and their suspects. Some of the suspects had gotten away so well that they'd been pulled from the cases entirely!

She was just getting sick of not being able to do anything at all while everyone else was able to kick and push them around and ruin their lives without consequence.

She would never get her parents back, and the people that caused their deaths were both free now. They had been judged negligent, not as murderers, but while they were with their wives and husbands and children and all their other family members, here she was, frustrated and stressed and not knowing what to do about it.

She sighed and looked at the door she'd been led to. Corrival.

"Come in," he called before she knocked. She opened it and sat in the seat before he could say. "Tell me."

She sighed again and did what he said, getting it all off her chest as quickly as she could before she changed her mind. He made her tea while she talked and listened silently to her woes. When she was done, he nodded.

"It's easy to forget how young you truly are, Valkyrie," he said sadly. "I think many of us are blind to your age at times. We live so long it no longer affects us, but you have been through so much in your short time and the magical world has been just as unkind as the mortal one."

"I just wish I had an outlet. When I met the Dead Men and we became a family, everything just sort of fell on my lap and I thought it was the world making up for the family I had already lost. It didn't make me miss them less, but it was easier, and I was happy. But now I have a family, and I love them, but there's so much in the way of us being happy."

"Outside factors can blind us. And you do not have all your loved ones with you, hum?" He mused, looking at her over his reading glasses as he stirred his tea.

She blushed as she realised how she sounded. "I didn't mean to say my family isn't good enough," she said quickly. "I just feel as if there are a lot of things that could be better but it's out of our control. Like Craven getting away today puts a halt to our plans and that frustrates us so we're not spending time having fun together. Does that make sense?"

"Of course it does, and even if you didn't think your family is good enough, you wouldn't be any different than thousands of other people," he told her calmly. "People are not perfect, Valkyrie, but we must value each and every person as they are. You are a very positive person, for example, and that makes people latch onto you, especially people like me who have been by their self for much of their life. However, you also turn to despondency quickly if you don't get your way. That does not make you less of a person for losing sight of what you do have. It is merely a flaw, one that age and experience will help smooth."

She bit her lip and thought about his words. _He's right_ , she admitted to herself. She was getting lost in all the bad things that had happened in the last few days, and how lonely she'd been at the Temple even with Solomon and Militsa. She was forgetting that she'd been around most of her family and able to talk to all of them for these last few days and hadn't been lonely and hadn't lost any of them. She might not have everything, but she had a lot.

"You aren't alone," she told Corrival instead. "You have us."

He smiled at her warmly. "You are kind, Valkyrie, but I don't think that is quite how it works."

"Why not? You're with us almost all the time, the guys love seeing you. At least one of them mentions your name once a day, and it was no different before you came to Ireland and became an Elder. You _are_ family, even if they don't see it that way. I mean, you're not exactly someone who exudes emotion. I doubt they thought you _wanted_ to be included in the family part of their lives because of that."

He smiled sadly. "I'm happy to hear you think so. It makes this old man feel happier at least."

She smiled and decided to enact another part of her old plan to bring Corrival more tightly into the fold. "I could give you a nickname. Then it'll be another inside thing, and I'll make the others call you it too. I'm sure they won't mind."

"Well, as long as it isn't Spider or something like that," he said gruffly, looking at his tea. She could see he was happy to be getting closer to the others, but he was struggling to show it.

"How about Pa?" She grinned.

He looked at her and scratched his chin. "Somehow I don't think that's an animal name."

"It's not. But I think it'd catch on quickly. I'll tell the others that's your name and I'll get them to give you a bedroom in the house."

"Not on that hall of rooms you have," he warned her. "I don't want to be in the middle of them boys ever again when they're all at it."

She laughed. "They don't do that at home! Well, maybe Tanith and Ghastly, but they've learnt their lesson. But there's a hall above ours that's got all the offices on, you could have a room there if you like. It's quieter in the least."

He smiled kindly. "I would like very much to live with you and your family, Valkyrie."

" _Our_ family," she insisted, grinning broadly.

"Yes, our family," he said, his voice getting gruffer with emotion. He cleared his throat. "Well, I should let you get back to work, _Cub_. I will see you soon, I hope."

"Sure thing, _Pa_ ," she grinned. She finished the last swig of her tea and went around the table and reached down to hug him. After placing a light kiss on his cheek, she told him she loved him and left the room, much brighter and lighter.

Sure, things weren't going great, but they weren't falling apart either. And she had finally been able to initiate Corrival into the fold as Pa. She was good at names.

Smiling, she made her way down the hall to the dining hall, going right ahead and picking out some food for herself and her family. She knew their favourites and was quick to grab it before someone else. They took a lot of food to feed, after all.

And she turned around into Nadia's parents.

Her heart jumped and she felt a little panic before swallowing it down with a fierce determination. They didn't need to know her emotions, thoughts or conflicts.

"Afternoon," she said shortly and went around them with her tray piled high. Did she look like a pig? Hopefully it was obvious she was on lunch duty. Did that make her look like a little kid doing the grown-ups bidding? She hoped it wasn't too obvious she was on lunch duty.

"Valkyrie," Mrs Keena said loudly before she could get away. Valkyrie stopped and looked at her politely. People were glancing at them curiously. "May we talk privately?"

"Last time I spoke with Mr Vinay, he insulted me," she said just as loudly. "Will that happen again?"

His jaw clenched and Mrs Keena put a hand on his elbow. "He won't say a thing, dear," she said.

She watched them for several seconds in silence, judging what they wanted, and then nodded when her curiosity got the better of her.

She turned quickly and walked fast around the building, dropping the tray into the hands of a young, giddy man who was happy to help her and continued on to the cushy meeting room. The pair went in ahead of her and she closed the door behind them.

She took her time now, breathing deeply to control herself, and sat opposite them with what she hoped looked to be an air of dignity and confidence. "What would you like to discuss?" She asked after a moment of silence.

"Valkyrie, we came today because we received a report from Nadia's school that concerned us," Mrs Keena said softly as if she was breaking bad news.

"I've not had contact with Nadia since you forced her not to have contact with _me_. She was pressured into doing what _you_ wanted and has not tried in any way to contact me since. Her bad grades don't concern me," she said blankly. It was a good Bliss impression.

Mrs Keena pressed the nail of her index finger into the pad of her thumb. She was anxious. Perhaps angry. "I would like to explain," she said, her voice a little more defeated this time. "Nadia's report says she has lost significant weight and they will be sending her home shortly if her health doesn't improve. They believe it is because of stress. We've tried to talk to her on numerous occasions, and she came home for several weeks for the Christmas holidays, but she hasn't muttered so much as a word to us and she doesn't look well."

"Again, this is because of _you_ meddling in _her_ life," Valkyrie told her bluntly. "If you hadn't messed up her plans of being happy, maybe she wouldn't be _un_ happy. I expect she would have told you that she had friends and family and a happy school life and enjoyed being with me. And when she did that, you ignored her and insisted she'd be fine. Would that be correct? Nadia shouldn't have listened to you, but she's a good daughter and she did. Now she's alone and sick and has bad grades. Are you going to blame that on me too?"

Mrs Keena was looking at her lap and a little tear dripped onto her folded hands. Valkyrie couldn't feel guilty. All these bad things were happening to Nadia and they could have pulled her from school at any time and fixed this. They hadn't.

"We would like you to talk to her," Mr Vinay told her quietly, staring somewhere above her head. "We think she'll listen to you."

Valkyrie thought about what to say. Did she show her hand? Or did she bargain? It felt all too similar to arguing with a suspect. "Tell me more about the report first. Don't think I've made my decision."

Mr Vinay's jaw clenched again. "She doesn't listen in class, she argues with teachers and she prefers to dawdle than do her work. Her friends reported she doesn't sleep and recently has stopped talking to them. The nurse reported on her weight and health and we were given notice of the actions the school is going to take."

"How long have you known she's going downhill? I know it's a while," Valkyrie asked them suspiciously. They didn't answer and Mr Vinay clenched his fist. Mrs Keena put her hand over his and she could see who had decided they were visiting. "See, I just can't understand how you can hate me and think I'm an awful person but then come here and ask for help. If your daughter is suffering where she is, just bring her home and help her. Ask what she wants and try to make it better. Keeping her there is making it worse for her health and ruining your relationship with her. Instead, you're here and trying to make me do it for you."

Mrs Keena nodded. "The school is very good for her. She could get a head start in any job she wants," she said, dabbing her eyes with a tissue. "She made friends and put on weight and was doing well after the Christmas break, but by the time Ramadan came this spring, she had lost it again."

"So you just left her there to feel miserable instead of getting in contact and asking how to make it better?" Valkyrie asked, her disbelief and anger getting the better of her. "You're forcing her to suffer there. And if she had lost her weight, fasting wasn't exactly a good idea. Isn't that against the rules anyway, being sick and stuff?"

"It's a good school. They are keeping an eye on her," she said quietly.

Valkyrie shook her head. "Just because she gets a good education doesn't mean she'll have a good life. She'll be bitter and miserable and jobless if she isn't happy."

Neither of them said anything. Mr Vinay was opening glaring at her.

She glared back at him. "There's no point in me speaking with her. Perhaps if you pull her from school you could solve your own problems with your own child instead of using her fifteen-year-old ex-girlfriend. Take responsibility for your own actions."

Mr Vinay's lip curled angrily, but Mrs Keena's other hand covered her husbands and looked at Valkyrie pleadingly. "We only want to give her the best."

"Then show her you love her instead of sending her to a country she doesn't want to live in," she said coldly, standing up.

"I'm sorry to waste your time," the red-haired lady whispered. Mr Vinay didn't look at her at all.

They left together but didn't look to be in union as they used to be. The door was left open behind them and Valkyrie sighed quietly.


	87. A few answers

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 87**

The three days later, the sky was full of sunshine and a spattering of rain, making half rainbows in the distance. With the Spiders now hiding elsewhere, Tesseract in the highest security prison in the world and Craven disappearing for the foreseeable future, they had been placed back on normal missions with any leads of the former things taking priority, assuming they came up.

It was kind of anticlimactic. The Spiders and Necromancers had set them up for a big chase and fight but disappeared. The Necromancers, the cowards, had stopped when they realised their leader was dead and the one they asked to replace him had tricked them all.

Being several days later, though, did give them one new thing to do. They had received a call from Kenspeckle so now they were here to see how Melancholia was doing.

Valkyrie walked ahead of the others and saw the girl was sitting up in bed. She had a frown on her face, but it was her eyes that gave away how lost she was.

"Hey," Valkyrie said softly, walking to her side. She got glared at. "How are you doing?"

"I'm fine. I want to go home," Melancholia hissed.

"Err, actually, I have to tell you some news," Valkyrie said. "Has Kenspeckle told you anything that happened, why you're here?"

"No," Melancholia said grumpily.

"Craven was telling everyone you're the Death Bringer and wanted me and you to fight. We did but when you threw me into a wall they started arguing and you held my hand and I knew something was wrong. Not just because you were acting weird, but you were looking pretty bad. So, I brought you here for treatment."

"You should have left me at the Temple!" She said loudly. "Why did you bring me here, you nimnit?"

"You couldn't stay at the Temple because I knew Craven could get to you there and I believed he had done something awful to you. Once I brought you here, he told everyone that you're the saviour and that I had tortured you and kidnapped you and another girl. I didn't, but they didn't exactly ask me, they just decided to try and kill me. And then Craven let the Children of the Spider into the Temple and they killed the High Priest and all the Clerics and destroyed the place when we tried to get them out. There isn't a Temple, a Priest, Clerics, anything. All the Irish Necromancer's are dispersing to other places."

Melancholia stared at her in shock. "Cleric Craven wouldn't do that," she whispered.

Valkyrie leaned against the bed frame and tried to look friendly. "Melancholia, I need to ask you something. What happened before Craven made us fight? What did he do to you?"

"Cleric Craven didn't do anything to me," she whispered, still thinking over what Valkyrie said.

"Then how did you get so ill? You've been in an induced coma for five days, the doctor said you were on deaths bed. What happened?"

She had a faraway look in her eyes. "Nothing."

Valkyrie nodded. "Alright. I'll get Solomon to talk to you about your future."

"I want to go home," she said angrily, snapping to her version of reality.

"Of course."

She left Melancholia there and found Kenspeckle and Crow in the other room. "Valkyrie. Finished attempting to get her to talk?"

"She's got a mental block," Valkyrie informed him, though she knew he knew.

"Precisely. I was just asking Skulduggery if he could send someone who could look through it without breaking it," he said, glaring at Crow.

"I will make a call," Crow said after a moment.

When he was gone, Valkyrie asked Kenspeckle, "Why not remove the block?"

He sighed. "Valkyrie, when I assessed her, I found dozens of broken bones, cuts, signs of torture. Her magic had an enhancer that was using her physical health to keep active. I had to give her a new kidney to keep her alive. I know how much of the damage was caused, but I cannot tell you who did it. She is healthy, but if you reveal the memories to her, she'll likely go insane. She's not capable of coping, as she showed you when she asked for help."

Valkyrie nodded, knowing he was right.

The man who would do the job couldn't come for a few hours but agreed to tell them the results by phone the next day.

.*****.

The call about Melancholia was difficult but informative. They knew all the horrors, but putting a name to the ones who did it to her was hard to think about because the names made it feel more real.

"It was Craven that took her to a lower level room," the Sensitive told them through the phone. "There were already seven Children of the Spider there and someone hired to put a block on her mind with blonde hair and green eyes, tan skin, and they left before the Spider's started torturing her. They did it all through the night, and then they left and more came in to heal her enough to survive. She slept through the day and I believe it was at that time Craven also left and began telling the High Priest that he suspected the girl is the Death Bringer to divert his attention."

"And she didn't wake up until Craven took her to fight me?" Valkyrie asked.

"No, she did not. She also still remembers nothing."

Crow thanked the man and they hung up. "Informative, but useless," he sighed. "The Sensitive he described, the one that put the block on her mind, we may be able to find him."

Valkyrie nodded, rubbing her eyes tiredly. "You think he'll try and leave the country?"

"I know so. That man is most likely Noirette Paine. He specialises in torture and confidentiality. He puts blocks on his own mind so strong other Sensitives have trouble getting past them. It's said even he can't remember the mages he works for," Crow said, leading the way out their Sanctuary office. "But he's been arrested before."

"Could they charge him?"

"In the past it was hard," he admitted, "because he would put blocks on all the people he worked with and himself, so they remembered his name but never what he did. Getting a Sensitive to actually see a crime was incredibly hard, so putting him away was too. But we keep a file of all those that say they knew him anyway."

She nodded and sulked all the way down to the Mystical File Room. He opened up the door and she sneered at all the cabinets. "I hate this place."

"This room holds the most important records we have to aid us in fighting evil and keeping ourselves prepared for attacks," Crow said, going to the cabinet he needed immediately. He looked in it for a full minute before pulling out the correct one. "Here. Noirette Paine. A two hundred and something mage from California with a reputation for blocking the minds of all around him."

She gasped suddenly. "That's it! That has to be why Marr was having trouble telling us stuff and she couldn't remember who she worked for."

"Exactly," he said, reading through the report. "It doesn't mention Marr ever reporting having met the man before she came here and got involved with The Torment. In fact, it doesn't mention any complaints at all in the last thirty-two years."

"So, either he's been really good, or really good at being bad," she said. "I'm imagining the latter."

"I agree," he said and slotted the file back. "I'm impressed he let the block weaken at any point for our Sensitive to see him, however. That is very out of character."

"Maybe he was just really confident she would die," Valkyrie suggested. "So he didn't use all his powers on her."

"It is a possibility, but I doubt the Spiders would have told him what they planned to do with the girl," he said.

"If he specialises in blocking torture, then it would make sense he could guess, though, right?" She said, and he nodded as they went to the car. "Wouldn't it make sense he assumed she'd be killed and now that she's on her way to one of the American Temple's she'll be in danger?"

"A possibility," Crow agreed. "However, if I remember correctly, and I'm always correct, Paine is a coward and as soon as he heard you saved Melancholia's life and there was a manhunt, he would have used the distraction to leave the country."

She sagged. "So he's gone then. It's been days, he could be anywhere in the world by now."

"Exactly. Which is why we're doing something else." He got in the car and so did she and they set off. "I realise we haven't visited Finbar in a while."

"No, we haven't. Has he seen something?" She asked.

Crow shrugged. "Honestly, I think I'm more concerned we haven't had a call about all these things happening. He usually Sees. We actually need to inform him Paine may have put a block on _him_."

She sighed when she sat in the Bentley. "This is tough sometimes," she said. "I don't like telling people bad things like this."

Crow hummed as he started the car and began driving. "That's why we have to appreciate what we do have. Our family."

"I do," she said quietly.

He didn't say anything for a long minute. "I wanted to talk to you."

"About?"

"Well, about you. About you growing older and–"

"Crow, Skulduggery, please, no, don't do this," she said, raising her hands. "I don't need this talk."

"I just want to say, you are a beautiful young woman and I'm very proud of you."

"Thank you."

"And I understand that you are getting older."

"No thank you."

"And that you were recently dating a Militsa."

"No, I wasn't."

"And that's what I want to talk about. You didn't date her. You're only sixteen," he said, patting the wheel nervously. "At your age, it's okay to mess around, you're young, it's encouraged even, but I just don't want you to think that because one relationship went wrong you can't have another long-term relationship."

"I know that," she said, a blush blooming purely out of embarrassment _for_ him. "And it's not as if anything even happened between me and Militsa, so it's fine."

"I'm just worried about you," he said kindly.

"Please don't be," she said into her hands.

There was a long pause in the conversation before Crow began again. "Are you going to see Militsa again?"

"Yes," she said reluctantly. "I'm going to tell her I want to talk to Nadia again."

"You do?" He said, surprised.

"Yeah," she sighed. "I love her. Still. I want to see her again, even if just so we can talk. I can't exactly have Militsa stringing along if I'm doing that."

"No, I suppose not," he said. "Well, I'm glad you've come to a decision."

"Me too," she smiled.

They got to Finbar's tattoo parlour in the evening, shutting off the Bentley and going into the shop quickly to avoid the gaggles of teen boys getting drunk with their mates for the first time.

"Skulman!" He cried happily when they came in. "Val! It's so good to see you!"

Valkyrie glanced at the man sleeping on the table. "Is he okay?"

"Oh, him? Yeah, man, he's just tired, you know?" Finbar said.

"Why did you tattoo a smiley face on him?"

"Oh, no, I didn't do that," he said. "He came in like that. I tattooed this puppy on him."

He pointed and Valkyrie saw the man's calf had a little white baby poodle tattooed on it. "I see," she nodded.

"Hey, man, I'm sorry," he said, looking over at Crow who was standing patiently. "Is there anything I can do for you?"

"Yes, in fact, there is. Can we go into the back?" Crow asked, and they went in there. It was messy but not as awful as it had been when she was younger. Sharon, Finbar's wife, would come over occasionally with their child and clean as payment for a tattoo or money while Finbar played with his son. They sat around the table. "Finbar, I have to be honest. I have a feeling there's something wrong with you."

He nodded slowly. "Okay man. What do you think is wrong?"

"I think another Sensitive put a block on your mind. Have you heard of Noirette Paine?"

Finbar flinched back and took a breath. "That's not a name you want to hear," he said, shaking his head. "Why do you think he's been here?"

"I believe that he's been blocking your visions. I don't think you couldn't have _not_ had a vision of the Temple coming above ground, or of the Spider's attacking. You are always the first to See, and you're also a friend of mine, so I suspect Paine was sent to make sure you didn't remember any visions involving the Spiders."

"That's deep man," he nodded. "I guess I'm gonna have to get checked out, huh? I don't want some other guys block in my mind getting in the way, you know? Gives me the hibijibis just thinking about it."

Crow told him the name of the Sensitive that they had spoken too earlier that had helped Melancholia and then they left him there with his sleeping client.


	88. Saying goodbye

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomo** **n – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 88**

She knocked on the house door and a few moments later it was opened by an elderly lady. "Good afternoon, Miss," the lady said. "What can I do ya for?"

"Hello," Valkyrie said politely. "I'm here to visit my friend Militsa Gnosis."

The lady nodded and let Valkyrie in. She was guided to the living room where Militsa was sitting on the floor dangling a piece of string for a group of kittens. "Militsa, you have a friend here."

Militsa looked over and grinned broadly. "Valkyrie! I'm so happy to see you!"

Valkyrie smiled back. "Me too. I thought we'd never be done getting this mess under control."

"I've kept up to date with it. Mrs Sanders is letting me stay with her until they find a place for me in Australia. I asked to go work there," Militsa said, the string falling to the floor. The kittens looked at it and then at Militsa before coming over to sniff Valkyrie. She picked one up and put it on her lap. It immediately began playfully biting her. "I know we were talking about me living here, but after the Temple fell… I just can't stay here. But the Australian Sanctuary said they'd give me an apprenticeship."

She nodded. "It sounds like it would be good for you. I actually have more than that to tell you. Will Mrs Sanders come back?" She asked quietly. Militsa used her shadows to carefully close the door and they sat close to talk. "Nadia's parents came to talk to me a few days ago."

"Really? You mean like last time?" She asked. She already knew the other time she saw Mr Vinay.

"Yeah." She told her the highlights of the chat. "I don't know what they plan on doing but it sounds like the school's sending her back to Ireland soon anyway."

"And then what?" Militsa asked. She was sitting a little more sagged now, more into herself.

"I want to talk to her, but I don't want to make the first move," Valkyrie told her. "I know I want to try again. I know she dumped me, and she hasn't tried to contact me when she was in Ireland, but she's been sick. I don't want to just call her and it make her more sick, but I don't know if it's so bad she won't call me even if she wants to."

Militsa nodded, considering her words. "Honestly, I don't want you to talk to her," she revealed. Valkyrie looked at her. "I want you to never talk to her or think of her at all. I want you to say, 'oh, I'll come with you to Australia'. But you did say this would happen."

"I did."

"And I think you should send her a letter when she's home. Nothing fancy, nothing high pressure. She has lots of time to reply to a letter, she can wait a week and blame the postal service, it's easy for her to deal with if she is in a bad place, you know?" Militsa said, stroking a kitten that was slowly falling asleep. It purred loudly.

Valkyrie nodded and smiled at her. "Thank you."

They sat silently for a few minutes, Valkyrie getting bitten and scratched by the three cats now in her lap, enough she was bleeding a little, but she enjoyed the time sitting with Militsa again. She liked having their legs pressed together warmly as they sat. The kittens were kind of cute too. She liked how feisty they were.

"Militsa?" Valkyrie asked slowly.

"Yes?"

"If I kissed you, would that send mixed messages?"

Militsa smiled at her. "Yes. But I still want one."

Valkyrie pushed the fighting fur balls off her lap and quickly cupped Militsa's face in her hands, kissing her on the lips. The kissed slowly, savouring the moment, both of them knowing it was a sweet last. They kissed for long minutes, long enough for the kittens to get bored of them and play by the window, and good enough for Militsa to jump on Valkyrie's lap with a small moan. They stayed like that, Militsa enjoying Valkyrie's body and Valkyrie enjoying Militsa's company until they were both out of breath. Militsa laid her head on Valkyrie's shoulder.

"Nadia must be a hell of a girl," Militsa said.

"The best," Valkyrie said, breathing in Militsa's hair. It smelled more of the old lady looking after her, but she could still smell the girl under that. It was familiar now, nice in its own way. The ache for Nadia in her heart grew.

"Will you tell her about me?"

"When we talk about our relationship, I will tell her about us and what we've done. She'll understand. We aren't together right now," Valkyrie told her.

Militsa hummed against her shoulder and held her tightly. "If she doesn't want to be with you, and when you're not in love with her, would you go out to dinner with me?"

Valkyrie smiled. "If she doesn't want me and if I get over her, I promise. But make sure you don't wait for me. I'm pretty persistent."

"I know," she said and kissed her cheek. "I'm not allowed to kiss you anymore, am I?"

"I think it might harm my plans a little," Valkyrie told her.

"Yeah. Well, I hope it goes well anyway. I need to see where mama cat disappeared to," Militsa said, standing and brushing herself off. "I still haven't seen a movie, you know. You and Nadia can come to Australia when I've made some friends, and we can all go together."

Valkyrie smiled. "That's a good idea."

It was a little sad leaving Militsa because they both knew they wouldn't talk or see each other for a long while. Even more so because they both knew Militsa really liked Valkyrie and she was letting her go without a fight for a girl she thought had hurt Valkyrie past redemption, and though Valkyrie understood, she disagreed. Their promise stood, of course, Valkyrie wouldn't forget but hoped it wouldn't have to be kept. She loved Nadia with all her heart. She knew Nadia would understand her loneliness and the cold feeling of having no one to hold.

Although she might get slapped first. She was okay with that.


	89. Nadia?

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 89**

"I hate this," Valkyrie said from her place of the floor. A heatwave had rolled into Ireland unexpectedly and it was making Valkyrie melt. Which was why she was on the wood floors spread eagle in shorts and a bikini bra. Her family knew about her scars and it was too hot to do anything else - Tanith had seen them a bunch anyway.

The others were better suited to the weather, but Tanith claimed it was just pregnancy that got her on the floor chewing ice and equally melty. She'd even gotten a haircut to help, a chop that left it level with her shoulders, shorter than Valkyrie’s now.

"I hate it more. And I'm hungry," Tanith groaned.

"You're always hungry," Valkyrie muttered. She wanted to shuffle out of the way of a beam of light slowly making its way towards her, but she was stuck to the floor by her own sweat. "We need a swimming pool."

"I don't want to go out."

"Get the others to do it."

"They're not here."

The girls groaned.

"If we get naps now, we can go buy ice cream tonight," Tanith said, a little hope in her voice. "We could ride my bike."

"You're not allowed to drive, but I agree with the ice cream," Valkyrie smiled.

"You can drive it."

"That's illegal."

"So?"

Well, put like that… that evening, she and Tanith got into something a little more covering but not much because it was still disgustingly hot and donned their helmets.

Valkyrie drove them out into town for ice cream. She rode for a long time and Tanith didn't seem to mind because she was out of the house away from the men, so Valkyrie took her own time driving around to her favourite ice cream place. It was next to the Pizza Hut she, Nadia, Tanith, Wolf and Fletcher had once gone to, and although she wished she was with Nadia, it was nice to go out at all.

"I love this place," Tanith grinned, taking her helmet off. Putting the keys in her pocket, Valkyrie followed the pregnant lady in. Tanith had worn a crop top – one of Valkyrie's – and some shorts that showed off her middle. She knew Tanith shouldn't be far enough along for her to see, but she could have sworn there was the tiniest little bump on her tummy. Probably all the eating and sitting around she'd been forced to do.

Valkyrie had switched into shorts that were a little longer to hide the thigh scars and a flowy top that covered the other scars. The ankle ones were on show, but she was getting more than comfortable with those ones because no one ever looked that far down. And the one’s on her forearms weren’t so bad really, and no one seemed to notice them either. They nearly looked like birthmarks, or that’s what Valkyrie liked to think if she ever saw someone glancing at her. At worst, it looked like she’d done them to herself and while that didn’t thrill her, it was better than looking like she’d been tortured.

"Same. I already know what I want." They put their helmets under their arms and tilted on their hips at the same time. They really acted like siblings and it made them very happy. They were taken to a table by the front in a massive booth by a teenage boy, maybe fifteen, who blushed the whole time. He kept asking them questions about literally anything and Tanith had to smile sweetly and ask him to get her a drink before he'd go.

"Boys," Valkyrie smiled.

"Idiots, the lot of them," Tanith said. "You've got the right idea, I think. Keep away from them."

"It's helped by all the dads I've had. I grew up hearing how silly dad Desmond is, Gordon was always weird, Crow's strange and now I have Solomon, kind of. And you know what? Solomon's the only normal one!"

Tanith laughed. "He doesn't even count yet! They haven't even officially said anything, so it might not be true."

"They are."

"Doesn't count yet." Valkyrie's phone buzzed and she looked at it. She put it away disappointedly. "Still not the one?"

"No," she said. She was hoping that maybe, just maybe, she might get a text from her ex, assuming she had a phone. "I might send her a letter when it gets to summer break. I just don't know if her parents will let her see it or not."

"I hope so. You're a good girl, and so's Nadia. I bet if she'd been allowed to see more of you while all that was going on, she would have been brave enough to stand up to them a little more."

"She's just being a good daughter. She doesn't want to lose her parents, who would? She thought it would go back to them being really close and she'd make friends and just have to deal with not being with me. She didn't realise what it would be like. But I don't want to think of that now. I want ice cream."

"Good thought. And that looks like ours now," Tanith grinned, her tongue poking out excitedly. The ice creams sundaes were massive, bigger than they should have been, and the teen boy looked really happy with himself. He put them in front of them. "Thank you!" Tanith said excitedly.

"Thanks," Valkyrie laughed, looking at Tanith dig in with more enthusiasm than she'd had all day. "Again, you're not meant to go food crazy for a few more months."

"I'm just trying really hard," Tanith said with a mouthful of strawberries and whipped cream. "This is so fucking good."

Valkyrie shook her head and had a spoonful of her own. "Alright. I need to know, what's your guess on the sex?"

"I don't really know. I had another scan recently, and everything was healthy, so I don't really care," Tanith said. At Valkyrie's questioning look, she continued. "The scan was just because I had a tiny bit of spotting and the nurses wanted to check everything because of before. It's all good. And I can inform you that I asked specifically about twins since you got your brothers so worked up about the idea, and they said it's just one. Which we already knew but I had to prove it to them."

"Good for the birthing, I guess. But if you had the option, and you literally _had_ to pick male or female, what would you pick?"

Tanith smiled. "I don't care!"

"Well, what names do you like in the least?"

She thought about it. "I kind of like the classic names, like maybe Grace or Mia, or else I want something really girly like Kamilla or Emma or Rachel."

"So, you want a girl, right?"

She paused as she chewed another strawberry. "I can see why you'd think that." Valkyrie started to laugh. "But I do have boys’ names too!"

"And what are they?"

"I like Tom."

"Just Tom?"

"Yes."

"I think this is a little one sided. I'm on the boy side by the way. I think it'll be a boy and I second the name Tom, it's adorable and although there are lots of them, it's kind of classic. There's always been Tom's around."

"I thought that too, but I told Ghastly and he shot it down. He said every Tom he's met in his whole life has been a bully and refuses to call him that. And then Dexter said he found a cat the other day called Tom."

"Was it a cute cat?"

"I don't know, I wasn't there. Ghastly wants to call the baby Harrison."

"I don't like that one," she said.

"Me either," Tanith agreed. "But I can't think of anything else. I mean, they'll pick a new one in a few years, but I need something good to tell them off with. I can't scream Harrison too many times because it's too long. And I can't call him Harry or he'll get called Harry Potter. Especially if he's born with scars, can you imagine the name calling? We need something nice."

"You have plenty of time," she smiled.

They made good work on their ice creams and were able to finish but couldn't move after. They didn't want to ride the bike straight away, so they ordered a drink each and decided to let themselves settle. Valkyrie got up to go to the loo.

It was a nice ice cream place, with a little crazy golf course out the back for little ones and families, and as Valkyrie walked, she thought she saw a familiar face. She looked outside, searching for it, but didn't see it again amid all the families and people walking around and a kid in the middle of it all throwing a tantrum because he wasn’t allowed to hit the golf ball that he was, in fact, allowed to hit. She went to the toilet.

It was only one bathroom for the whole building, a mix gender family bathroom with room for any type of person, which was a nice thought, Valkyrie mused as she washed her hands, until you had twenty families in the place and all the kids needed to pee and there was only one changing table and one toilet. Those thoughts came from talking about the baby, but it was also true.

She unlocked the door and pulled it open, expecting to be barrelled down by kids. Instead, she saw someone else.

Her heart jumped in that way that only love could make happen as she looked at the young woman. Her heart rate tripled. Her stomach had butterflies. Her knees shook a little. She had to swallow. God, this woman was perfect.

"Hey," Valkyrie said.

Nadia's voice cracked as she looked up at Valkyrie. "Hi."

"You look incredible," Valkyrie whispered, her eyes never leaving Nadia's face. Her memories and the pictures did no justice. Her face had darkened in the Indian sun and her cheekbones stuck out more, not just from her weight loss which was shown by the bagginess of the dress Valkyrie had seen her in before, but because she had matured. Dare she think it, but Nadia was more beautiful than before.

Nadia ducked her head embarrassedly. "Thanks. You look…. Um, good."

"Thanks," she said uncertainly. "Would you like to talk? Just a little, I need to know how you've been."

Nadia's hands came together and she started picking under her nail harshly, probably hurting herself in the process. She wanted badly to take those hands in her own. "I don't know."

"Do you need a drink? I don't mind what we do," she said more quietly, feeling the panic well up. Did she not want Valkyrie? Had her feelings changed? That was okay, kind of, but she needed to at least know.

"Can I think about it? I need to–"

"Oh, yeah," Valkyrie said quickly, getting out the way of the toilet. "I'll get you a drink. What do you want?"

"I have one. Just a second," Nadia said and closed the door.

Valkyrie deflated and quickly ran to Tanith, almost killing a child. "Nadia's here, imma talk to her."

She wasn't sure if Tanith heard, because she ran back to the bathroom and stood at the end of the hallway away from the toilet door – she didn't want to look creepy just standing there waiting – and waited. Nadia took her time and she hoped the girl was okay. Hopefully she was plucking up the courage to tell Valkyrie what she felt.

It took over five minutes for her to hear the flush of the toilet and she was left standing for five more before the door was gently unlocked and Nadia poked her head out. She looked surprised to see Valkyrie was still there.

"Hey," Valkyrie said, jumping her on toes. She stopped, not wanting to be stupid. "Would you like to go for a walk?"

"I'm not allowed," Nadia said quietly, her head down again.

"We don't need to go far. Just outside the door where it's quiet. I promise," Valkyrie said.

Nadia took a long moment to think. "I'd like that. And some water."

Valkyrie nodded and they walked together. Nadia was looking around nervously so they walked quickly and Valkyrie reached over the booth and took Tanith's water before she took a sip. She was nearly shouted out but then she saw Nadia and smiled instead. Nadia didn't even see Tanith because she was looking at the ice cream list and Valkyrie more than anything wanted to get her something nice.

They'd definitely get caught then, though, so she wanted to talk first. She led them outside and gave her the glass. She sipped it a few times.

"Thank you. I didn't see you get it."

"I know, it's okay," Valkyrie said with a soft smile. "Tell me, how have you been? How was India?"

She shrugged, holding the glass in two hands. Her wrists were thin. "Really, really hot. But fine, I guess."

"Just fine?"

Nadia shrugged, looking at the glass.

She swallowed and gently put her hand on Nadia's elbow. When she wasn't pushed away, she slowly put her other one on Nadia's chin and pulled her face up to see her. "I want to see you. I haven't seen you in so long and you keep looking away."

Nadia bit her lip and looked down as soon as Valkyrie's hand was gone.

"Why won't you look at me?"

"I'm not allowed to talk to you," Nadia said again.

"You don't need to worry about that right now. It's just us," Valkyrie reassured her. "I want to see you smile. It's been so long. I've missed you so much, Nadia."

She saw the moment Nadia broke down. The glass slipped but Valkyrie caught it and put it on the ground and pulled her in for a hug. She wasn't hugged back, but Nadia did rest her head on her chest.

"Please don't cry. I never want you to cry," Valkyrie said soothingly. "What can I do, I'll do anything?"

She sniffed and whispered so quietly she almost didn't hear: "I broke up with you."

"I know," she said quietly, leaning down to her ear. "It’s okay."

Nadia's arms wrapped around her, pressing their bodies together. Valkyrie breathed in her hair, her skin, all the exotic excitements and differences to herself burning into Valkyrie and filling her up. She loved this woman and she didn't want to lose her. Their bodies pressed together, and they probably got some looks from the families going in and out, but she couldn't do anything but hold her as she cried.

"I miss you," Nadia sobbed. "I love you so, so much."

"I love you too baby, more than anything," Valkyrie told her. "You believe me, don't you? I love you so much."

Nadia sniffed and pulled back, wiping her tears. "I'm sorry Val. I've done such bad things to you."

"Let's just talk," Valkyrie suggested. "It doesn't need to be tonight, but we need to talk, we can work things out."

"We can?"

"Of course. Or we can try anyway. Remember what I told you? We'll try every last thing we can to save us before we give up, and then it would be mutual and on our terms. So we'll try," Valkyrie grinned. Nadia smiled and wiped some more tears. That smile went away suddenly when she looked behind Valkyrie. Valkyrie turned, unconsciously keeping Nadia behind her. "Mr Vinay."

"Nadia, come inside, we're having a family night out," he said, staring darkly at Valkyrie. He looked a little darker too and she expected he'd stayed in India for a while when picking Nadia up. Or maybe he was so angry he was literally burning up. The look in his eyes was certainly furious.

Valkyrie felt Nadia move behind Valkyrie and she put a hand on the girl's belly, stopping her. She didn't seem as if she were trying to get passed anyway. "Me and Nadia need some time to talk."

He glared, baring his teeth. "My daughter has no business with a girl like you. Nadia, go inside. You're mother's worrying about you."

She felt Nadia put her face on Valkyrie's shoulder blade and her determination strengthened. "If she wants to talk, she can. She can be inside in ten minutes. She won't get hurt here."

He started to shake with rage. "Nadia you will get inside this instance or mark my words, I will put you over my knee and make you wish you were never born. You have three seconds."

Well, Nadia didn't like the sound of that any more than Valkyrie. Her stomach dropping, Nadia pulled away from her and slowly shuffled over, looking at her father nervously. He glared at her and she went into the building. When he thought she was gone, he turned back on Valkyrie, stalking over.

"How dare you try and be with her unaccompanied?"

"As I recalled, you've asked me twice to talk to Nadia, and now we are and you've stopped us. That doesn't seem exactly right, does it?" Valkyrie growled back.

He poked a finger into her neck hard enough she couldn't breathe properly. She pushed herself into it. "You stay away from her or I swear I will do everything in my power to end you. Stay. Away."

"Is that a threat, Mr Vinay? Because I have a pair of cuffs in my pocket and I'm not fucking scared of putting them on you. Do you have any idea how much the Elders don't like you right now? They know how horrid you've been. They won't be in your favour if I throw you in a cell for a week or two." He slapped her so quickly Valkyrie couldn't stop him, but she made sure not to move even though it stung, and it unnerved him. She looked back at him stonily. "I'd like you to know. When your daughter suddenly disappears, it's not because I've done anything to her. It'll be because she fucking _left_ _you_ for a life better than the one you're forcing her into. Do you slap her like that too?"

He spat in her face and turned quickly, throwing the ice cream places glass door open so hard it nearly smashed. Nadia was quick enough to hide from him, but when she had wiped the spit away, Valkyrie didn't see her either. Sneaky girl.

She went back to Tanith who looked concerned as she sipped her new glass of water. She'd left the other glass outside. She hoped someone brought it in. "We should go," Valkyrie said. Tanith looked ready to talk, but she shook her head. "Let me tell you later."


	90. You got her pregnant? Plus a Ball

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 90**

They got back and did indeed talk about it, but Valkyrie only asked for the family who she would appreciate advice from. Luckily, the full family was home. She had Tanith, of course, Anton, Dexter and Skulduggery.

Now, usually Crow wouldn't be involved in advice giving since he was prone to insulting her, but she wanted a perspective from the _law_ this time.

They gathered in Valkyrie's room because that's where she was stressing when Tanith brought them to her.

"Calm down, Cub," Wolf said immediately, a warm smile on his face. "Sit down with us and talk."

She crawled onto the bed and sat against the headboard with Wolf, his arm around her waist comfortably. Bear opted for a chair at the side of the bed, Crow sat on the edge at the end and Tanith plonked herself cross-legged in the middle with a packet of crisps. On the way home she'd shouted she was too full and felt sick, but it seemed to have faded now.

Valkyrie told them what happened. She tried not to talk about how astonished she was to see her and how amazing she looked, but Wolf asked a few questions about it and she ended up blushing and agreeing that yes, she was blown away. They then spoke about the health side of Nadia and they were all equally worried. Her family loved Nadia because she loved her. They didn't want her suffering, especially as they feared it was down to stress.

When they started talking about Mr Vinay, they got more serious. "I just don't understand why he isn't letting me near her if he asked me to do it, even if he wasn't completely on board. He came alone the first time. If he really hates me that much, surely he wouldn't come at all."

"I find it strange how he's gone from that lovely man before to the one he is now," Tanith mused.

"There is a chance he was controlling before, but that his family was cooperative with what he wanted," Wolf said thoughtfully.

Valkyrie shrugged. "Nadia never mentioned it. She always spoke about how her dad was on her side a lot and that her mum was always trying to force her into things. I mean, even when they were saying how she'd lost weight and the school wanted to send her home Mrs Keena was saying how amazing the place was and that she wanted her to stay there."

"People change," Crow said. "Or perhaps Dexter is right and it is only now he is exerting his power over the family. It may be after spending time with his mother, who you said is head of the family and enjoys family traditions very much, he has decided to be more like her."

Valkyrie nodded. "I suppose that would make sense. But it doesn't help Nadia."

"No, it does not," Crow agreed.

"Why don't you go visit her again?" Wolf said.

"She may not welcome an intrusion," Bear interjected.

"Bear might be right. I remember her saying the rooms at the school are shared and at home they were being more vigilant over her, at least last summer. Maybe it's changed since she came home this time, but I personally don't want to get caught, plus I don't think it'll make her life easier," Valkyrie told them. "I can still send a letter, but I doubt Mr Vinay will let her have it, and I expect they'll be checking on her phone."

"You need to see her outside the house," Wolf said, grinning very much like Snake would, the most secretly cunning of them all. "Nadia's parents love parties, right? So we need to hold a Ball."

"It'll need to be really damn good one to get them to come," Valkyrie fretted.

"The Requiem Ball is being held this year," Crow said. "Usually Corrival holds it at his house, but the location is still always left until the last moment to reduce the chance of attack, and I doubt they'd not come _just_ because of us. If we get the guest list as inviting as possible, I expect we could convince them to come."

"And hold it here?" Valkyrie asked.

"Yes. We'll need to make a few changes to the house, but that's for Anton and Erskine to do," Crow said. "We can have more control over who comes if we hold it here."

Valkyrie nodded. "It's worth a shot. How long do we have?"

"If we talk to Corrival, we can get it done."

"Could you do that now?" Valkyrie asked excitedly.

"I can tell Corrival when he gets here," Bear nodded. She hadn't told them about the nickname for him yet, she'd been so busy. She would do it soon. She needed everyone calling him Pa, after all. Yes, forcing her idea of a perfect family on them was wrong and slightly creepy, yes she was still going to do it.

"So we've worked out a way for me to maybe see her, but now what?" Valkyrie said.

"Kidnap her?" Tanith suggested.

"Well, I was kind of thinking about that, yeah," Valkyrie laughed. "I'm just wondering though, if she decides she wants to stay here, at any time, is she legally allowed to? Can Mr Vinay force us to send her home? She's not a legal adult until mid-December."

"He can cause a stirrup and tell everyone that we stole her, but once they interview her and find she's with us willingly they won't do much because she's almost an adult. If anything, our laws are laxer than the mortal ones on when a child is legally called an adult, even if most mages consider people children until we're at minimum over fifty. Once a physic can assess they're old enough to make a rational decision, they have the power essentially."

"That's good," Valkyrie nodded. "And it also might explain why he's trying to keep her away from me. If we invite some of his family from around the world as well, he'll probably feel quite comfortable knowing there's eyes on Nadia all the time."

"Agreed," Crow said. "If we work as a family to cause as much distraction as possible, it should be free sailing. Invite mostly business people, bring in the man that runs your family business in trust since he hasn't been seen at public functions in years, we can dance with the family and if it looks like Mr Vinay is about to pounce on you, we can call for a toast."

"What if we hold a dinner too?" Wolf suggested.

"Dinner," Tanith grinned.

Laughing a little, Crow said, "There hasn't been a Requiem Dinner and Ball before, but I see no reason why not. We can extend the party by a few hours like that also."

"I like it," Valkyrie grinned.

"Good," Wolf said, kissing her forehead. "Because I'm out of ideas."

.*****.

The Ball was scheduled for barely three weeks from then and they were _just_ able to ram themselves in there as hosts and convince Corrival it was okay to break the trend and have a Dinner also. Crow was looking forward to it and had told them over dinner that he had asked Raven to be his formal date and they had all cheered him.

Valkyrie had informed them of Raven's code name at the same time, much to their amusement, and then told them they were all to call Corrival Pa from now on. They were reluctant at first because they were manly men and manly men didn't give in to calling their former Sargent Pa immediately, but once they heard Valkyrie say it a few times and said Pa was very happy to be included in their family, his real name was no longer uttered, at least in private.

She didn't expect them to ever really say it in front of others, but that was okay. It was still very nice.

Valkyrie got to help Pa and Snake with the guest list with a little help from the others. They found out who Mr Vinay was doing business with and who he might want to do business with, they cut out one of the original guests that he absolutely hated and they added in all of Mrs Keena's closest friends who they heard from social circles she hadn't seen in a while. They also included families with respectable teenage children they might want Nadia mingling with.

They then made the food as appetising as possible while Bear had an emergency kitchen revamp to fit the cooks and other staff needed for the dinner.

Gordon got in on the rest of the cleaning and other revamping. He had the floors polished and a whole room got new flooring entirely, the chandeliers were changed one night so Valkyrie woke up to a bit of a surprise, and the bathrooms were essentially refitted with the most modern, pretty appliances. She couldn't complain about that, they were gorgeous grey stone sinks and counters, the taps were like small waterfalls and the floor was a dark tile, and the toilet had heating built into it. Her home turned into a fancy hotel downstairs and she loved each change. The only thing she asked for was some new pictures on the wall.

Tanith helped her with that request. She had met someone at her maternity hospital that did photography and agreed to do the pictures as long as she could bring her baby since she had no one to leave them with.

It worked out perfectly because the young photographer had strapped the baby to her front – they were all smiling and loving on the child so their pictures were perfect. They had a massive canvas sent to them that went in the living room, otherwise known as the _parlour_ , and several others printed to put around the downstairs. They were really nice, and Valkyrie and Tanith cooed over the baby when the men had a formal photo with Pa. That one looked serious and stern but also had father sons vibes so the girls had deemed it acceptable. The sisters had some cute photos done of them as well, but they were less formal and more sitting in a tree.

By the time it was one day before the Ball, they had the whole place set up and perfect, and as an added bonus, Tanith didn't faint in all that time.

Waiting on the RSVPs was difficult, but they also weren't required. She had no idea if Mr Vinay, Mrs Keena or especially Nadia would be coming, but they did get a lovely little note and a massive bouquet of flowers from the rest of Mr Vinay's extended family as a whole that did agree to come. Either he was not as he wasn't on that note, or he just didn't want to give them flowers and was coming. Valkyrie put the flowers in a vase in the parlour so everyone would see them when they came in. Bear said it would make it look as if it was their favourite gift, which formally people would give when going to a formal dinner and event. They hadn't received any other presents as this wasn't a private party, but that wasn't the point.

Of course, the day before was when she and Tanith decided to talk about outfits and realised they didn't have one.

"Don't worry," Panda said, rolling his eyes. "I finished your dresses last week. I was just waiting for you to remember."

"Thank god," Tanith said, breathing a sigh of relief. She kissed his cheek. "Thank _you_."

Panda had thought of everything the needed, so they put it in their rooms and went out to a salon to get prettied up.

And tomorrow they would have the big day.

.*****.

Tomorrow came slowly.

They woke up early because Snake was excited and woke them all up. They had a nice breakfast and Valkyrie put Tanith's hair in big rollers and Tanith put Valkyrie's in little ones. They dressed in easy to take off clothes – to get over their hair and makeup later – and they were prepped. The others had nothing to do because they were men and men didn't take much doing up for these things. They had to comb the house for anything that wasn't clean and clean it instead. Gordon was set up downstairs to talk to people as well.

It got to eleven o'clock and they were done. Bored. Nothing to do. It was an awkward situation of being completely ready to do things but it being too early to do any of those things. They went over the plan of how to act to give Valkyrie time with Nadia and convince her to let her visit or even to outright live with Valkyrie, but that was a short talk.

Then there was a knock on the door.

They all looked at each other and shrugged. None of them expecting anyone over. Valkyrie, hair still in rollers, went and answered it. She grinned.

"Hi," she said, giving him a hug. "What are you doing here?"

"I got an invite from Tanith for the big party tonight," he grinned, his sunny personality shining through. "And she said she has big news!"

"She sure does," Valkyrie smiled and let him in. "She's through here. Do you want tea?"

"I love tea," he said and followed her through into the parlour. "Tanith!"

"Brother!" Tanith squealed and jumped on him. "I'm so glad you made it!"

They hugged tightly and when they pulled apart, they held hands and he looked them over on both sides and sagged. "Aw, I bet Mum and Dad you were engaged. What else could be your big news?"

"Err," Tanith started, turning around and sitting herself safely back on the sofa. "So, you know Ghastly Bespoke?"

"The one you liked, yes," he said, crossing his arms. Panda came into the room then with a tray of teacups and a pot. "What about him?"

"Well, we kind of started dating…"

"And?"

"I'm nineteen weeks pregnant? Which is almost five months?"

He closed his eyes and took a deep sigh as Tanith and the others watched. He spun and stared at Panda, who'd wisely passed the tea tray to Crow. Panda rubbed his hands on his trousers and stepped up to the former assassin.

"You got my sister pregnant," he stated.

"Err, yes," Panda agreed with a small blush. "That err… yes, I did."

"And you're _not_ marrying her?" He asked, a glare sliding over his face and masking any trace of happiness or love.

Panda hesitated. "Not at this moment. We are dating though."

Tanith's brother rushed Panda and Panda flinched as if he were just going to take it when Tanith's brother suddenly decided to hug him instead. He began laughing and held Panda tightly. "This is so exciting! I'm going to be an Uncle!"

Tanith started laughing. "I really thought he'd hit you then."

"Me too," Valkyrie laughed. Panda was so pale it was funny.

"I'm still annoyed you're not getting married though. I have to paint the garage for Dad now. And I had a whole speech to convince you to let me do the speech instead of Dad! But I'm so excited for this now. I think it's going to be a girl," he grinned, slapping Panda on the back.

"No, it's going to be a boy," Valkyrie frowned. How dare he think differently. "Tanith wants a girl too."

"I don't want one," she said with a roll of her eyes, and then it morphed into an evil grin. "This time."

Her brother laughed at the joke but Panda's laugh was more than nervous. "Tea," he said faintly and fell into his chair.


	91. The Requiem Ball

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 91**

Hair curled and held back a little with a sparkly headband much like a tiara, a gorgeous peach and gold dress and some flat golden shoes, Valkyrie was ready for the night. She was stunning and looked her age, somewhere between a mature teenager and young adult.

The dress was a trumpet style and hugged her body beautifully and had several layers of peachy lace over a golden sheath of a dress. It was simple in that it was just coloured fabric and some pretty lace, but the body hugging top half brought out all the womanly curves and the flow of the bottom had a hint of young and fun in it. The dress zipped up at the side and hugged her perfectly and was absolutely incredible to wear as well as look at.

Tanith helped with her makeup by giving her dark brown and golden eyelids, a dark blush and a shimmery pink for the lip. It was simple but the darker colours made her look a little harsher, a little older, more capable, more womanly, but without ageing her, aided massively by the headband and very _slightly_ padded bra. That's what Tanith said anyway.

Tanith had a deep blue dress with a slit down the side and a low front. It was also simple and showed off her baby bump which growing nicely each and every week. Tanith had phoned her parents earlier to tell them and it was a good job because there was no doubt Tanith was both sexy and pregnant in that dress.

When they asked Panda why he had chosen the styles, he said it was because every other dress he made was dramatic and a lot of them were ballgowns. They would stand out as much more sophisticated looks, and many people had gone for greens, yellows and reds instead of gold, peach or blue, so once more they would stand out from the crowd.

Plus, he had made sure to give them the best materials and best everything else, so they truly would be the stars that night.

"I was going to make you a teal dress, Valkyrie," he explained. "But I thought a lighter colour would blend just enough to be less easy to spot in the crowds by watching eyes than a brighter colour."

She had agreed. The whole reason they wanted this party in the first place was so she could talk to Nadia and if she stuck out too much from the crowd she'd never get her way. Plus, she loved the dress anyway.

She went downstairs to meet the men with Tanith. Crow had gone to collect Raven as a formal date – he'd gotten Raven a small, thin bracelet made of gold as a gift for the man. It was surprisingly masculine in look and Valkyrie expected he'd like it. Crow himself was wearing a tuxedo with a deep blue waistcoat, peachy tie and gold cuffs. In fact, they were all in black tuxes, it was just the waistcoats and accessories that varied.

Wolf had no waistcoat and a peach bow tie left undone, Weasel had a peach waistcoat and no tie, Snake had a deep gold waistcoat with swirls of peach and a matching bow, Bear had gone for a black waistcoat and tie, but the buttons of the waistcoat and fastened suit jacket were gold with a subtle peachy thread, and finally, Panda had a dark golden waistcoat and a blue tie.

All their looks were, of course, similar and they wanted people to notice but Panda had given them each a little twist. Valkyrie actually wore a little pinkie ring with a blue stone in it and Tanith had a rose gold band on her pinkie. They were a real, matching family. Valkyrie grinned at them.

"We look so good," she said.

"Not as good as you," Wolf smiled charmingly. He kissed her hand as if he were her date. "Would you like a drink?"

"Am I allowed wine?"

"Not while the grownups are around," he grinned. She kissed his cheek and they set themselves up for hosting. "Pa is around the corner, we should see him."

Pa was indeed around the corner and had his arms crossed in his fresh looking Elder's robes. "Hi Pa," Valkyrie said.

He unfolded his arms and smiled at her. "My, don't you look beautiful," he said. "Do a spin, then."

She did, Wolf holding her hand like a dance. "Is everything ready?" She asked after she'd been given all the admiration and compliments.

"Yes, yes. Gordon is excited in the back ballroom, the bar is staffed and there are a thousand drinks, the music is set up, all the musicians are here, and the kitchen staff are fully prepped and prepared. We have three spare waiters in case one passes out as well," he said, shaking his head. A previous party of his had several waiters pass out and hurt themselves at the same time and there hadn't been enough staff, so he was being extra careful this time. Rich people problems. "I also made sure to triple check the dining table. It just so happens there are _two_ people here tonight with the last name of Robin, and one of them is a friend of mine. I've asked him to sit away from you if there is a young lady in his seat and explained your mission. He's a romantic, the twit, so you can eat with her."

"Thank you, Pa," she grinned, giving him a small kiss. He smiled slightly at all the endearment, but then sent her to look natural. She had to semi-greet people, which meant follow the others and look pretty and not insult anyone.

It felt as if there was no one arriving until the very second the clock turned six and then a fleet of cars started down the driveway. Staff opened the door regally and Reapers stood security in every which direction.

They saw Sanctuary staff, the Elders, businesspeople and a multitude of foreign Elder's and former soldiers of the war. By the time it was half past, Valkyrie was worn out greeting people and, although it was a strange concept, being complimented. She just refused to move until she could greet one family in particular.

That family arrived at six thirty-two, one of the very last and arriving by a fleet of vehicles all at once. They must have rented the most expensive cars they could, and it certainly showed in how gorgeous they were as they went at a slow speed down Valkyrie's stone driveway.

The staff opened the first car and out came the first lot of family. She knew some of them. There was Nadia's grandmother and head of family, Nadia's grandfather, three great aunts on her grandmother's side, and a great aunt and uncle on her grandfathers. Then there came the actual aunts and uncles, four of them total to go alongside Mr Vinay who was not in that car or the second. There was a striking number of cousins.

"Good evening Mrs Prachi, Mr Farhan," Valkyrie grinned, shaking Nadia's grandparent's hands. "Thank you so much for your gift to my family."

"Not at all," Mr Farhan smiled. He was an old man, looked much older than his wife, but had many lines that spoke of happiness and smiling. Nadia had said he liked to buy gifts for the children of the family and sent them out at all times of the year. He was popular with the kids.

"Yes, Miss Cain, not at all," Mrs Prachi said. She had a little bit of warning in her voice and Valkyrie suspected she'd been warned against her by Mr Vinay. Not unexpected but she had thought the woman would withhold judgement. Then again, she had been a big source of pressure on Nadia to break up with her, so perhaps Valkyrie was being too kind. "Could you tell me where the bathroom is? My grand-niece Eloise is expecting."

Grand-niece Eloise didn't look as if she appreciated that question very much, but Valkyrie just smiled a nice, convincing smile she used to convince people they wouldn't go to prison if they fessed up. "It's just over there by that archway, or there is a sign showing another through the back ballroom. There are a few others with signs also."

Mrs Prachi just nodded regally, looking much like an India Mrs Bracknell in her purple and orange sari dress, gold accessories and sharp eyes. Eloise mouthed the words 'thank you' to her with a blush.

The rest of the family was much quicker to welcome, and much faster. She actually spotted Nadia, but she kept her head right down and didn't look at Valkyrie. Mrs Keena barely looked also, and Mr Vinay didn't shake her hand.

At least they were there. She squeezed Bear's hand.

.*****.

The music picked up softly moments later and she noticed smiles flutter over the guest's faces at the sound. She herself had just spoken to China, a way for her to get right in the middle of a grouping of Nadia's family without looking as if she were actually trying, and China complimented the changes to the house. She also told Valkyrie she spoke to one of Nadia's cousins and that they had indeed been told to keep an eye on both Valkyrie and Nadia, before asking where Crow was and telling her to talk to one group in particular.

That group was of some businessmen and one woman she had money in, as well as some of Nadia's family. A coincidence in terms of the business people, but useful in terms of victims.

"Good evening," she said pleasantly.

"Good evening Miss Cain!" One of the men said jollily. "It's a pleasure to see you once more. We met at a party on your birthday some years ago."

"Yes, you're Mr Boa," she said, remembering the strange pattern of scars on his neck. "It's lovely to see you again."

"You look so well. Oh, I remember last time, she danced the entire night, and I mean the _entire_ night with a young lady and you both smiled the whole time. Will you dance again tonight? It is nice to see the talent in one so young," Mr Boa said, slotting in a vote of confidence to Nadia's extended family oh so well and accidently.

"I think I will. My brothers have all asked for the first dance, so we'll see who gets it," she said and got a small round of laughs.

Thank goodness Mr Boa was good at keeping the conversation going and it wasn't long before the group had grown and split in two. She was careful to get on with one of the women as that was primarily Nadia's family and they joked and spoke about their time in France each, and how much they wanted to travel to different places. It barely took a moment before they were the group to visit as everyone interjected the best and their most favourite places to go. New Zealand was big on the places-to-go list for them all, brought up by adventurous places like the Amazon and forests in Asia.

She was good to get the conversation on places everyone enjoyed to keep her family targets occupied which seemed to work as they laughed and told everyone amazing things about whatever the country and some city or other they insisted everyone needed to visit. She honestly was interested, but at that moment all she did and said was calculating as she attempted to get the conversation to move and flow and seem attentive and positive as a person.

They must have been the biggest and loudest group in the room by the time a light bell was tinkled to silence them. "Dinner is served," an elderly waiter said to the room.

They smiled and everyone made their way to the dining room. It was extended with rented solid wood tables and chairs, flowers, a table runner and a thousand forks, knives, spoons and plates. She took her time moving to the ballroom, spotting Nadia lagging behind with an entourage of younger cousins invited solely for this reason. She gave the family a false sense of security by inviting the cousins.

She went over to them as Nadia's parents went through the door - Wolf tugged the sleeve of a man who she assumed was the other Robin.

"Miss Robin," she said, ignoring the children.

Nadia's face darkened with a blush and the children either ignored them because they hated their duty or stopped with the girls because they likely feared punishment. Nadia wore an Indian style of dress, some name she forgot, that left her midriff bare. She'd got a belly bar while she was gone. She was in a deep purple, much like the colour of her grandmothers' dress, and she shone with all the sequins on the outfit. She could also see the outline of her bottom ribs and how small her legs had gotten, not enough to be cripplingly unhealthy, but enough for Valkyrie to take notice.

She looked behind Valkyrie and was weary. "We can't talk," she whispered.

"But we can sit together," Valkyrie smiled, offering her arm. "We have seats next to each other. Come on, no one will cause a scene tonight."

"My father slapped you last time she spoke," she whispered. There was a small crowd around them she looked into nervously, and the children, not much more than ten, moved on when their stomachs growled.

"I don't care, I just want to eat with you again. We can talk and have a nice time. I promise."

Nadia was certainly nervous, but she smiled at Valkyrie with big eyes, eyes that were just as desperate to take in Valkyrie as Valkyrie's were for Nadia. It was nice having her hold her arm again, and they made their way into the hall silently, sneaking their way along to sit by the Elder's. She pulled out Nadia's seat and she sat with a smile, tucking a lock of hair out her pretty eyes. Next to Nadia was one of her cousins, the American one that had a baby not long ago and had a husband that had been on the wrong side of the war but for the sake of getting Nadia there, he'd been given an invite. The wife didn't seem to mind or notice the strange seating and didn't say a thing.

They were in the clear.

Valkyrie sat herself and gave Nadia another small smile. "You look beautiful tonight by the way."

"So do you," she said. There was a bit more of that old confidence in her voice. "I love the dining table. You should keep it like this every day."

"If we oiled the middle we could pass the food too. You'd be eating and a box of cereal would just fly passed," she grinned, a little giggle passing her lips.

"The carton of milk probably wouldn't stop," Nadia grinned.

"It would go straight into the plate of whoever was at the end."

"If you opened it and had a ramp, it would tip and pour into their bowl," she laughed. Valkyrie joined her and just loved her so much. Without showing it to everyone else, she put her hand over into Nadia's chair and touched her wrist. Slowly, Nadia took her hand in her own and squeezed it tightly. They smiled at each other for a long time, looking into each other's eyes. The moment was broken by the food being served.

They ate with small smiles being shared, avoiding the gazed of others and talking quietly about the little things Nadia had done since she'd been back and how good the food was. They had both chosen sorbet for dessert and shared a little laugh as they were served in synchrony. Out the corner of her eye she saw Mr Vinay glare at her, but she didn't look back. She just looked into Nadia's eyes until Nadia looked away with that little, shy smile and took a small spoonful of dessert into her mouth.

Of course, no one had to get up after the meal immediately, but the cousin did go so they had a bit of privacy. It was just Bear on her other side and who cared what he heard.

"Will you dance with me later?" Valkyrie asked Nadia with a soft smile.

Nadia bit her lip excitedly and jerked her head as if she were about to look at her parents before keeping still and nodding. "Yes. I'd love to dance. We didn't get to dance at school."

"How was the school?" Valkyrie asked.

She shrugged a little and looked down at the little After Eight mint she'd got from the middle of the table and put on her plate. It was strange, because she looked so small, but she ate all three courses of her meal and had two drinks. It made Valkyrie smile because she remembered Nadia's amazing appetite. It was always funny to see her put away more food than Valkyrie who was twice the weight and height of her. "It's not the best," she admitted quietly. "It's got nice people and teachers, but I struggled with the language change for the first two months, then the work just was so fast paced and I'm really bad at reading the language too. I've learnt a lot since then, but it was a bit tough."

"What about the teachers? Or friends?"

She shrugged one shoulder again. "It was fine. The teachers are really smart, they just like to push us. And I've made a few friends."

"Do you have a best friend?"

She glanced at Valkyrie. "Not really. But I always have someone to talk to."

"That's good," she said, taking a small bite of her chocolate. "How have things been at home?"

She hesitated. "What do you mean?"

Valkyrie glanced with her eyes down the table and saw Mr Vinay and Mrs Keena locked in conversation with a businesswoman. "Your dad came to me after Christmas and both of them again a month and a half ago asking for me to talk to you. They were concerned and wanted me to do it."

"Is that why you're talking to me? Is that it?" Nadia whispered, her eyes hurt.

"No," Valkyrie said calmly. "I told your dad to sod off the first time, and when they both came I told them that if you were sick, they should have pulled you before, not asked me since we weren't exactly in contact. But whatever made them come to me before changed. At least, it has for your dad."

She closed her eyes and clenched her fists. "They did that?"

Valkyrie put her hand over Nadia's. "Hey, don't get stressed. I – you know I love you. I actually planned on sending you a letter soon anyway, but then I realised if we had the party here, we could probably talk."

Nadia breathed a little laugh as smiled. "You held this whole Ball to talk to me?"

"Yes," she laughed. "Is that funny?"

"A bit," she smirked. "It's actually the most fun I've had since–" She cut herself off and bit her lip, looking somewhat guilty. "It's just a lot of fun."

Valkyrie smiled and tried not to ask what the look was about. "Do you want to go dance with me now?"

"My dad will probably try and stop us," she said.

"Well, I have a few ideas of how to avoid him. Come on, we aren't in trouble yet," Valkyrie grinned.

"I don't like that 'yet' part," Nadia mumbled, but followed Valkyrie hand in hand into the ballroom. They went to the louder, busier one, most of the guests following them because most of the Dead Men followed _her_.

There was no one dancing yet, but four groups went up anyway. There was Tanith and Panda, Raven and Crow, Weasel and Wolf, and Valkyrie and Nadia. The band watched them as they got in position and the girls smirked at each other in the pause before the music.


	92. Valida, together again

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 92**

And it started. It was good to dance at all, but with Nadia it was wonderful. They twirled and grinned and Nadia laughed when Valkyrie picked her up. They didn't stop for four songs, leading the room in sync as more couples joined the dance floor and they turned it into the dance room and the talking went to the other.

She saw several times people try to get into the dancers to interject their dance, but someone would always sweep up to stop them or engage them in conversation.

It didn't seem Nadia was able to go a full night of just dancing, though, and although it was not what she wanted, she carefully weaved them onto the outskirts of the room and at the end of the song they stopped and she held her arm out.

Nadia took it with a flushed grin, holding her arm in both hands and almost hanging on her in giddy happiness. She smiled and took Nadia quickly through the crowd and out to the hallway. She had to be quick on her feet and picked Nadia up for a bit of it where Nadia laughed far too much and Valkyrie joined in, and she was able to sneak them under the stairs and through the door of the downstairs snug.

It was set up already, of course, with drinks and snacks and a million cushions. It was a pretty place, perfect for reading or talking. Nadia smiled as Valkyrie shut the door. "Now that was sneaky," Nadia grinned. "So sneaky I didn't realise you doing it until just now."

She grinned back and sat on the loveseat. "I know. I'm just really clever. And I also really, _really_ want to talk about us."

Nadia nodded and brushed her hair out her eyes again. She sat with Valkyrie but left a little space between them. "I think that might be a good idea."

There was a small, awkward silence in which they both thought of what they wanted to say but didn't dare. Valkyrie breathed in and took the lead.

"Maybe we should do it in order? Talk about why you broke up with me," she said somewhat calmly.

Nadia nodded. "Okay. To be honest, I had been thinking it for a little while before I said anything," she said quietly, a little tremor in her voice. "I was just really struggling at home. Mum and Dad wouldn't stop telling me to do it and they were saying about how bad it made me look to be with you, but it wasn't too bad until Daadii came. It was like a wall hit me, emotionally. I keep on thinking of when I started to tip in their favour, and I can't work it out. I just started to think they were right. Daadii would talk about how her friends spoke about you, and that everyone knew about you and all the fights you get in, and that they all think I was throwing myself away by being with you. She just made me feel so small and naive and stupid."

Valkyrie held her hand out and Nadia took it with a small smile.

"It was just difficult hearing it and feeling so stupid all the time. I thought if I broke up with you then I would be smarter for it, and that I'd be told I was being good, and my parents would be glad. But when I told them what I'd done, they just nodded and told me to study for school and I just completely broke down. I knew immediately that I'd made a mistake, but I thought at least I wasn't making you wait around for me in India."

"You could have called me at any time. I would have been happy to just wait," Valkyrie whispered.

She shrugged. "It just didn't seem that way. And then I waited and did nothing and went to school for months and it didn't seem right to talk to you because of how bad I treated you and the break up. And then I – there was this party after Christmas."

Valkyrie saw a tear slip down Nadia's face even as the girl looked away. That guilty look was back, and she wondered if she ought to look guilty too. "Tell me about it."

She nodded. "There was a party. I went with the girls I share a room with and I met someone when I was there."

"Who?"

"A girl," she said, her voice hitching. "All my friends were saying I should talk to her, and I did, and she was really nice, and she asked me to go out with her and I said yes, and we went out to dinner on a date."

Valkyrie nodded, taking a small breath. "Anything else?"

She nodded, dabbing her eyes gingerly. "I liked it, and she asked me on another and we went to this park. It was really nice. And we kissed."

"Anything else?"

"We had another few dates and kissed but nothing else. I just felt so bad at the time, but I really liked it too. I was talking to my roommates about how I felt, and they said they thought I should be with you, and then I was even _more_ confused because literally everyone had been telling me the opposite until that moment. Regardless, I decided to break it off with her. She wasn't very nice to me when I said I didn't want to go on any more dates and it really hurt me. I just wanted to feel like I wasn't so stupid and horrible, but she just made me feel even worse about myself and more horrible for leaving you and dating _her_."

Valkyrie shuffled over and put an arm around her waist, holding Nadia's hand with the other. "It's okay. Just tell me everything else and we can talk about it after. But you should know you're _not_ stupid and you are an _incredible_ person."

She laughed as her tears took over and she sobbed out the rest of the story. "There isn't much else to say. Nothing happened at school, and I barely talked to anyone because I always felt like I was too stupid to do it. I got a few letters from Mum but they all just asked about friends and school and she never asked about me so I just stopped responding after a few. Got my phone after Christmas break but I didn't turn it on because every time I looked at it, I was hoping it was something from you and it was making me feel really bad. I know I should have just called you, but it… I just couldn't do it. It was really bad at home," she said through the tears, looking at their hands. "No one came to talk to me, so I just spent weeks sitting in my room alone. It was so horrible. Just sitting there all day, every day, with nothing to do or someone to be with. I didn't want to call my old friends because I haven't spoken to them in so long. I had no one."

"You have me now. I'll do anything to make it easier," Valkyrie said soothingly.

She laughed bitterly. "Why? How? I kissed another person, Valkyrie. I felt so bad, I knew I was emotionally cheating on you, but I still did it because I'm a horrible person."

"It's okay because we weren't together, were we? We hadn't been together for months. That's not cheating on anyone but yourself and your own emotions. You don't need to worry about what I have to think."

She nodded, unconvinced, as her eyes silently wept tears.

"Would you like to hear my side? I think it'll make you feel a bit better." Nadia took a moment to decide and then nodded. Valkyrie took a breath, as she didn't know if it would put Nadia at ease, but she had to be honest no matter what. It was hard stomaching Nadia kissing someone else, no matter how the relationship went, and it would likely be equally hard for Nadia.

 _I just need to be honest and trust that's enough_ , she told herself. "Well, I felt really bad for a few weeks after we broke up, and I felt so awful at your birthday I bought and wrapped you a present but didn't want to send it to you because I thought you might hate me. It's been seven months full of drama, to be honest. So much was happening, and I was struggling to keep up, to think and process things emotionally. So a few months ago I decided to live with the Necromancers for a month to see how it was. And I met a girl called Militsa there."

Nadia slowly locked eyes with hers and they looked at each other in quiet commiseration. They had done the same thing.

"She liked me a lot, and I thought she was really nice, and we spoke a lot, and I told her I didn't want a relationship but I wanted to kiss her, basically, and that's what happened. We spent a lot of time kissing, and she sat on me my lap a few times and we spoke. We spent most of our time talking about Necromancy, the outside world and you. She was actually supportive of me trying to talk to you. "

"She was?"

"Yeah. She made me promise to tell her if we don't work out, but she also told me good luck in talking to you again. She wants us and some new friends of hers to go to the cinema one day together. Not that that matters right now," Valkyrie said, biting her lip. "After that, I knew I wanted to be with you again and I worked myself out emotionally. I had felt bad because I kind of guessed you left me because of your parents. And I was a bit jealous you picked them over me. It's stupid, but that's how it felt."

"You shouldn't have been," Nadia whispered.

"Yeah, but I was. And, if I'm being really honest, I felt betrayed too. Because we said we'd only be, you know, intimate with each other so long as we agreed to not break up until we chose to. And then it happened and I didn't exactly feel like being the one to go to you when you'd gone back on your promise to me."

Nadia looked up at her with regretful, guilty eyes. "I am so sorry, I never meant for it to go like this."

"I know. I do. It took a few months and a big change of going to stay with the Necromancers, but when I had finally worked my way through the emotions, I knew I wanted to try and convince you to date me again," she smiled, looking at Nadia's unsure face. "I know I kissed someone else, but we were broken up and I think, in my head, I kind of needed to move on from the bad side of the emotions before I could think of the good ones. And then your parents came, and I ended up running into you, and voila. I got the Requiem Ball to be hosted here to trick you into talking to me."

She smiled despite the pain in her eyes. "You did. We kind of did the same thing, huh? But you chose better than me."

"We can talk about that another day," Valkyrie promised, knowing she wanted to beat that bitch to a pulp very soon. Who cares who she was, she made Nadia feel awful and Valkyrie did not appreciate that. "But right now, I want to know where we stand."

Nadia took a breath and thought about it. "Honestly? I don't think I can date you with my parents the way they are. I want to, I love you as much as I always did, and I've missed you, but my father hit you, Val. He came home and said he wished he could make you just disappear."

She smirked. "I think you're forgetting I'm a mega strong warrior queen. And anyway, I'm going to be an aunt soon, so I need to stick around."

She gasped. "Really? Who's having a baby?"

"Tanith and Ghastly," she grinned.

"Tanith and Ghastly!? I thought they'd never get together!"

"Neither did we and then Tanith got really, really sick and the doctors worked it out. She was really worried about it, but her brother came here today and is excited too."

"Oh, I'm so happy for them!" Nadia grinned. "Is it a boy or girl?"

"Boy," she grinned. She knew it would be a boy, no doubts.

"Aww!" She said, then laughed. "But still! My dad might hurt you Val."

"I'm willing to risk it. And, you know, my house is always open to you. You can come to stay with us any time for as long as you want. I spoke to Skulduggery and he said they can't legally make you leave either," Valkyrie told her, trying to be sweet and not sound as if that's what she wanted. Their relationship ended due to pressure, she shouldn't restart it putting pressure on Nadia, that was just a bad idea. "You could have your own room if you want."

Nadia smiled sadly. "I like that idea. But I can't just leave my parents."

"Could you leave to visit friends regularly?"

"I don't know. I can try." She bit her lip and looked at her knees. "I'm sorry I kissed someone else."

"Don't be. We weren't together," Valkyrie said before smirking. "Should I say sorry too?"

Nadia swatted at her arm for her attitude. "No, it's fine. And you made that girl sound nice and I can't hate nice people. But you, you are a truly bitch for what you have done. Daring to kiss someone when you're not dating anyone? Only a bitch would do that."

"I prefer the term, Princess Bitch, thank you," she said playfully.

Nadia smiled and leaned in and gave Valkyrie a small peck on the lips. They kept their faces barely an inch away and smiled softly. "I missed you, Val."

"I missed you too," she said, leaning over and pecking her lips also. "Does that mean I've convinced you to be my girlfriend?"

Nadia kissed her lips for a little longer. "Yes," she breathed and kissed her again.

Their breath becoming ragged as they breathed in the familiar smell of each other and felt each other's lips again. Valkyrie's hand did what Nadia's did, holding her side, then sliding to her waist, and up again to the side of her breasts. It was so good to just feel the girl and to press their bodies together on the sofa. She pulled Nadia on top of her, which was a little awkward in their dresses, but they made it work because the warmth and feel of each other was so important after their time away. Kissing a million people couldn't make up for the way Nadia made her feel in even the smallest of ways. There were moans and high pitched noises as they made out on the sofa and held each other tight.

It must have been a long time they held each other and ruined each other's makeup, but it was all worth it when they looked in each other's eyes as they attempted to catch their breaths and Valkyrie tried to get control over her suddenly fired up body. They giggled quietly.

"I love you Nadia," Valkyrie grinned. "Thank you for talking with me."

"I love you too. Thank you for listening and not hating me."

"I couldn't hate you," she whispered, kissing her again. "I don't think it's possible."

Nadia smiled and buried her head in Valkyrie's shoulder as they lay on the sofa.

"Hey?" Valkyrie asked. "What time is it?"

Nadia bolted up in a sitting position and looked at the clock on the self. She gasped. "It's nearly midnight!"

"Really? God, we've been here nearly two hours," Valkyrie said. "Quick, I hid some makeup down here."

Nadia laughed at Valkyrie's prep work but she sorted her clothes in the little mirror and they helped each other with their hair and accessories before they smudged and wiped at makeup and reapplied what they needed to look the same as before.

For Nadia, that wasn't just possible. Her happiness changed her whole face and she looked gorgeous with fire in her eyes and a big grin on her face. Valkyrie kissed her forehead.

"You better not forget how much I love you ever again," Valkyrie smiled softly. Nadia licked Valkyrie's nose. "I'm taking that as a yes."

They walked out that room looking happy and better than ever, and it showed. She didn't care what anyone else thought.

They didn't get far before Nadia's parents zoned in on them.

Valkyrie squeezed Nadia's hand and they stood still at the same time, both knowing what was coming. Nadia smiled up at her, and she knew she was in the right. How couldn't she be with those eyes on her?

"Nadia, where have you been?" Mrs Keena breathed unsteadily. She looked a little drunk and more than a bit frazzled.

"Cain," Mr Vinay growled. "Get your hands off my daughter."

"Dad, Mum, can you just listen?" Nadia begged, wrapping her other hand around Valkyrie arm securely as if she thought they'd be physically ripped apart. A few members of family on both their sides were glancing and that was bringing the attention of more people. "Valkyrie and I have been talking for the last few hours and that's why we weren't in here. We decided that we've both been making mistakes, but I've honestly done more. I shouldn't have broken up with her, and I lied a few weeks ago when I said I didn't love her. Me and Valkyrie both feel the same as we have since we met at thirteen, and we decided to get back together."

"You're in a relationship again?" Mrs Keena asked as her husband went a strange colour. "Nadia, darling, don't you think it would be best to work on getting some weight back and studying some more before you jump right back into a relationship?"

"I'm _not_ jumping right back in," she said frostily. "I know how I feel, and that's it. I want to date Valkyrie and I will, but I won't lie to you about it."

Mrs Keena bit her lip and didn't say anything, looking a bit shocked at the strength Nadia suddenly had. Mr Vinay, on the other hand…

"Is there a problem?" Raven asked as he and Crow walked over arm in arm.

Mr Vinay ground his teeth. "Nadia, we are leaving."

Mrs Keena looked at him and wilted. She was no help, obviously.

Raven frowned. "Why on earth would you do that? This is a celebration! Not only for the ending of the war, but also the new generation falling in love," he said loud enough for the others in the room to hear. "I, for one, am very glad the two are dating again. They are practically made for each other. You don't see commitment and resolve as strong as theirs very often."

"That may be, but Nadia is _my_ daughter and _I_ wish to leave," he growled darkly. "Nadia, you know what will happen if you don't do what you're told."

Behind them, Mrs Prachi and Mr Farhan watched closely. "Dad, I'm going to stay."

" _Nadia_ ," he said warningly, his eyes glinting.

"Dad, if you don't accept that me and Valkyrie are together, then there's not much I can do. There's no one you can turn to that can make me stay away from Valkyrie. I can date who I want, and right now Valkyrie's home looks a lot more inviting than yours. So decide."

He took a quick step forward and the whole room held its breath as Valkyrie stepped in front of Nadia threateningly. As if her pretty peach lace dress and tiara made her threatening. She and Mr Vinay glared viciously at each other. "I will see you at home, Nadia," he breathed and stormed passed them.

As soon as he was out of the room it seemed to feel lighter. Mrs Keena looked down as she walked after him, only glancing at her daughter pleadingly before going.

Valkyrie and Nadia looked at each other. Hopefully her parents would come to terms with it, but their minds were made up. They were made for each other, just like Raven said. They'd make it work.


	93. Family moments

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 93**

Nadia didn't stay the night, but she did stay until the very, very end of the party and then Bear drove her home with a warm smile. Valkyrie watched her go from the front door, feeling giddy, happy and a little sad because she was leaving.

"You did really well Cub," Wolf smiled, putting a hand on her shoulder like a proud dad. "I honestly didn't expect you to get back together so quickly."

She shrugged a little. "We both still liked each other the same, we just had to talk about what had happened. It turns out we spent our time very similarly, so it was easy to move on."

"Oooh, so she kissed someone else too?" Weasel grinned from next to her.

"She went on a few dates with someone and they were horrid when she didn't want to go on any more. I'll be getting the full story another time," she promised. Wolf nodded his understanding and Weasel grinned. "But for now we're seeing how everything goes. No promises, but I think we'll be alright."

"Mr Vinay did surprise me," Crow said, coming up behind them. He had an arm around Raven's shoulders who looked to be a little tipsy. "But his mother surprised me more. I expected her to just take Nadia and leave, not watch and stay silent."

"Me too, actually," Valkyrie admitted. "She was surprisingly neutral in all this. I wonder if she was just holding it in as a family thing rather than something to do at a party. It would make sense, right?"

"That may mean there are double the people about to crucify Nadia at home, or perhaps her grandmother will be so busy shouting at Mr Vinay for causing a scene here he won't have a chance to start on her," Wolf mused. "We'll just see in the morning I suppose. But before that, I would like to take a long moment to point out that your little talk would not have taken the best part of three hours, young lady!"

"Oh my God," she complained and started going upstairs.

"Excuse me, what do you think you're doing? You didn't happen to mush faces for some of that time, hum? I'm waiting," Wolf grinned at her, following Valkyrie up the stairs.

"Shut _up_!"

"I can run faster than you!" He said, and she didn't get halfway down the hallway before Wolf grabbed her and spun her around before kissing her cheek from behind. "I love you, sis. You did amazing."

"Thanks, Wolf," she grinned.

.*****.

Valkyrie woke up the next morning and was able to restrain herself from talking to Nadia immediately by leaving her phone in the bedroom when she went to the loo, but after that, she decided it had been long enough.

It was just past ten in the morning and Nadia had left the house at two last night alongside the late guests. Eight hours was a long time not to hear from her after _everything_.

She decided to give her a simple text in the end. It read 'Good morning. Are we allowed to talk today?' She sent it and washed her face while she waited for a reply.

That reply took a good long time, so Valkyrie went downstairs with her phone and sat at the table for breakfast where everyone else was too. It was impressive how they all knew to wake up together. Tanith looked very tired still, and Snake was dealing with a hangover, but it was okay other than that.

They also had Corrival and Solomon at the table, who'd both stayed the night with them. Pa had his own room a floor above them as promised, but she could only assume Raven was staying in Crow's room on nights he stayed. This must have been the fourth time he'd been at the table for breakfast, but there was a good chance he'd stayed overnight on other occasions.

They all gave her a smile when she came in and put her phone on the table.

"Oh, memories," Weasel said wistfully. "Don't you all remember Cub texting all through our meals? I finally feel back to normal."

They snickered at her so she stuck her tongue out and poured herself a bowl of cereal, getting cornflakes everywhere when her phone buzzed. They laughed at her and she left the box lying over her bowl to read it.

'I think so,' it read.

'How were your parents last night?' She asked.

A moment later Nadia sent, 'They were in bed already. I didn't think they'd wait. Daadii was awake though.'

'What she say?' Valkyrie asked.

The message was long enough for Valkyrie to sort her food out and eat a spoonful. 'She just asked about how much I spoke to my dad and how he was acting at home and if I was listening to him. She said I was being naughty for not listening but she also said I was growing into a woman so I should have leniency but then she said I was still a daughter of his and had to listen. So I don't know. Does that mean I have to do what he says to be good, or just listen and tell him no each time? Or should he be more lenient and that make me good by itself? I don't know.'

Valkyrie chewed thoughtfully. 'You listened last night and was polite saying no, and you went home and stuff, so I would say it's on him. She didn't say anything at the party so you can't be doing that bad.'

'True.'

'Have you seen anyone this morning?' She asked.

'I saw mum but she didn't say anything. She looks really tired, I don't think she slept. Maybe she didn't see me.'

'You could try talking to her?'

'I tried for weeks to talk to her and make her listen. It's her turn,' Nadia sent, and Valkyrie could feel the resentment in the text. She'd been right when she thought this would happen. She just had to make sure Nadia didn't change because of it, at least in any holding onto her issues type of ways. She was a good person, she just needed to stand up for herself and make her parents see she could make good decisions.

'I'd probably feel the same,' she sent. Then in another, she said: 'When can we see each other next?'

There was a long pause and Valkyrie took her bowl and spoon to the kitchen, almost walking into a door because she was staring at her phone intently, not wanting to miss the message for even a second. She heard laughter behind her. 'I don't know. Maybe tomorrow. I'll check'

'I'd like that,' she grinned. She stood there staring over her phone until another one popped up saying she was allowed out with 'friends' tomorrow for lunch. Valkyrie grinned and did a happy dance in the kitchen, and knocked the bowl and it shattered on the floor.

"What was that?" Tanith asked warningly.

"A bowl," Valkyrie said. "I'll clean it, I promise."

She cleaned quickly and thought of what they could do. How would she get to Nadia's? How could she get Nadia away? What would be the best thing to do? Should she knock on the door and say it was happening, or ask permission? She was taking her out anyway, so permission was just a formality she didn't care about.

Maybe she shouldn't do that. Should she just tell Nadia to meet her outside, or help her sneak out unnoticed? She was meant to be seeing a friend after all.

She could assume Nadia didn't want to spend the night at hers since she hadn't last night when it was easier for her to do it, so she wanted to see her sooner rather than later as there would most likely be a time limit on them. So she said, 'I'll pick you up at 1 and get food?'

It only took a few minutes for the text to come. 'Family lunch is 1. Have to be earlier or after.'

'12.30 then.'

They sent a few more messages but Nadia had decided she would go talk to her mother while her grandmother was out with other family so they agreed to stop talking until Nadia texted her again.

She put her phone in her back pocket, knowing there was still a slight change in their relationship but nodded to herself as she pulled the full binbag out the bin and tied it up. It made a lot of sense. They couldn't go right back into saying they loved each other every minute after over seven months of not talking. That made her laugh a little. Dexter always did say the number seven was lucky.

Speaking of Wolf, she pressed the binbag into his chest with a cheeky grin and ran off as soon as he took it, his hungover mind taking it before he realised what she'd done.

"Hey Val," Tanith said breathily from next to her brother, her biological one that is, who'd gotten up, worked out and eaten way before the rest of them. Tanith had her head back on the sofa and looked pale. Being pregnant really wasn't healthy for her. "What's your plans today?"

Valkyrie shrugged casually and sat opposite her sister. "Oh, you know. A few chores. Eat. Nap. Get excited about seeing Nadia tomorrow."

She grinned. "Lover girl," she mocked.

Valkyrie picked some lint off the sofa. "I have nothing kind to say to you."

"If you were going to say I'm fat, you can go fuck yourself," she murmured and then groaned as the thought apparently brought on nausea. Her brother patted her leg kindly.

"I'm glad I'll never have to do this," he said.

Valkyrie wrinkled her nose. "I'm hoping I won't have to."

"And leave poor Nadia to do all the work?" Snake winked before closing his eyes and settling in to sleep off his headache.

"Hey! I barely left the womb myself, give me a minute before we start on the babies, okay?" She said, holding her hands up. "I'm sixteen for Christ's sake."

"You could get pregnant," Tanith mumbled. "Old enough."

"What, with Nadia?" She said with a tease in her voice.

"I ask no questions," Tanith smirked back.

"Please, god, don't," Crow said, coming up behind her and putting a hand on her shoulder.

"I'm not, we just had this conversation!" She said, throwing her hands up.

"But if you keep trying really, really hard it might just work," Wolf insinuated with a smirk. "Think about it."

She stuck her tongue out at him and he chuckled to himself as he took his seat. The whole family was now in the living room being lazy. "The question is, who else is going to have a baby? Because Tanith's doing her bit, and I've said no. The baby needs cousins, guys!"

The men groaned and leaned their heads back to avoid eye contact. She looked around the room with a smirk. "Snake?"

He grunted. "That's the last thing I want right now. Try Anton."

"Bear? Any little feet coming along?" She grinned, leaning in and resting on his shoulder.

He chuckled deeply. "Unlikely in the near future. Perhaps one day."

"Ooh, I think that's the best we're gonna get! Unless anyone else wants in on this?" They shook their heads and Crow squeezed her shoulder. "What about you, Crow? Should I be preparing?"

"Do I look like I'm getting pregnant?" He asked in a deadpan voice.

"Maybe," she said back and he swatted her ear and sat in his chair. Raven squeezed in next to Valkyrie on the sofa. "So, unlikely then. Too bad I guess."

"What makes you want to have babies around?" Raven asked.

She shrugged. "Dunno. I like the idea of nieces and nephews more than the baby's part," she said. "Like, if you all went and had babies right now, I'd have to move out of here, but when they're, like, seven or eight I could come back. I don't want to be around that many crying humans, you know?"

He chuckled and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, giving her a squeeze and letting her go a moment later. She had a vague memory of her father Desmond doing that when she was a very little girl. It was nice.

"I say we order lunch," Tanith said, raising a hand. "I want food. Not more babies. If I have to push one out, I want at least a year before one of you takes the spotlight."

"No one's getting pregnant," Crow declared and pulled out the takeaway drawer and all the menus within. "Now that's decided, what do you want?"

"A baby," Wolf grinned and got hit in the stomach by Weasel.


	94. Meet the Grandparents

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 94**

The day went slowly and the night even more so. By the time tomorrow came, they were all happy because it was a big day as it marked the start of Tanith's sixth month. It was also the first day she'd had real morning sickness and had thrown up on and off for an hour before being able breath and settle herself.

She'd looked bad when she came downstairs and had immediately sworn at them all and blamed their positive ideas of pregnancy to be the cause of her being sick.

When Valkyrie was ready and she had distracted herself until the time was right, she ran down the stairs with her bag and other stuff. The others were sitting around the parlour which wasn't yet turned back into the comfortable living room it usually was. They looked up when she walked in.

"Can I get a lift to Nadia's house?"

They all grinned. "You're going to Nadia's? You are brave," Wolf grinned wolfishly. He lived up to his name well. "Did her Daddy leave?"

She gave him a sour look. "No. I'm going to lunch with her."

"Take the bike," Tanith said, an arm over her eyes. "The helmets are in the garage."

"Thanks!" She grinned.

"You can't take the bike, you don't have a licence," Crow said quickly. "And even if they can't see you’re not old enough to drive, they will see Nadia."

"But Nadia won’t be driving, will she?" Valkyrie grinned. She quickly ran upstairs and put on her protective jacket and switched her shoes for her protective boots and bolted downstairs to the garage. Tanith threw her keys at Valkyrie and she caught them mid-run.

The bike was glorious as ever, and she knew the vehicle she wanted when she was a year older and got her licence, but for now, she got the fake one out Pa had made for her and shoved that in her purse. The bag went on the back of the bike and she attached the second helmet for Nadia and rode away.

It was so exhilarating riding a motorcycle by herself for the first time on open roads. She'd been taught to ride alone, but that was with Tanith right behind her on a quad, so now she could really do whatever she wanted.

She seemed to be a boring person though because she just rode the way Tanith did. She sped too much, took shortcuts in the countryside, and gave the Gardaí little salutes and got smiles from them. Being so tall and bulky, she was pretty sure they thought she was a man, and dressed in black protective gear she looked as if she owned the bike and was meant to be driving it, so no one stopped her. She was so excited to see Nadia she probably wouldn't have stopped for them.

She stopped a street away from Nadia's house and left the helmet on the seat, knowing no one could get it off with the symbols on it. No mortal would want to touch, but they could admire. It was a pretty little trick Tanith got from a friend of hers, and it always made Valkyrie smirk when she thought about it. She didn't even have to lock it if she didn't want to.

She texted Nadia but after a few minutes waiting, she didn't get anything back or see Nadia. Wandering around the corner, she didn't see the girl coming up the street either. She had wanted not to knock on the door and be seen since Nadia was meeting 'friends' but perhaps her family requested they see the friends. She sighed and jogged over to Nadia's house, flattening her hair quickly before knocking. There was a long, long pause in which she waited. The butler opened the door. He said nothing but he did look down on her so disdainfully she wasn't sure if that was just Mr Vinay telling him to do that or if it was his own feelings.

"I'm here to pick up Nadia," she said.

He said nothing. He closed the door in her face. _Well_. 

She waited, just in case he came back, but ended up getting her phone out. Just as she texted Nadia she was at the door again, it was opened by Mrs Prachi.

"Miss Cain," Mrs Prachi said, wearing a pretty green and lavender sari. She didn't smile. "You are here to pick up my granddaughter. Please come in."

Valkyrie did that with a small smile, trying to act very comfortably when she actually wasn't. Mrs Prachi took her through into the parlour. She noticed they had, of course, fixed the wall from a year ago. How strange, she hadn't been downstairs in this house for a year.

In the parlour was Mr Farhan, Nadia, Mrs Keena, Mr Vinay and two of Mrs Prachi's sisters who both wore salwar kameez, a type of dress, a name Valkyrie recalled proudly since she hadn't uttered the words in about two years. She was good at this. They were all sat silently and Nadia had her arms crossed and head high, but she looked upset as if her feelings had been hurt. Mrs Keena looked upset also, so she wondered if they had both been told off or if the two of them had fought.

"Good afternoon," Valkyrie said, tilting her head unconsciously.

"Take a seat, Miss Cain," Mrs Prachi said, sitting next to her husband.

"Please, call me Valkyrie," she smiled.

She smiled back politely. "Of course. Valkyrie, I have some concerns about you dating young Nadia. I have been told some bad things about you from my family, friends and the wider community. How do you justify dating Nadia if those concerns are true?"

"What sort of concerns do you have? Other than general gossip," Valkyrie said neutrally. If Mrs Prachi was going to say she was awful, she'd suggest Mrs Prachi believed gossip. Ha.

She didn't appreciate it so much. "You are often fighting, constantly putting people in danger and regularly get into verbal fights and insult people for your own amusement. I do not see how that can benefit my granddaughter, her parents or even the Sanctuary you work for."

"Mrs Prachi, my job is to get into fights. I am Co-Head and Second Detective for the Irish Sanctuary, and I didn't get that just because of my family status with the Dead Men. I worked for it, and I worked hard. I almost died every few days, I've been in coma's and I've had limbs reattached. Occasionally I have to get into fights out of work too because people are unhappy that I was a part of sending their family to prison, and I am in my rights to defend myself. Sometimes that takes a few insults, sometimes I have to hit them, and sometimes they're being such idiots I laugh at them. But it's all legal and they all get tried by impartial psychics and I've always been right," Valkyrie explained. "As for putting others in danger, I don't keep it a secret how dangerous my job is. I'm an apprentice Dead Man and my brothers are constant targets. A lot of disgusting people want their hands on me. I've told Nadia before how dangerous it is, and every time she said she wants to be here."

"Nadia is still a child, unfortunately, so whilst it is romantic, I don't enjoy the sentiment," Mrs Prachi said.

"I keep Nadia up to date with my cases as much as I can. There have been times I've begged her to leave the country, and she's refused. I can't force her to leave, and honestly, it's not realistic. Even if we weren't dating, these people would still exist. I can't stop that," Valkyrie said honestly.

Mrs Prachi was unreadable and so was her sisters. Mr Vinay just glared, Mrs Keena watched her with a bit lip and Nadia just smiled at her. Mr Farhan looked as if he couldn't care less and was just waiting for this to be over for lunch. She liked him more than the others, she decided.

"What are your intentions?" One of the sisters asked quietly, the younger one.

"For Nadia?" She asked. "I love her. I want to spend as much time with her as I can and eventually move in together."

"Before marriage?" The older sister asked with her nose up. The first sister raised her eyes to the ceiling.

"If ever Nadia's ready to," Valkyrie smiled. "I don't really mind."

"Do you _plan_ on marrying her?" Mrs Prachi asked with a raised eyebrow.

"If she can put up with me for that long–"

"What about Nadia's education? Where would she study?" The older sister interrupted, not caring for the marriage idea.

"She can study where she wants," Valkyrie said neutrally. "I don't mind if she doesn't study at all, I can't make her do it."

"What about your education?" The younger sister asked.

"I haven't decided yet. I have just completed my first set of real exams, and I have to think about what to do next, but I haven't decided. I think I'm going to stay with my work though."

"And what is your long-term working goals?" Mrs Prachi asked.

"I want to continue my work in the Sanctuary and as a Dead Man, and I will also be taking over the family businesses when I turn eighteen and then twenty-one respectively," Valkyrie said. This was a lot of questions for a sixteen and seventeen year old to date.

There was a small silence and she felt their consideration. Did this relationship really lie on the type of job she'd get? She doubted that. She felt as if they were considering her in general, all three sisters with their differing standards. And the marriage questions just felt incredulous, not something they expected.

Mrs Prachi continued. "Tell us about the businesses. We are a family built around our business, after all. Young Nadia is very smart and we expect her to be a young entrepreneur also."

"My father was a mortal, and he had a construction business that went to my Uncle Gordon at the time of his death. There is a chance we may sell or convert it into a magic business, we haven't decided yet. The other business is the real family business and that is in construction materials with magic properties and signals. It's the biggest in the country and we are making plans to expand. Other than that, my uncle primarily set up a lot of investments and stocks that deal with themselves for the most part."

"And what sort of future do you expect this type of work to give our Nadia? Assuming you remain together for the foreseeable future," Mrs Prachi smiled, stroking a lock of Nadia's hair.

"At present, there are nine mages living in my manor with no income going towards expenditures except my own, and we also have two others live there on a renting basis. So in terms of wealth, Nadia won't ever have to worry or even work if she wishes, and I expect a few of my family members will be moving to live with their partners in the near future, but even if they didn't, the house is more than large enough to give us all the space in the world, have more family stay with us and to have those horses Nadia is always asking for."

She got a smile out of a few of them, but the older sister and Mr Vinay were still more than sceptical of her.

"I feel as if monetary value is not enough to base a relationship on. If you truly wish for a long-term bond with little Nadia you will need to focus on your educations," the older sister said scornfully.

"With all due respect," Valkyrie said slowly, not sure if that wording had been used in a hundred years or more without sarcasm, "education can only get us so far. I've been taught how to run my businesses from people without a degree, and I can run my Sanctuary Department alone too. I don't have a degree to do any of that and I've been home schooled for years by people who don't have proper educations either."

"I fail to see how that helps your case," the sister said.

"But at their age, it's easily fixed," Mrs Prachi interrupted. "For instance, if Nadia agrees to go back to finishing school, we could put this whole mess of who she is dating behind us. At their age, marriage, business and homes are a nice formality but not entirely important."

Valkyrie looked at Nadia and saw her wince a little. "I don't want to go back to that school," she said so quietly it was nearly a whisper.

Everyone stared or glared at her. "I see," Mrs Prachi said. "And what do you think you want?"

She looked at her knee. "I don't know."

Mrs Keena leaned forward and tried to look kind but it seemed condescending to Valkyrie. "Honey, are you sure you don't like your school? A lot of very successful mages have been there, and it would really help your chances of going to University. Won't you miss your friends?"

Nadia shrugged a little, as if she realised she wasn't meant to but had already done it too late. "I don't have very high grades there anyway, Mum. I don't want to go back."

Mrs Keena was about to argue that but Mrs Prachi put a hand up. "Nadia, what would you say to this. If your mother and father agreed not to question you on who you date, and do not stop you from seeing that person, would you agree to go back to that school?"

Nadia hesitated and for a moment Valkyrie had to look away as rejection settled into her. But then, Nadia shook her head. "I want to be with Valkyrie, and I don't want to go to that school. Maybe I'd go to another one, somewhere nearer?"

Mrs Prachi hummed and Valkyrie couldn't tell what the matriarch was feeling but she, herself, certainly felt a lot better. "We will have to discuss your education further, it seems. Women have not long been allowed an education like you can have Nadia, and we want you to have the very best. Miss Cain, thank you for your time. You and Nadia may go to lunch now, and we expect her back by four this afternoon."

Valkyrie nodded and stood with Nadia, letting Nadia lead the way out of the parlour. Still in sight of the family through the arch door, she whispered to Nadia if she still had the old protective jacket she'd left in her room and Nadia nodded and went to fetch it. A few moments later she was back, donned it, and they left the house.

"That was really not okay," Valkyrie whispered as they walked quickly up the street.

Nadia took a deep breath and smiled. "It went well. I think they like you a bit more," she said back. "Why do I need this jacket anyway? Not that I don't love it or anything. I actually really love it. I – thank you for leaving it with me."

"That's okay," she said with a smile. "I had a feeling you'd want it. And it's because we're traveling in _style_ today."

Nadia gasped.


	95. A little date

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**C** **hapter 95** **  
**

"Surprise!" Valkyrie grinned. "You've always wanted to ride a motorbike."

"I don't have a licence," Nadia said quickly.

"Well, yeah, I kind of thought I'd drive and you'd hang on," Valkyrie said, gently pulling Nadia over. "I can teach you but not today."

"Valkyrie, how did you get this?" Nadia breathed, her eyes never leaving the gleaming machine.

"It's Tanith's. It's how we got to the ice cream place too since she can't drive anymore, I just drive the bike everywhere for her and I get to use it myself sometimes," Valkyrie explained. "And don't worry, Pa – I mean, Corrival gave me a fake licence."

"Corrival? As in Elder Deuce? You call him Pa?"

"Yes."

She gaped. "Seriously? He actually gave you a fake licence?"

"Yeah I know, it's great! Come on, let me help you into the helmet. You have to do the jacket up first," Valkyrie smiled, and helped her do just that. "Oh my god, you're so adorable!"

"I feel massive," Nadia said from beneath all the layers of padding.

"You're not though. Just your head is three times its normal size. You're so small in my old jacket that it just makes you look smaller and it's so funny," Valkyrie laughed. "You're like a little, cute bunny in a massive helmet!"

"Stop laughing at me!" Nadia complained, but she looked like a tiny, angry bunny when she did that and Valkyrie laughed more, wheezing about how adorable she was. "I hate you."

"You love me," Valkyrie smiled, and kissed Nadia's hand because that was the only skin showing.

They got on the bike and with a little help, Nadia was safely wrapped around Valkyrie for the journey. After promising a thousand times to go slow, they set off into Dublin.

Perhaps she didn't stick by that promise the whole way, but feeling Nadia's arms tense around her whenever she sped up or when they curved around traffic was the best feeling in the universe and she would have to try and convince Tanith to give her the bike when she had a baby to travel with. It was only right she inherited the death machine when Tanith downgraded to the status of 'responsible' after all. She _was_ her sister.

Regardless of bike ownership, she loved riding with Nadia and when they got to the car park and removed their helmets Nadia was a little shaky but had the biggest grin on her face.

"Fun?"

"Yeah," she breathed with a laugh. "I don't think I can do that myself."

Valkyrie shrugged. "I'll get you a car. Come on, it's a ten minute walk to the restaurant."

They walked in amiable silence to the restaurant and they were seated as soon as they got there due to being after the lunchtime rush. She'd taken them to a simple place that did a lot of soups and sandwiches, but all of it was on the high-end spectrum, so the food was always great and the atmosphere was a lot quieter. She asked the waitress to give them a table upstairs, which she did, and they sat by the window with a view into the busy street below.

"Is there anything I can get you?" The waitress asked as soon as they were sat.

"A jug of water, please," Valkyrie knew to say. She'd been with Gordon almost every week as a child and just before his death, she had been able to do all the talking for them. She'd been very proud at the time.

The waitress did that and was quick enough to halt any conversation progression, and then they were able to order soup each and a shared platter of mixed bread. She loved fancy food.

"This place is nice," Nadia commented easily, sipping her water.

"It is, it's one of my favourites. I hoped we could share a dessert, they're even better than the food," she smiled. They had a little silence and Nadia looked out the window at the people. "What was that family meeting all about then?"

She screwed her face up. "It was my family deciding if I'm allowed to date you. They always do this, but usually when it comes to more serious stuff. Dad was the one that suggested it."

"But is it really as serious as marriage and jobs?"

"No, Daadii just wanted to sort out whether I should be allowed to date you and decide whose side to be on in a 'once and for all' manner, I guess. Since her opinion kind of tells the rest of the family what to do, we really want her to like you. Having those flowers the kids picked out in the entrance at your house the other day probably helped, because they were really thrilled, but I don't think they liked that you had me eating with you."

"It wasn't that bad though," she said.

"No, but Daadii loves tradition, and that means I have to stay with my parents and stuff. I tried calling her Grandma once and I was told if I did it again, I'd get a spanking."

"That's a little harsh."

"Dad said once it's because she doesn't want traditions to be forgotten so she makes all her children and grandchildren know about them. It took a long time before she let her children move out of her house, and that was two hundred years ago when my dad was past sixty. I guess I don't mind some of it, but she likes to force her clothing choices on me and I hate that. What's wrong with skinny jeans?"

"Nothing."

"Exactly! So I want to wear them and she gets annoying. I tried to wear a different top today and got marched back to my room. And God forbid she ever see my bare legs," Nadia muttered, covering her face. "I can't even wear a skirt. Skirts are _girl clothes_."

"She'll go home soon," Valkyrie soothed her sympathetically. "And it didn't sound like she hated us together by the end."

"No, she sounded like she'd discuss it with the family and her friend before getting back to us. And that's before they decide what school _I_ have to live at," Nada sighed. "I just want to go to a school I like and date you. Is that so bad? I don't know what she's going to think when she finds out I don't _want_ a business like everyone else.

"What do you want to do?"

She shrugged. "I think I'd like to work from home. I like management, so I might work for my Dad if he ever pulls his head from his arse."

"You could run my businesses if you like," she suggested carefully. "I don't want to run them myself, I just like the big things."

"I don't particularly like finances though," Nadia said with a bit lip.

"Then hire someone?" Valkyrie laughed. "You don't need to decide now or anything, I was just saying it's possible."

Nadia didn't get to respond because their food came then and they started to eat. As always, the food was amazing, but it was nice to make a memory with Nadia there to go alongside those of her Uncle. She still had Echo-Gordon, but food was a big part of their lives together, testified by Gordon's weight, and she wanted to eat out again like she used to. But with Nadia this time.

"Where do you want to go to school then? Or don't you know?" Valkyrie asked Nadia.

She shook her head. "I don't particularly want to go at all, but I guess if it was in Ireland I wouldn't mind too much. But I doubt Mum would be keen on the idea and I don't know how well Dad will take Daadii getting involved in that bit, you know? He can still send me away, that's the thing. But then we'll have other family problems if he doesn't do what his mother says because she's stricter with her kids than with me or the other grandkids. Especially since he actually asked for her help."

She looked at her plate with what she hoped was a casual move. "What will you do if he does want to send you back?"

Nadia smiled sadly at her and reached her hand across the table for Valkyrie to squeeze. "We'll work it out."

"Or you could just move in with me?" Nadia had a hesitant look on her face. "You'd have your own room and space and you could go to your parents whenever you want. It's just something you could do, you know? I have space. I'd love to see you for breakfast again."

She smiled a little. "It sounds nice. But if I do that then I'll be in real trouble from Daadii and Dad and probably Mum and the rest of the family will think it's bad even if they don't think Dad should send me back to India, and I don't want to be that person that causes all the problems, you know? I just want get this over with and move out when people usually do and just see you when I can and text you all the time. I want the normal stuff."

"We can do that anyway, so don't worry," Valkyrie smiled. "And I'll work in India for a year if he sends you back."

"You can't speak any of the native languages," Nadia frowned.

"The English dealt with that problem, don't worry. I just need to talk as loud as I can and everyone will know what to do," Valkyrie grinned teasingly.

"You're an idiot," Nadia smiled, rolling her eyes. "And that's a really bad joke."

"I know it is, but I _could_ probably get by, and I wouldn't mind learning a little of the local language of wherever the school is. I'm sure Wolf knows something helpful."

"It's literally in the middle of nowhere. There's no local people, let alone a local _language_ ," Nadia complained. "I don't mind small places, but this school takes it to a new level."

Valkyrie shrugged. "I'd work it out. I could break into the school and scare your roommates."

Nadia just shook her head and ate her soup, and they chatted a little about all the things they used to and caught up on what they'd missed. Nadia could tell her a little about all her roommates which were the 'sort of' friend's she'd made, and Valkyrie talked about her Temple visit a little more and all about the baby stuff that had been prepared. Nadia had a pair of her old baby shoes and was excited as anything to let Tanith borrow them for the baby. They were pink, she said, but they were so small the baby wouldn't be seen in them for long, and Valkyrie doubted Tanith would care. They'd gone to a little baby boutique a while ago and the shoes had been more expensive than a pair of Bespoke protective boots, and that was saying something. This child wouldn't get a colour choice, a shoe was a shoe.

They shared a sundae ice cream together and by the time they were leaving, both of them were holding hands and it felt so much like before that if someone said she dreamt being apart, she'd probably believe them.

They walked slowly back to the bike and when they were there, they checked the time and saw they still had an hour.

She had no intention of taking Nadia home with that long to go, and Nadia didn't ask what Valkyrie's plan was, so she hoped it was fine and she drove them to her house and helped Nadia back out her helmet.

"Hello stranger," Weasel grinned from the doorway with Wolf. "Having fun?"

"Hi," Nadia said with sudden nerves.

"We had loads of fun," Valkyrie grinned. "You?"

"Well, we hung curtains, packed boxes, stuck up all the stickers, took down all the stickers, put some nails in the wall, hung pictures, got shouted at, hung different pictures and moved a whole load of furniture around."

"Is Tanith having fun?" She asked instead.

He shrugged. "It's hard to tell with the mood swings. But probably, yeah."

"Well, that's all that counts," Valkyrie smiled and patted his cheek.

Valkyrie led Nadia upstairs to put the helmets away and Nadia smiled a little when she looked around Valkyrie's clean, perfectly organised, fresh looking room.

"I never knew you had carpet," she smiled, a little tremor of nerves in her voice. She didn't come further into the room than the desk by the door either. Whatever happened to make her so nervous, so self-conscious, was high on Valkyrie's list to get Nadia talking about so they could fix it. She'd been more confident at thirteen with spots and starting her periods than she was now at seventeen.

"I know, it's a strange phenomenon that happens every once in a while," Valkyrie smirked instead of what she really wanted to ask. "You can sit down if you want."

Nadia nodded and carefully sat herself on one of the desk chairs, spinning it to see Valkyrie who was sitting on the edge of the bed and trying not to look as if she noticed the odd behaviour.

"Do you want to talk?" Valkyrie asked after a moment of watching Nadia silently.

"We talked all afternoon," Nadia said quietly, pressing her nail into her thumb again.

"Do you want to see the baby room?" She asked after a moment.

Nadia smiled, and they went into what she could only assume was the neutral grounds for how Nadia was feeling.

Tanith was there to tell them all about the changes she'd been making with the help of Wolf, Weasel and her brother. It looked good, and Valkyrie followed as the other two raved about how incredible and exciting it all was. The walls were a pretty yellow, the furniture had been given a wax seal to lock in the amazing wood finish, and everything was so, so pretty. The stickers on the wall were Pooh Bear themed and it made the yellow pop and gave a direction to the room. It was completely gender neutral, which was fine, and useful too, since Tanith had already decided after much arguments with Panda that she was waiting till birth to find out the sex. And at any rate, the Pooh Bear theme was adorable.

"We need to go baby clothes shopping," Nadia grinned, looking over at Valkyrie. She was standing next to Tanith's brother who had been completely ignored the whole time. "If you want gender neutral, we can get as much as we want and it will still be perfect for baby."

A smile gripped Tanith and she squealed excitedly. "There are cute places in Dublin to get clothes!"

Tanith's brother laughed. "Did you say 'cute'?"

She glared at him. "Yes, I said 'cute', you pillock."

He put his hands up. "Alright, alright. But you probably want to come to England at some point and see Mum and Dad while you have a baby bump. You're six months, Tan, only a while more before you can't fly."

"Oh yeah," she realised. "Oh my god, Nadia, we could do the shopping in _London_!"

Nadia's smile fell. "I don't know if I'm allowed."

"I'll try and convince them, I'm sure they'll let you," Tanith grinned with a mischievous look in her eyes. "I'll say I need to go alone and Valkyrie is on cases, and I want a female friend to help me choose. It won't be hard convincing them you're the only other woman I know."

"But why would you want me?" Nadia asked.

"Because," Tanith shrugged. "I'm pregnant and stupid, that's why. And I want baby clothes. Sorted."

Nadia let a little smile settle on her lips. "Well, you're welcome to try. And you totally need a footrest in here for the rocking chair."

Valkyrie and Tanith's brother gave each other a look and raised their eyes to the ceiling at the same time. At least the other two were having fun. She wondered idly how much this shopping trip would cost her.


	96. You're not helping

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 96**

Two weeks on, two weeks of dating Nadia again in the middle of the second heatwave of the year in early June, and she spent that time on cases.

Tanith's brother went home the day before, having taken Valkyrie hunting a few times. Their prey, serial murderers that were good at being quiet and laying low, had been entertaining and exciting to track and find, and she felt as if she learnt more from him then than the weeks she'd spent learning to track at the Sanctuary with the Dead Men. They were good, but they were more on the loud and psychotic end of the hunting spectrum which she took to naturally, unlike this type of tracking, which they avoided because they enjoyed the big stuff more. Now she knew both.

On that particular day, having just finished a particularly nasty case, she sat in one of Kenspeckle's beds and looked around at her family. Wolf and Weasel were sitting together as they usually were nowadays, inseparable. Raven had just arrived and was talking with Crow who at on his own bed with two broken thigh bones. Raven was over practically every night now and had been since the Ball. He'd immediately found a little spot in their family and settled himself in without question or ruffling any feathers, so to speak. As a couple, they were somewhat reserved, but they would look at each other over dinner with something in their eyes and it would fill Valkyrie's heart that they both might have fallen for the other.

She hadn't seen Nadia in that time, but they spoke every evening and texted in the day. Valkyrie worried about her. Sighing, she checked her phone with the hand that wasn't in a bowl of mud and saw she had a message. She smiled at it and send a cute one back before putting it away and looking up at Snake who had just come over and stood beside her.

"Hey, Cub," he said slowly, sitting down next to her. He was being quiet as the two couples in the room spoke to their partners. "How's your hand?"

"It's okay. Kenspeckle said it won't fall off. How's your head?" She asked.

He shrugged. "It's fine. Did you get to finish the case?"

"Yeah, the Cleavers got the criminals. As soon as we're healed, we can go home," she smiled.

He nodded. "Good, good."

She reached over and took his hand. "It's okay, Snake. Stop stressing."

He smiled softly at her and clutched her hand tightly. Since everything with the Spiders, he had good and bad days, and they were always there and ready for anything he said, did or needed. "Thanks."

They sat like that until Kenspeckle swept through the room and finished their healing and told them to leave, essentially, which they did, Valkyrie keeping a hold of Snake's hand. They picked up fast food for lunch since they all knew whatever Tanith made would be awful and really wanted to skip out on that - it was the cravings, but god, they didn't want any more samples than she could physically force in their mouths - and got home before it was cold.

"Whose car is that?" Wolf asked, looking at a car parked literally in the middle of everything and blocking them from getting passed properly. Crow parked the Bentley at the side of the driveway.

Valkyrie looked at the same time Weasel spoke. "Cub’s aunt and uncle."

Valkyrie groaned and hit her head on the plush headrest. "Not Fergus and Beryl!"

"Yep, those ones," he grinned. "Ah, come on kiddo, it can't be that bad."

She grumbled and got out the car, Snake sticking close to her side today as his means of comfort while he worked over his own thoughts, and trudged into her house. Tanith was curled up with a mug of tea looking mildly irritated as Beryl gave her bad advice on how to raise her child. She practically sagged with relief when they came through the front door.

"Stephanie!" Tanith grinned, waving them over. "Come on, say hi to your relatives. I'll make tea."

Tanith almost bolted from the room and Weasel and Wolf made their exit with her, more than smart enough to know a bad situation. Snake stayed close even when Beryl gave Valkyrie a very unwanted hug.

"Stephanie, it's so good to see you. You've grown so much, look Fergus. She must be as tall as you. Come on, sit down with us," Beryl smiled without conviction. "How have you been recently?"

"Oh, grand, grand," she nodded, sitting with Snake opposite them. "This is my brother Erskine by the way. And Skulduggery Pleasant is standing around over there with his boyfriend, Solomon."

Raven stomped on Crow's foot - he had his facade on - right before her aunt and uncle turned with bulging eyes to see them and they both smiled. "It's a pleasure to meet you," Raven smiled. He pulled Crow bodily into the room and forced him into his chair and then took a seat on Valkyrie's other side opposite the evil relatives. "Do you have enough tea?"

Beryl looked down at her mug as if something strange might be in it and nodded. "Yes, thank you."

"Oh good, good," Raven smiled.

"So, do you all, um, live here?" Beryl asked, trying to seem casual but actually leaning in as if it were the most important thing in her life.

"We do," Valkyrie said before anyone else could. "Tanith and our other brother Ghastly are expecting their baby in two and a half months, and they have a little flat area upstairs, and the rest of us all have our own rooms. It's fun."

"Is it now?" Beryl asked, taking a sip of tea without releasing her lips from their thin, pointy smile. "How's school going, Steph? Are you still dancing? Been in a swimming competition recently?"

"I'm home schooled now, and I quit both," she said shortly.

"Oh, how unfortunate. I remember you dancing all over the place and always wanting to go swimming. My, Melissa had to drag you out the ocean sometimes, do you remember?"

"Yes, I did enjoy it," she said drily.

"Do you think you'll pick it back up?"

"No, I don't," she said. "I have other things to do. I have an apprenticeship with Skulduggery as a detective, and soon I'll be babysitting, and I want to spend the summer with my girlfriend if I can."

"Oh, yes, you do like your girls," she said with a fake laugh as if it were the funniest inside knowledge. "Carol just got herself a boyfriend, a young man in the army. We're very proud of her."

"Is _she_ still in school?" Valkyrie asked a little rudely, remembering Carol as snappish when she saw her at the reunion a few years ago, while Crystal had been curious.

Beryl lost her smile a little. "Carol decided to take a gap year before university. Crystal just got her college results though, the highest honours you can get! We're so proud of her."

She hummed. "While it's nice to see you, kind of, I don't really understand why you're here."

"We just thought it would be good to get back in contact," Beryl said, though her husband did not look as if he wanted that. "You'll be a grown woman in just a year and a half, and we want to make sure we can see you grow up, see you get married, all your children. It would be a shame if we missed out on your milestones."

Valkyrie nodded slowly. "Okay."

"We also wanted to invite you to the girls nineteenth birthday this weekend," she continued to grin. "Would you like to come?"

"Err, I don't know if I'll be busy or not-"

"We hired the golf club to fit in all the family, so we'll all be there for the girls, and I imagine everyone will be thrilled to see you," Beryl gabbled on. "We'll have a small dinner there, and a big cake. Do you still like chocolate cake?"

"Of course," she smiled, feeling Snake lean into her a little. He was not having a good day. In fact, she suspected he was driving himself into a mental hole. She needed to get Beryl and Fergus gone so they could help him through it. "You said it was this weekend right? I'm sure I can make it. Why don't you call me later with the details?”

Beryl looked a little taken aback. "Oh, yes, I can do that. Here, I should write down your number, let me get some paper."

She reached into her gigantic leather handbag and started rifling around in it looking for pen and paper. Snake leaned into her a little more, his hands digging into the fabric, and Valkyrie pressed her shoulder into him comfortingly and stroked the back of his hand as Fergus started glaring at him suspiciously.

"Here we are," Beryl said and clicked the pen, which immediately fell apart, the back end flying across the room from the strength of the spring and hitting a vase, immediately shattering it.

The loud noise was exactly what they didn't need and Snake let out a high pitched whine and curled up on himself, breathing faster and faster, his hands scrunched in his hair.

"What on earth?" Beryl started and was ignored. Wolf and Weasel ran into the room as Valkyrie got on her knees and started stroking Snake's hair soothing him with kind words and trying to break the grip he had on his scalp. "Stephanie, what's going on?"

Wolf knelt next to Valkyrie and put a hand on Snake's cheek rubbing his thumb gently and saying with her that he was safe and so was everyone else. It didn't help that Beryl had decided to stand up and start shouting for someone to answer her and Fergus was backing up everything she said just as loudly.

She kissed Snake's hand and turned to her aunt and uncle and put a sardonic smile on her face. "Will you be quiet? Erskine is just having a small panic attack and you are _not helping_."

Beryl and Fergus crossed their arms in synchrony. Is that what spending too much time with another person looked like? Christ.

"Why's he acting like that? If he's upset he can go to another room. That sort of behaviour is unacceptable around someone as young as Stephanie," Beryl said, utterly ignoring her and waving her hand at Crow instead.

"Exactly. What type of house is this?" Fergus glared.

"Our Stephanie shouldn't have to put up with something like this," Beryl continued.

"I shouldn't have to put up with you," Valkyrie growled out but it was completely drowned out by Tanith storming into the room with her hair flying around her head like a blonde halo and anger etched onto her face.

"What's going on? Why are you all in here?" Tanith snapped. "Valkyrie, say goodbye to your aunt and uncle, Skulduggery, Solomon, be useful and make some tea, and Saracen, you can clean up that mess."

The men shot off to do their thing and Tanith got on the phone to Bear so he could help calm Erskine down since he was always the best at it and Snake's usual person to go to on bad days. Valkyrie grabbed Fergus' wrist and pulled him from the room and out the house entirely, Beryl on their heels like a yapping animal. When they were at their car, she turned and tried to smile.

"I'm afraid we're busy at the moment," she said politely. "I have your house number and I will send you mine. I'll see you this weekend. Is that all?"

Beryl stuck her nose in the air, glared, and nodded to Valkyrie, got the keys out her giant bag and hopped in the passenger.

Valkyrie glared at Fergus. "I know you know about magic," she whispered to him when he glared back. "This is my home and they are my family. Don't you come here and cause problems again, understand?"

He shook his head. "I just wanted to make sure you were safe," he said.

"In the last two times I've seen you, you've insulted me and said I didn't deserve my inheritance even though Gordon did it because he considered me his child, and then at the reunion, you insulted my adopted family. And now this. You just need to let it all go or _shut up_. Since you'll be seeing me this weekend now, I'd suggest keeping your mouth closed if you don't want any trouble," she said lowly to him before giving him one last glare and pushing passed and back into the house, slamming the door angrily and hearing their car roll out the drive.

"God, I hate them," she muttered, the back of her head hitting the door. She took some deep breaths, calming herself, and then went into the living room to see how Snake was.

He seemed okay. He was on the phone with Bear, nodding and listening to what his brother had to say. Weasel was using a dustpan to clean the glass, Crow and Raven had brought in the tea Tanith had supposedly been making, and Tanith herself was rubbing Snake's back. Wolf was sat on the floor still with a hand on Snake's knee and gave Valkyrie a smile when she came in.

They all sat together for almost an hour, Valkyrie sitting against Wolf and letting him stroke her hair to calm her down too, and enjoyed each other's company.

"I think I'm okay," Snake said quietly, resting his head back on the sofa. The phone had been hung up some time ago when Snake had gotten through the worst of it.

"Good job," Wolf said genuinely, squeezing Snake's leg. "You want something to eat?"

Valkyrie's stomach growled.

Snake snorted a laugh. "I guess it might be time to eat."

Tanith laughed suddenly. "And we can all talk about how much fun you'll have at the party this weekend, Val!"

"I've decided I want a new family," Valkyrie said grumpily.


	97. Crystal, Carol and Myra

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 97**

"Please don't make me do this," Valkyrie whined.

"It'll be fun," Tanith said as if that were a reasonable statement.

"It won't be," she told her for the millionth time. "They're all going to be crowding around the twins saying, 'oh, how pretty, how perfect, how girly' and I'll be standing there getting ignored. I doubt anyone even knows what I look like. It's mostly going to be Beryl's family."

"Then make friends. You're always saying how many extended cousins you have," her sister said.

Valkyrie groaned as they pulled up outside the golf club. "Do I really have to?"

"Yes. Now, here. Don't forget the presents and remember young lady. No swearing, no hitting, no spitting, no mean words and most of all, if there's cake, bring me some. Understand?" Tanith said, looking into the back of Gordon's old car. Wolf smirked and looked at her in the mirror from the driver's seat.

"Yes, _Mum_ ," she said and jumped out of the car.

"I love you!" Tanith shouted through the window.

"Love you too," she said, waving and walking to the lobby.

"Have fun!" Tanith shouted loudly as Wolf drove her away.

Valkyrie shook her head. Her sister was an idiot, but it made her smile. She had made sure to be ten minutes after when she was meant to be there, so all the setting up was done and she wasn't the first there. She actually saw quite a few relatives she recognised which was mostly second cousins and their children. Which she was pretty certain were her third cousins. Then there was her great-aunts and great uncles. Her paternal grandparents had died before even her parents.

"Stephanie?" Someone said. She turned and saw an older second or third cousin – she didn't keep track – she had used to get on with as a young child. He was tall, about the same size as her, with sandy hair like Gordon but his own mother's blue eyes. She almost had to take a step back, because other than the cheekbones, eyes and being obviously younger and fitter, he looked strikingly like Gordon.

"Err, yeah, that's me," she said awkwardly. "I'm sorry, I've forgotten your name."

He smiled as awkwardly as she felt. "It's Mark. We haven't seen each other since Gordon's funeral some years ago."

"Oh, yes," she said, not remembering him being there at all. "Err, do you know where Crystal and Carol are?"

He pulled a face. "On the balcony, I think."

"Thanks," she muttered and walked away quickly. She hoped she didn't have to talk to him much tonight. Thankfully, the party was only meant to be two hours which was bearable, kind of.

She went to the balcony as Mark told her and stepped out into the cool evening to find, as he said, her twin cousins leaning against the railing with their chins on their hands. One of them was smoking, but Valkyrie honestly forgot which one was which from the back, and they were different sizes too. One had remained somewhat overweight as she'd been her whole life, while the smoking one had lost a significant amount of weight, so much so Valkyrie thought she looked smaller than Nadia from the back, and she knew she could see Nadia's ribs. She held her breath a little and put on a smile.

"Crystal, Carol," she said and watched them jump and turn around. "Happy birthday."

Both of them gaped at her. "Stephanie?" The larger one said, and Valkyrie had a feeling that one was Crystal.

Carol dug her cigarette into the bannister and kept glancing at it and back at her. "You came," she said, the shock evident in her voice.

"Yes, obviously," Valkyrie said without too much sass and held the unnamed presents forward. "Here."

They took them, Carol a little faster than Crystal who honestly seemed kind of jittery with her around, and Valkyrie watched with Crystal as Carol ripped through the paper to the present within.

"I wasn't really sure what to get," Valkyrie explained.

"I like it," she said, holding up the clutch bag Valkyrie had got her. She looked inside and pulled out the silver shoulder chain, and thin voucher to a cinema nearby. "Thank you, Stephanie."

She shrugged. "It's fine. I'm glad you like it."

"Crystal, open yours," Carol demanded.

Crystal seemed to very nearly flinch at the sudden attention but did carefully unseal the tape and pull out another clutch, this one a shiny silver bag, and it had the same voucher inside. She smiled at Valkyrie. "Thank you. I actually really needed a bag like this," she said a little quietly, but Valkyrie saw the gratitude in her eyes and shrugged again.

"It's fine." They stood there silently for a moment, both of them scrunching up the paper and holding their new bags before Valkyrie broke it again. "So. Beryl said you got some good grades at college, Crystal. Are you going to uni?"

She grimaced. "I guess," she said uncertainly.

Carol nodded. "We're going to a uni down south this September. It's close to the army base my boyfriend's at."

Valkyrie nodded slowly. "Well, I think I'm going to get something to eat," she said, knowing full well she didn't want to know a thing about this boyfriend.

Carol nodded and turned away, not interested anymore, and reaching into her jean pockets for her packet of cigarettes. Crystal took a step forward and said quietly, "I'll come too."

They walked together through the busy hall of elderly relatives and a couple of kids running around until they got to the buffet and Valkyrie looked over it carefully before picking up some pizza, garlic bread, a few crisps and a few carrot sticks to pretend she was healthy. Crystal had chosen about the same as her, and they sat together at an empty spot on a table and bench.

"So," Valkyrie started after they'd had a few bits. "How's life?"

Crystal shrugged, her arms lowering more than before. "It's alright. I got a summer job lined up in a few weeks, so that's good. Are you working?"

"I have an apprentice with my adoptive father," she said easily. "He's training me to be a detective."

She smiled a little. "That sounds fun."

"It has been. And it's only a year and a half till I'm eighteen too, and then I'll have to deal with my biological dad's business and some of the other bits Gordon dabbled in," she said. "I don't think I'm even going to go to college."

"I think you have to be in school till you're eighteen," she said uncertainly.

"Not with an apprenticeship, at least full time. Either way, I won't be going. I'm so busy with work," she said, leaning in like it was admitting something. "I'm really bad at written exams. I'd end up failing anyway."

Crystal laughed a little. "So am I. I didn't think I'd ever get through college."

Valkyrie smiled and sat back. "Hey, you did it, though. Your mum said you did really well. Congratulations."

She blushed. "I did pretty good, yeah."

"So what about friends? Do you have a boyfriend squirrelled away in an army base too?" She asked teasingly.

Her shoulders dropped once more, but this time Valkyrie saw the defensiveness. "No, not really. Do you?"

"Actually, I just got back with my girlfriend," she said a little softer. "We broke up for seven months and just got together again. Do you remember Nadia?"

"The girl you brought to the reunion? Yes, she was pretty," Crystal said, taking a deep breath. "Why did you break up?"

"Her family didn't like me and kind of pressured her into it, which sucked. She thought if she gave in they might not send her abroad for school, and they'd be happy again, but it didn't work out like that. She was pulled from school two months ago or something for health reasons and we were able to talk and got together again."

She smiled. "Aw, that's sweet that you still like her. How long have you been dating? Without the seven months."

"Without the breakup, two and a half years, ish," Valkyrie said. "It feel's way longer, I can tell you that."

Crystal looked over her shoulder and around them before leaning in. "Can you tell me something?"

"Yeah?" Valkyrie said, leaning in too.

"Erm, if you really liked your friend, and she was a girl, but you didn't know if she liked girls too, what would you do?" Crystal asked, biting her lip after in a much too hard way.

Valkyrie breathed a laugh and grinned. "I'd be honest. You don't want to lie about it or be left guessing. I mean, most people our age kind of conform to just thinking they like the opposite sex, so she might say no because she hasn't thought about it yet, but you never know. When I told my brother Anton I liked girls, he warned me of that. And even if someone that says no now might decide differently in a few years' time when they're older," she explained. "So you know, be honest and hope for the best, I guess. You might be rejected, but at least you'll have an answer."

Crystal took a deep breath and nodded. "Okay. I think I might do that."

"That's good," she grinned, and then looked around the room. "So, why aren't you talking to anyone else?"

She grimaced again. "Me and Carol weren't nice when we were kids," she said quietly. "Carol still isn't that nice I guess. And I just follow her around."

Valkyrie shrugged. "Well, it's your birthday. You might as well go have fun and talk to someone."

"Who?" She asked uncertainty.

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and stood, taking her half eaten plate with her. "Come on. I'll reintroduce you to your family."

.*****.

The party wasn't as bad as it could have been, and she ended up talking with Crystal and a few of her cousins from Beryl's side that weren't that bad and where deeply interest in internet culture which was fun for Valkyrie because she didn't get much time to look at those things. She ended up staying half an hour longer than the party just to talk and then took a taxi home.

Inside the house, she almost sagged with relief that she could take off the shoes that were rubbing blisters into her heels.

There was a giggle from the top of the stairs and Valkyrie's head snapped up. It was Fletcher's girlfriend. She'd seen her around a few times in the house, mostly doing chores like washing and occasionally she came downstairs to the bigger kitchen and baked. She seemed nice but Valkyrie didn't like her much. It wasn't nice having a virtual stranger in her house, and since Myra had become Fletcher's girlfriend, they hadn't exactly seen Fletcher. Which they didn't mind but Valkyrie had still been wanting to make up a little of the damage she'd caused to their friendship when she shot him. As it was, Myra was holding a basket of laundry and had some cooking supplies on top.

"I haven't seen you in a while," Myra smiled at her, slowly coming downstairs like a young lady in her own house. Valkyrie tried not to look like she was calling her a bitch in her mind. "Were you somewhere nice?"

She shrugged. "A cousins party. Shouldn't Fletcher be helping you with all that?"

"He's at work," she said with that same little smile and a delicate shrug of her small shoulders. "I don't have university today so I'm getting the chores done. Is anyone else home?"

She tried to accept that this might be Myra's home if she was here all the time. She tried to not dislike the way she said 'home'. "I think the others went out to dinner. Do you need help carrying all that?"

"Please," she said, and Valkyrie came over and grabbed the whole lot and carried it through to the kitchen where Myra took the cooking bits from the top and grabbed the basket of clothes. "You know, I once put a spoon in the washing machine without realising. I was really confused when I took it out and then I realised I'd used yours to bake and hadn't even noticed."

Valkyrie smiled. "It happens. What do you do all day in Fletcher's room? Except do chores and bake."

Myra didn't answer for a moment as she measured out how much washing powder she wanted and threw it in the machine. "I do my studying. I have a room rented at my friends I stay at sometimes and I go shopping or to the beach when I'm there. Fletcher gets his work done pretty fast most days which is why I don't do much around the house here, I just get my work done and then we spend time together. Isn't that how you spend time with your girlfriend?"

She shrugged. "Kind of. I've done my GCSE's now so I don't exactly need to go to school if I don't want to, so I just work at the Sanctuary and see her when I can."

Myra looked at her strangely. "Don't you take time off to see her?"

"I do when I can, but I can't exactly let someone blow half the world to smithereens by not being at work," she said with an eye roll. It was common knowledge what the Dead Men dealt with, surely people knew by now. Then again, Myra was mortal and relied on Fletcher for information. "What are you going to do after uni?"

Now Myra shrugged as she worked on her batter from memory. "I'm not really sure. Maybe I'll help Fletcher set up his business, or I'll be a baker."

Valkyrie didn't point out that Fletcher was a sorcerer and lived longer than her and it was incredibly unlikely for him to give up magic for her. She shrugged, nodded and decided to leave before she was mean.


	98. PART 2: A new case

**Serious Notice:**

**From now on, the rating M is a very serious one. This is to be considered Part 2 of this story. Here are some of the things you can expect to be brought up as of Part 2 of this story:**

**Rape /** **Sex /** **Self-harm + other mental health issues /** **Homophobia /** **Starvation /** **Torture /** **Graphic giving birth-ness**

**Before anyone gets scared, I will not, and NEVER will, graphically write a rape scene, it isn't happening, and that's final. BUT.** **And this is a serious but. I will be writing more graphically than before for some themes. I have touched on** **some of these topics before, but it will get more intense.**

**The reason I am doing this (the change in content, so to speak) is due to Valkyrie's and Nadia's age, plus I'm enjoying writing these crazy things. If anyone has a trigger on any of these themes and wants a better idea of want to expect so they don't get themselves into something they don't want to, just PM me and I'll tell you the details so you can make that call.**

**Enjoy, I guess!**

* * *

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 98**

Days went by and Valkyrie went on her cases and helped in her spare time to work out where the Spider's had vanished to. No leads were found. Still. Wherever they were, they didn't seem to have any intention of leaving it. Honestly, Valkyrie wasn't sure she cared as long as they all lived and died there.

Valkyrie checked her phone. Nadia was in the habit of constantly asking what Valkyrie was doing because she was so alone at home with nothing to do or anyone to talk to. She wished she'd just come as live at her house, at least she could be with Tanith there, but she was reluctant and Valkyrie refused to push the issue. Something had happened to make her nervous and she didn't want to reinforce the feeling.

"You're deep in thought," Solomon smiled at her from Skulduggery's chair in the Dead Man office.

She smiled at him. "Just thinking, is all."

He hummed. "Thinking about a certain person?"

She blushed. "I do it a lot."

He grinned. "You're so loved up."

She grinned back. "I never thought I'd hear you say something so cutesy."

"Neither did I. I feel like a new man," he smiled. "I want to make sure it lasts too."

"I'm pretty sure Skulduggery’s obsessed with you, so you don't have to worry."

There was a grunt from the doorway and Crow came in looking somewhat embarrassed. "You better not be talking about me behind my back."

"We talk about you when you're facing forwards too," Valkyrie reminded him.

"And you can take these down to Communications for your effort," he sniped playfully and gave her a sheet of paper. She looked at it.

"What's a Shunter?" She asked with a little head tilt.

"It's someone who can go between dimensions. This particular one is probably the best at it, but it's still a somewhat useless skill. This man, Creyfon Signate, is able to use what he calls 'reflective dimensions' to change where he is in the world," Crow explained. "It's a lot like teleporting except he does it slower and he has more control over his exact location because he's standing there, invisible in another dimension, and can step out whenever he wants."

"Wouldn't that sap his power?"

"It does. Every magic has its drawbacks, and that is his. That and the discipline itself is stupid because no one knows where any alternate realities are, just this one layer around our own world that only one of the Shunters can access. Which is why there are only two of them, and one of them is in prison, and this one here just went missing."

"Maybe he died in the other dimension," Valkyrie said curiously, looking at the tired looking eyes of the photo. "He might have tried holding it too long."

Crow shook his head. "Signate's been interviewed about his Shunting a thousand times. Once he loses concentration or power, it spits him out wherever he's standing. The thing is, we can't say for sure that he wasn't doing something dubious which led to his disappearance, and people don't like him much seeing as he can stand and watch them without anyone knowing he was ever there."

"Ah. So you're sending this to Communications to spread the word of his disappearance, why?"

He shrugged. "Hope, I guess. Or perhaps the same thing that happened to Signate happened to someone else's friend or family and they'll be bolstered to talk to us just because we have a case."

"Hope then," she said with an eye roll, and ran down to Communications and explained to them they wanted the word out Signate had gone missing and Skulduggery Pleasant needed answers.

She could already feel how weird this one was going to be.

She got back to the room and the two men were moving about getting things. "What's happening now?"

"Nothing for me," Raven said, looking up. "Skulduggery just had an idea. You, Skulduggery and Dexter are going to go visit the other Shunter in prison and see if he knows anyone that particularly dislikes Shunters."

"He was imprisoned almost fifty years ago, so it's a longshot, but since we have no other case, I thought we'd go on a trip."

Valkyrie grabbed her jacket. "Just let me get some coffee. I haven't slept since yesterday morning, remember?"

**.*****.**

Wolf met them outside Hammer Lane Gaol, the prison that Crow told her was practically impenetrable. There hadn't been an escapee for fifty-one years, making it the second most secure in the world after the moving landmass of a prison they kept the worst of the worst in. It was a taboo to even mention it in case it turned up, and of course, Valkyrie didn't believe in that type of thing, but she still made sure to not so much as think about it. Just to be sure.

Wolf wrapped her into a hug when she got out the Bentley. "There's my little baby sister!" He grinned. "What’re we doing today?"

"We need to talk to a Shunter called Silas Nadir, a serial killer," Crow said, looking at the innocent looking house they had parked across from. "Do you remember him?"

"Oh yeah," Wolf said with a nod. "I remember roping in three teleporters to help me catch him and then you went and caught him without us."

Crow shrugged. "I'm good like that."

They entered easily, only telling Valkyrie after she'd walked through the door how close she had been to killing herself on the doorframe, and they were greeted by Delafonte Mien, the warden.

"Dexter," he smiled when they came through and shook her brother's hands warmly. "It's good to see you again, and you, Detective. I don't believe we've met, but you are Detective Cain, correct?"

"Yes, sir," she smiled without really meaning it and shook his rough hand. She was looking behind him through the glass wall that went right down into a food hall of some type. "I didn't think mage prisons served food."

"They don't," the warden smiled proudly. "This is the common area. Only a select few prisoners have the luxury of using it, and we have a strict punishment system in place for those that abuse it. Most prisoners are thankful for time out of the cells."

"I didn't imagine them having a space like this," Crow said, looking around it too. It was empty at the moment and there were thick metal doors closing it off to the other areas which she assumed went to cells. "Does the building have other luxuries?"

Warden Mien chuckled. "We boast some reform programs to keep the prisoners sane and somewhat mentally driven, but all other amenities are for the staff only. Much of the workforce lives in the prison so much of it was reconstructed some time ago to have more space for places like staffrooms, a communal kitchen and a small library."

Crow tilted his head. "You don't have kitchen staff now?"

Mien looked somewhat surprised. "I didn't know you'd visited the prison before. Yes, we removed kitchen staff and almost halved cleaning staff to make a bigger budget for more guards, using cleaning signals to deal with the majority of the tedious tasks and allow the guards have more time to relax between shifts."

Crow nodded thoughtfully. "We want to visit a prisoner. Silas Nadir."

Valkyrie saw his eyebrow make a small tick of movement up before he smiled slightly. "Let me check the database for his prison number and I'll tell you where to find him. The name doesn't ring a bell."

She tilted her head at the same time as Crow and saw Wolf hide a smile. "He's been imprisoned here for fifty-one years," Crow said.

"We have over three thousand prisoners in this building, Detective," Mien said with a small strain to his voice. He smiled suddenly as if he noticed it himself. "I'm sorry. We don't often have guests here. Would you like some refreshments while I search for Nadir?"

"No thank you," Crow said drily.

Mien said nothing in response and tapped away at his keyboard until a man with cropped black hair and a sharp nose came up on screen. At about the same moment the doors down in the common room opened and about two dozen of those three thousand prisoners came wandering into the room below. They wore a white vest with orange overalls over it and had chains tying their hands and feet together but they had some give to them, allowing them to move and use their arms more freely than a high-security prison surely must find acceptable. They sat around the room quietly and looked up at the control panel and looked right at her. Wolf watched them also and put a hand on her shoulder, drawing her gaze back to the screen.

"This is Silas Nadir, prison number two-seven oh-nine one-four, brought in for a sentence of three hundred years for the murder of multiple mages and mortals by use of his magic, which is Shunting. He died fifty years ago, almost to the day. That was only a year after I became warden," Mien said, looking over to Crow. "I'm afraid I can't help you, but you're welcome to look through his file. We now conduct interviews with our prisoners as part of our reform programs for those that wish to participate and have more information in their own words about their crimes, but this prisoner died twenty years before that started."

Crow kept looking at the screen and a moment later a piece of charcoal smacked against the glass exactly where it needed to be to have connected with Valkyrie's head if there hadn't been any glass. None of them jumped, but they did all look down to see a few of the prisoners glaring up. One of them had charcoal on his hands. She smiled without humour at him and he let loose a scream. The doors opened and the prisoners that weren't involved shuffled off to their cells as four of the others started attacking guards.

The warden sighed. "Excuse me. Please stay here while I deal with this."

"Of course." They watched him walk quickly out of the lobby and off to wherever he was meant to be. Crow looked at them. "Quick," he said and started running.

Wolf and Valkyrie grinned and rushed after him. He led them down hall after hall and signals and protective walls of glass closed behind them with crashes and slams, all barely missing Valkyrie. Wolf was barely an inch in front of her and stayed by her side, in danger with her so they could at least be together.

She had no idea where they were going but took joy in blasting through doors and launching herself down stairwells, almost shrieking then an alarm went off around them. She knew that meant a breach, and one of the prisoners because it was red. If it were about them, it would have been yellow but she had no doubt they knew about them. How long did they have?

It didn't matter to Crow or Wolf, who grabbed her arm and kept her running. She was sucking in heaves of air by the time they stopped down in the deepest part of the prison. "Are we done?" She tried to say, but it came out as a few gasps.

"This is the only feeling of a body I could find," Crow said, tilting his head. He opened a door and they saw a man, hovering in mid-air with thousands of wires and tubes connecting him to… wherever they went. Crow nodded. "I had a feeling there was something strange. When I called a few hours ago, do remember when he said only two people had ever died here? He missed out this man. Why would he remember those two deaths and not this one? Being the first death of his career as Warden, you would expect he'd have remembered it."

"Is he even dead?" Valkyrie asked quietly. The man was seriously pale but he did have a little pink to his lips.

Wolf strode in and put his hand on Nadir's neck. "He's alive," he said slowly. "But I don't know if he will be if we pull him out of all these wires."

"Should I call Kenspeckle?" Valkyrie asked.

"No, we'll let the Sanctuary deal with this," Crow said. "Also, I expect Kenspeckle is busy today. Ghastly dragged Tanith off for a full check-up."

Wolf snorted. "She actually let him do it?"

"I don't think the word 'let' is necessarily the right one, as I'm under the impression it's a _compromise_ ," he said.

"What does she get?" Valkyrie smiled.

"He won't nag her about having the baby in a maternity ward rather than with Kenspeckle," Crow said.

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "He's still on about that? Kenspeckle isn't a midwife."

"It gets better. She also told him he has to make all the reusable nappies and clothes and all sorts of other things. She was looking online at patterns as he literally dragged her out the door," Crow said with humour in his voice, and then the Sanctuary picked up the phone.

Wolf and Valkyrie grinned at each other. This baby got funnier the more it grew, and they didn't even get to know the sex, let alone know what name the parents were going with. Tanith was now seven months and a bit and had a big baby bump and the whole family was giddy with excitement. It was surprising how easily a human that wasn't even fully formed could take over the lives of two women and six men, but it sure had.

The Sanctuary came in swarms some hour later when Crow explained his suspicion of Nadir being hooked up to change between portals continuously. When they pulled him off the wires he'd made a lurch for Valkyrie and very, very nearly punched her, but Wolf was fast enough to pull her back. He almost choked her in doing it, but they had no idea what else he could have done to her considering he'd spend fifty years with his magic solely going between three dimensions. She'd have been obliterated most likely. Thank god for brothers, apparently.

They took him, and the Warden and most of the staff, once more came to take over the prison, to the Sanctuary for questioning. It was no use though. Before they had even gotten to the Interview Room, they knew it was too late. Nadir was a blubbering mess and it had all been for nothing on the Shunting front.

"It does tell us one thing though," Valkyrie said as they walked back to the Dead Man office after attempting to make him say, draw or write something other than gibberish. "If a Shunter spends took long dimension hopping, it fries them."

Crow hums. "Except Nadir did it for fifty years and he was hooked up to god knows what which was not only sapping his magic but also potentially excruciatingly painful. We can't know if it's the same as Signate, and that's with the assumption the same thing is happening to him, and I really doubt information like this could be being passed around without one of us hearing about it."

"I doubt he's being used the same way," Wolf remarked. "It's too much of a risk for the Warden to have talked about his secret weapon. You're right, we'd have known about it long ago if he had been."

Valkyrie nodded. "True. I'd say it's more likely he was killed."

"I think so too," Crow said. "But we need to tread carefully just in case and try to recover him alive if possible."

"The usual then," she smiled at him. She opened the door to the office and took a step back out. The men looked over her.

"Ah," Crow said, pulling her out gently. "It may be too late."


	99. Tracking

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 99**

Seeing the carcass of Signate hadn't been fun for Valkyrie. Wolf had held her when she'd stood there still, just looking at it, and helped her walk again, walk all the way to Pa and be enveloped in another hug from him. She'd snapped out of it when he was halfway through scolding Wolf for letting her see the body but could only smile apologetically. There was no stopping Pa.

Corrival had gone off, seen the carcass and come back with a little sweat on his brow.

"It doesn't get easier," he muttered and sat in his chair. He gave Valkyrie a soft smile and leaned back with his arms crossed. "Don't you worry now. You're a strong girl, strong enough to keep up. You want to run with the big dog, you've got to see the big dog problems. This is our world, see."

She nodded and they waited in silence for Crow to join them. He took off his hat and placed it on the desk. "Signate's been dead for a lot longer than we predicted."

"He was almost a – a hull," she said softly, thinking of the dry, dead thing in their office.

He looked at her. "What does that tell us about the murder?"

"Well, it eliminates him having drowned, I guess. It also indicates he was killed in a dry place for his body to look like that. It's probably from age rather than anything else," she said, her detective head coming back.

"That's true. I expect he was left in a hot place with minimal humidity," Crow said. "Where would that be?"

"I don't know," she thought aloud. "Somewhere they have a fire constantly? It could also be magic, though I don't know what type."

"True. We'll get back to that point. When I examined the body, I found a knife wound, something with a jagged blade that ripped the skin when it was pulled out. It means the killer may still have the knife."

"That makes it easier," she said.

"Exactly. I have some people looking over security footage so we might find something out soon," he said. "But we also have something else to worry about."

"What?" She frowned.

"Solomon isn't picking up his phone. He wasn't meant to go home yet," he said darkly and Valkyrie's eyes widened a little.

"They took Raven?" She whispered. "We need to see that footage."

"The staff will check, lass," Pa said, closing his eyes and putting a hand up. She sat fully back in her chair. Funny how he had trained her without her noticing. All the cakes he made her bake had acted as positive rewards it seemed. "You cannot over exhaust yourself. I will make sure all the fact are as the staff says they are, you, Pleasant and Vex should get some rest. I'll be sending you out as soon as I know what's happened."

They couldn't argue with him, just got themselves together and got going, driving home silently and wondering how they had gone from having a nice morning to having insane prisoners, dead bodies and a missing member of family. At least they had Pa to sort them out.

Tanith was, as usual, home and was just getting a package as they pulled up. She took it from the man with a sweet smile that made the old man smile even as he drove away. Valkyrie smirked at her sister, knowing she loved the attention she got for her looks. "What you get?" She asked, knowing her voice was a little tired but not quite able to stop thinking about Raven to sound more chipper.

"Just some baby clothes," she shrugged and they went into the living room. She asked how their day had been and they told her all about it and at the end, she gave Crow a pat on the shoulder. "I'm sorry they took him, but I'm sure we can get him back."

Crow just nodded.

They had lunch, Crow staying in his chair in the living room instead of joining them, choosing to have whatever Tanith made them. Valkyrie and Wolf gave each other looks of warning, daring the other to not eat the mess of pasta, leaves, nuts and tomato sauce that was their bowls. It didn't sound so bad until the vinaigrette was added on top. Drizzled wasn't the right word for it. It was a _healthy serving_. The two of them pushed it down their throats and listened to Tanith tell them what her mother had said in her letter.

Valkyrie was washing up when Crow came in the room and said they had a lead.

"Are we leaving now?" She asked, drying her hands.

"Yes. We don't know who the man is that took Solomon, but we know how he did it and what car he used to get away," he said. "We'll go in his direction and hope we come across a clue. We need to leave now."

"Wait, how'd he do it?" Tanith asked in confusion.

"Cloaking shield," she said and kissed Tanith's cheek and ran after Crow. She and Wolf didn't get a chance to even buckle their seatbelts before Crow was racing down the street. She gripped her seatbelt in her hands and stared out ahead, wishing Crow would slow down but knowing there was no chance so long as Raven was gone. This person could have killed Signate and they didn't want the same to happen to another person Skulduggery loved.

.*****.

They drove all afternoon and way into the night, never catching sight of the car or anything that stood out to Crow. Wolf had forced Crow to stop on the side of the road and the two of them had begun arguing, which turned into shouting and Valkyrie's stomach had turned uncomfortably. She felt worse for Nadia now. Listening to her family fight all the time.

"Stop it," she told them without looking in either of their directions. "Let's just find a hotel and start again tomorrow."

"Good idea," Crow had said after a moment and begun driving immediately. Wolf crossed his arms. He had wanted to go home.

The hotel Crow found was a crappy thing but it had a family room which they took. Wolf and Valkyrie shared a look as they travelled up the stairs.

The 'family room' was actually just a room with a double bed and a single so close together in the same space it might as well have been called a large double. Of course, Crow didn't need to sleep which was helpful.

"Alright," she said when they were in the room. "Talk."

Crow tilted his head. "Me?"

"Yes you! Look, I know your upset Solomon is gone and we don't have a lead, and that you're worried about him, but you're taking it out on Dexter. So _talk_ ," she glared.

He was silent for a long moment. "I'm afraid there is nothing to talk about. You've quite nicely summed it up."

"You're doing it again," she said coldly. Wolf put a hand on her back. "You're pretending nothing is wrong and avoiding the problem. Remember what happened last time? You didn't talk to me for a month and it really upset me."

His shoulders sagged a little. "I'm not doing that."

"You are. You're doing it right now. You need to talk to us, Crow. We're family. And you just want to throw us, your only help right now, completely aside. What will you do? If you're all alone without us and you need help? Do you expect us to just turn up and help when you don't talk to us, when we won't know where you are? Because don't think I know you're trying to get this over with so you can go find him yourself."

Wolf stood up from his perch on the bed and frowned at Crow angrily. "Skul, you need to rest too."

"I am a skeleton," he said without emotion. "I do not need rest."

"There!" Valkyrie practically shouted. "That! That's you pretending. Talk to us, Crow. Let us help."

He took his hat off and put it on the bed. "I just don't want to stop searching tonight. I want to keep going and give them less time to hurt him."

"Solomon is a capable man, I'm sure he can handle it without us for a few hours rest," Wolf said. "You need to meditate and we need to sleep. In a few hours, we'll be ready to search again. If we're all too tired we can't fight, and then it won't even matter if we find them."

Crow nodded and sat in a chair that faced the window. Valkyrie was about to start talking again but Wolf shook his head and she hesitated and ultimately gave up.

She looked at Crow, tapping his finger on the armrest in an irritated, angry way and she just felt awful. So awful she had to push Wolf away from her and went into the bathroom.

Tears leaked out of her eyes silently and she rushed to the sink before she could start really crying and splashed her face with water. She searched her pockets and found her phone but had barely unlocked it when it died. The fact she couldn't talk to Nadia upset her even more and she splashed her face angrily again, really rubbing at her eyes, trying to keep it back.

The bathroom door opened and Wolf came in, smiling softly. He gently closed the door behind him and wrapped her in his arms, kissing her cheek. "It's alright," he whispered almost silently. "Don't get upset over him. He's just stressed."

"He said he wouldn't do this again," she whispered roughly.

"I know babe," he said, stroking her hair. He picked her phone up from the counter. "No charger?" She shook her head. "We'll get a new one tomorrow. Just don't cry Cub."

She nodded and tried to stifle her tears. "I love you."

"I love you too. You're my second favourite sister after all," he smiled. She glared at him playfully. "Hey, Tanith's giving me a niece or nephew, what have you done?"

She snorted. "I can get pregnant if you want."

He glared. "I will kill anyone that dares do such a despicable act to you."

She laughed softly into his shoulder. "You were all for me and Nadia."

"That's different," he said. "That's _Nadia_. No boys allowed."

"That doesn't make sense."

"It makes perfect sense," he smiled and looked at her face thoughtfully. "Do you want to sleep with me tonight?"

"I thought you said no boys?" She said cheekily and he swatted her ear.

"You're my sister and that's not an okay joke," he grinned. "I've taught you so well. Come on now. Keep strong. We'll shout at Skul when we get Solomon back."

She nodded and he let her go to the loo and ready for bed as much as she could with literally nothing but what she was wearing and joined him in the bedroom, getting herself in the big bed with him and snuggling into his bare chest. He was warm and he smelt good, just like their home.

She fell asleep with the dim light coming through the window Crow looked out of, wishing he'd act just a little different sometimes.


	100. Basement dwellers

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Warning: Very strong themes of rape and abuse**

* * *

**Chapter 100**

Valkyrie was shaken awake that morning and almost shot out of bed in a panic.

"Calm down," Wolf said, a little smile on his lips. "It's just us. You need to get ready, Skul got a call."

She nodded, resting a hand over her hammering heart, and reached for her phone before remembering it was dead. Disappointment flooded her, but there might be time later to get another cord so she didn't think about it too much and rushed to get ready. Within ten minutes they were racing down the stairs after Crow.

The car was freezing as the heatwave had abruptly ended and it was barely past six in the morning. The Bentley hummed and shot off when Crow put his foot down but this time she was prepared and breathed deeply as Crow drove them through the little town and then back around to a motorway towards the west of Ireland.

"What was the call?" She asked Crow after a few minutes.

"A man of our suspect's description was seen by the coast," he said tightly.

"What about Raven?"

"Seen with him."

They didn't speak for the ride over, and they had to leave the car a few miles away and take a bus in to avoid being recognised. The phone call, Crow said, indicated the man was in the port with all the cargo boats and massive warehouses. There was a bustling fishermen's market in the town and they followed the crowds into a warehouse that was filled with boxes and stalls.

"There aren't enough people," Crow muttered.

Valkyrie frowned. "There are nearly two hundred people in here," she said quietly back, but he either ignored her or didn't hear and began walking. She gave Wolf a look and he could only give her a sympathetic smile. Stupid skeleton. She'd find something she could rip a new one out of. Perhaps she'd pull his jaw off.

Stewing in her anger, she followed around to the back where less people were milling and the shops had less content. The stench of fish turned Valkyrie's stomach. Wolf took her hand and gave her another smile, this time in support, and they walked much slower behind their brother. Crow began looking over the fish with a smile on his facade and fake gusto in his walk. He began questioning the sellers on their items, specifically the crabs it seemed, and Valkyrie had to look away or she was going to kick him. She squeezed Wolf's hand and it helped.

"Don't look now, but there's a man staring at you," Wolf said lowly. "Dark, tall and average over there."

She nodded and they looked over a stall for a moment before turning around on themselves and giving Valkyrie just a moment to see the staring man staring at her with the white of his eyes glowing with hatred before they were moving again.

"Has Crow noticed?" Valkyrie asked him.

"I don't know, but you need to focus Cub," he warned. "I know you're mad, and I am too, but don't let it stop the mission. We still need to save Solomon and find Signate's killer."

She nodded, taking a deep breath. He was right. She needed to focus.

They walked around a whole row of stalls to get back to Crow without too much attention, and they found him and another man hunched together in a deep conversation, and when they got nearer she saw Crow had his hand on his gun.

"Hi," Wolf said with that big smile of his.

Crow said nothing. The man he was threatening looked harsh with small scars on his face. "Skeleton," the man growled. Only half his mouth moved. "I've done nothing wrong here."

"But you are wanted for crimes in almost every other country," Crow said coldly. "A man came through this area recently with a black van. He had someone with him, a Necromancer called Solomon Wreath. If you tell me where they went, I can forget I ever saw you here."

He huffed. "But your friends won't. And who's to say I saw anything? There are lots of men in vans travelling in pairs around here. It's full of fishermen."

Crow tilted his head in a way Valkyrie knew meant he was practically looking for a fight now. "I know you know because Solomon Wreath was being dragged here unconscious and probably in cuffs, and my suspect also killed Creyfon Signate and dumped him at the Sanctuary yesterday. It's exactly the type of person that would come to someone like _you_ to hide."

He grunted. "Bad for business to let you in."

"It'll be worse if I don't look around. I'm looking for my suspect and Solomon Wreath alone. You have my word," Crow said, taking a step towards him.

The criminal, whoever he was, didn't seem fazed. He stood quietly for a long moment, considering, and then smirked. "I won't let you in. But the girl is fine. Better for business."

Wolf tensed. "She can't go alone–"

"She's a Dead Man," the criminal half grinned, a nasty glint in his eyes. "You trained her for this, no?"

Valkyrie said nothing, knowing she was in a hard place. She didn't trust that criminal would tiny bit and didn't doubt he was full of shit, but then again, he was right in that she was trained. But if Wolf said no, chances where that it was a bad idea. "I'm not sure," she decided to say, glancing at Crow.

"You'll be fine," Crow said, nodding to the criminal.

"Crow, I don't think this is a good idea," she said a little louder, but Crow grabbed her arm and pulled her forward to stand nearer to him.

"Valkyrie, you're our only shot. Either you go and find Solomon, or we lose him. You have to," then he pushed her forward and she almost fell into the criminal.

She didn't like it at all and was exceptionally mad with how Crow was treating her, but knew, at least in one way, he was right. She turned the corner behind the fish stand and was out of sight.

The criminal didn't seem to care that Valkyrie was nervous or on a mission, slowly making his way around the back of the warehouse and opening a door that should have led outside but actually only had a set of stairs going down on the other side.

She glanced at the criminal, but he was looking at her blankly. She already knew practically nothing. Might as well continue.

She descended quickly, hopping down the stairs even after the door was shut above her. A noise echoed up the thin staircase and it was only as she saw the light at the bottom that she could make out the shouts, cries, laughs, distant music and all the footsteps. Crow meant there weren't enough people upstairs because they were all down here it seemed. It was dingy and dark, and smelt like sweat, fish and alcohol. No one looked at her when she entered so she quickly went into the shadows and tried to look casual.

All she needed to do was find their suspect who they didn't have a good description of and get Raven. Then she'd make a plan. She praised herself in her head before getting on with it.

Looking around, she could see the basement or whatever this place was had several sections that made up a large hall and had a few rooms off to the side. She could only assume almost every man and woman down there with her needed arresting, so the question was, where would someone with a hostage go?

She decided to check the bar first.

The bar looked old, battered and had little craters in the wood from old bullets, but had been able to stay upright and actually kind of cool despite that. The barkeeper was a hideous man, worse than Panda, if only because his eyes said he'd taken all those scars for fun. She avoided his eye and looked over the patrons instead.

She was looking for a man, she knew, with dark hair and unknown skin. He had worn dark clothes as another clue and might still be. But there were four men of that description at the bar. She looked over the tables and saw more like that. Damn. There were private booths too but they were all open to see into and she didn't see Raven so she turned and walked passed a huddled group in the corner, but they were all taking drugs and she didn't think whoever had Raven would be getting high with a skilled fighter as a hostage.

She nearly went into the first room off the side but saw it was full of naked woman and kept going, and the next one had naked men and she walked even faster away. Good to know. Don't look there ever again even if Raven _is_ there. He'd be fine. Probably.

Unfortunately, that didn't leave her with many places, and when she had circled the full room and glanced in every alcove, she started to lose hope. If Raven wasn't here, she couldn't identify the suspect.

A hand landed on her shoulder and she turned.

Three giant men, bigger than Bear, taller than him too, loomed over her. Two of them were leering but the one in the middle glared.

"You have been summoned," he said so deeply if felt as if her bones shook from the vibration.

She glared. "I don't answer to anyone here."

"You have been summoned," he said again, and grabbed her arm before she could make a move and she felt her magic leave her.

She stared at him as he led her to the centre where a fighting ring was. "How are you doing that?"

The man didn't answer, just kept his dull eyes staring ahead. One of the leering men behind her smacked her ass so hard she almost fell over and the dozens of watching men and women laughed.

She could feel herself breathing faster and faster, the panic setting in. "What am I summoned for?" She asked quickly.

"The master wishes for you to fight," he said, pushing a man out his way. He hit the floor, glared, and backed down when he realised who pushed him. "To the death."

"Oh my god," she muttered. How was she meant to get out of this? Could she bargain? Bribe? She just feared if she caused a fuss about fighting – _to the death!_ – then she might be sent to that room with all the naked people. "Don't make me do this."

The man didn't answer her, just held her tightly as she tried to yank herself free from him. The more she tried, the more he made her feel weak and she had to stop. Someone else was in the ring shouting and riling up the crowd. The man held her by her hair and her eyes drooped as her protective clothes were stripped.

When she opened her eyes and all at once became aware of what was happening again, she was in just her pants and bra. They'd even taken her _socks_. Her hands shook when the crowd grew and the bets started being taken.

She knew how street fights worked. There was no way out for her with all these people invested because they would help stop her. It just depended on who they put in the fight with her, who she needed to kill.

Could she kill? She'd killed before. She could, but did she want to? Should she? In here it might be acceptable but if they went talking and the Sanctuary found out she killed someone in an illegal fighting ring there might be problems.

 _More problems if you're dead_ , her brain said, and she listened.

The crowd found someone for her to fight and she stood still, covered in goosebumps and shaking like a leaf, her opponent coming unseen through the crowd, getting pats on the shoulder, raising his hands in the air, pulling himself into the ring and she could see his face–

Scapegrace.

"You?" She said, looking at him. "You're meant to be in care."

He glared at her. "I'm the Killer Supreme. I will kill you in this fight and all will know to _fear me_!"

The crowd jeered and shouted bets, money exchanging hands faster than Valkyrie could see. Child versus idiot.

She shook her head and tried to think of the fight instead. Could she get away with not killing him? Perhaps if she just knocked him out really good and gave the crowd some entertainment she'd be let free? That sounded reasonable, even by illegal fight standards. She hoped so.

Scapegrace took his top off, showing his surprisingly toned body, and they stood across from each other, waiting for it to start. He licked his lips and looked at her carefully, lining up for his fight attack, and she stood carefully upright, trying not to look as uncomfortable as she was, and got ready to defend. There was a buzz and Scapegrace jumped.

It wasn't hard to slide out his way, grab his arm, spin him and punch him in the jaw. He turned like a ballerina and she grabbed him again and threw him across the ring where he fell on his face.

The crowd made positive sounds, so she launched forwards, grabbed him by the hair and pulled him up. Surprisingly, he got his balance and tried to hit her, but she ducked and put an arm around his bare neck and flipped them so they were on the ground, body slamming him. People were jumping excitedly.

Taking a breath, she rolled, grabbed his leg and jumped up, straining under his weight and holding him on her shoulders. She slowly pulled him above her head and heard Scapegrace screaming and when the crowd held its breath she slammed him down into the bloody ring and jumped on the man, rolling them over and grabbing his arm, pulling it back between her legs and dislocating it.

His screams got the crowd shouting more and more, putting it in her favour, and she released his arm and hopped on his back, listening to him squeal like a pig when her knees rammed into his small muscles, and she lifted both his arms in the most painful way she knew, lifting and lifting until she pulled them right out the shoulder sockets and the elbow ligament was utterly destroyed.

She pulled herself off him, his arms hanging from weird angles behind his head, and looked around. They were waiting for the kill. He screamed, tears streaming down his face, and Valkyrie knew she couldn't kill an idiot of a man like Scapegrace. He was already down.

She shook her head and stood back and the crowd immediately started booing angrily. She turned and saw the person that had gotten her from the room and went to him, not knowing where else to go. She crouched. "I can't kill him," she shouted over the roar. "He's defenceless."

The man did nothing, but the one next to him, a good looking one in a suit, nodded with a strange smile and got into the ring. She backed up.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we seemed to have an unwilling fighter," he said neutrally and the crowd went quiet. More people from all parts of the basement came over now this man was on stage. "What should we do with her?"

There was no answer. Not a peep.

He smiled. "Girl, what's your name?"

"Valkyrie Cain," she said. She knew they recognised it. "I'm looking for Solomon Wreath, a Necromancer we think was brought here against his will."

He hummed. "You want Solomon Wreath?" She nodded. "I know where he is."

She clenched her fist. "Where is he?"

"Not here anymore," he said, smirking and twirling for the crowd. "I can tell you if you do something for me."

"I won't kill a defenceless man."

"Who, him? No, I don't care about him. In fact, you don't have to kill anyone. How about this: if you can force someone of my choice out the box, I'll tell you what you want. If you can't, he'll kill you. What do you say?"

She hesitated. "I just have to push him out the box?"

"Yes. No magic or weapons allowed," he smiled and held his hand out. "What do you say?"

She didn't exactly have an option, especially since the magicless and weapon-less part had been taken care of by his minion for the time being. She shook on it and stood back as one of the leering men stepped forwards. He was naked and didn't care. She felt herself go pale. Killing defiantly wasn't on this man's agender.

The sick crowd loved it.

She only looked at his face and remembered what Wolf had said upstairs. Stay focused on the mission. If she got him out the box, she won. The crowd had pulled out the ropes that made the ring a ring, leaving them on just a stage.

She took a deep breath and reminded herself she was a Dead Man. She had been taught for things just like this, for attacks from several people like this at once. This wasn't actually new to her.

They stared each other out on the stage, and when the buzzer went, she was ready for him to charge. There was no way for her to get away, giving his gargantuan size, so she let him grab her and used the momentum to flip herself onto his back and lean so they both fell to the floor. He was stupidly fast and was up at the same time as her, trying to grab her and she backed up.

She timed it carefully, and just as he got to the middle of the ring, she sprang forward and jumped, kicking him in the face at lightning speed, not stopping for him to get any footing before she was hitting him, smacking his arm back with all her strength and kicking his leg. He looked as if he was going to kneel just so she couldn't get him off the stage, so she put a foot behind him and pushed.

He went stumbling, his height and weight giving him no advantage now, his eyes widening as he went. He seemed to know she'd somehow gotten the better of him, and grabbed at her before he fell, making her scream as his nails bit into the flesh of her breast and tore her bra off. Deep scratch marks began bleeding immediately, and she was naked in front of over a hundred people other than her pants, but he hit the floor with a thud, holding her bra triumphantly.

She breathed heavily, not wanting to cry but also really wanting to do that and turned back to the man. She didn't cover herself. That was a sign of weakness and she couldn't risk that. She wished she was back upstairs.

He smiled at her, clapping with the rest of the crowd and hopped on stage. "I think you've done it, and in record time. I’m impressed," he said, coming close. She stepped back and glared at him. "You want to know where your friend is?"

"That was the deal," she reminded him in a loud, strong voice. They all heard her.

"I know, lass, I was there. You friend is being taken to The Old Mill. You know what that is?" He asked.

"Not yet," she said, holding herself proudly.

"Then you never will," he grinned and grabbed her arm with surprising speed given his small size and the crowd roared. "Can I present to you, our newest attraction, Valkyrie Cain!"

She pulled in a gasping breath and yanked herself free of his arm, but it was barely any use. The crowd was getting up on the stage and the man she had pushed off already had a hand on her shoulder and his penis brushed against her lower back, leaving a sticking trail and she felt nauseous. She took a deep breath, held it, but the panic kept coming, and she could feel her magic returning to her, but she was shaking so much that when she clicked her fingers nothing happened anyway. She could see her eyes watering and the hyperventilation was kicking in and he grabbed her ass and half pulled her pants down–

She squeezed her eyes shut and just pushed, like with her Necromancy magic, and she heard the screams as she sent just magic, _any_ magic inside of her that would come to her fingers, out at the crowd. Her knees shook and she fought to keep herself standing when the man grabbed her breast from behind, making her scream fearfully and the magic fell from her fingers automatically. She stared as it hit him and he turned to ash.

There was a moment of silence as the crowd accepted she had more magic than they knew and fear wouldn't keep it back, before they grinned and the death made it more than a game.

It became a competition.

She could barely breath and her knees shook violently, but could feel the magic in her and it was all she held as she ran to the stairwell and took the stairs in twos, faster than she had ever run before. Her knees give out every few jumps from how much she was panicking and the screams of the patrons below coming after her and fighting between themselves where overwhelmingly loud and she could feel herself becoming weak from fright. In the darkness she hit the door at the top and nearly fell back down, crying out and grabbing the door handle. There was a flash behind her that made her jump and the bright magic jumped out of her hands again and the door was also turned to ashes.

She fell through it.

The man that had let her into the basement was standing there already and looked down at her naked body disdainfully before stepping right over her and down into the dark. The sounds of in there was muffled out here, and the sudden change of shouting to fish mongers was disorientating. A moment later she was wrapped in Wolf's protective arms.

"Cub, what happened!?" He practically screeched, holding her tightly and hiding her breasts from the watching, smirking men.

"Th-the Old M-Mill," she stuttered, pulling in her breaths rapidly and holding her eyes open so they wouldn't cry, but also putting her head on his shoulder. "That's where they t-took him."

He shook his head. "Okay, okay, we'll deal with that in a moment. What happened to you baby?"

She shook her head and fought to pull away and managed it right in time to throw up. Dexter held her hair.

"Valkyrie," Crow said when she was wiping her mouth. Wolf pushed his shirt over her head and she willingly covered herself in it, though blood was smeared down the inside from the cuts on her breast, and it barely took a moment more for the wound to soak through the shirt. It barely covered the bottom of her crotch. She took a deep breath and looked at him with tears on her cheeks. "You said it was The Old Mill?"

She let out a laugh and hickuped as her tears tried to turn into sobs. She took a deep breath, digging her nails into her thighs painfully, and stood up even though her whole body was trembling. "I can't believe you," she whispered roughly and walked on shaking legs, blood covering her borrowed shirt, right into the crowds with just her brother on her heel.


	101. Where's my magic?

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 101**

She barely made it halfway around the building before she got lightheaded and began to succumb to her hyperventilating, shock and panic. Wolf was already with her, but the problem was, his hands steadying her and keeping her leaving the damn fish market was making her panicking get worse and worse, but she knew if he let go she'd fall to the ground and probably start pulling her hair and that was making her panic more because then people would be even more likely of seeing her. She couldn't _breathe_. It was like her throat was closed up as tears had filled her eyes and her breast throbbed in pain. Her ears rang and she dug her hands into her forearms so much she could see she was scratching herself badly, but when Wolf tried to gently pull her fingers from the skin, she whined with massive, panicking eyes–

And passed out.

Valkyrie woke up in Kenspeckle's hospital and immediately started sucking in deep breaths. There was no one else in the ward and after looking around a few times, she felt her heart slow down and her breathing get easier. Was this what it was like for Snake? When he had just left the Spiders and realised everything was a lie, and he was constantly stressed? Just, unable to breathe. Unable to be with people, but at the same time, worried now there was no one there – her nails stuck into the palm of her hands. She was so on edge and she hated it.

There was a light knock on the door and she took a deep breath, sat herself up on the bed and swallowed before croaking, "Yeah?"

Wolf carefully opened it and stuck his head in. "Can I come in?"

She smiled nervously. "Sure."

He smiled back and closed the door gently behind him before taking a seat next to her bed. "How are you feeling?"

"Physically? A little sore but not in pain. I'm tired."

He put his hand on the bed, palm up and welcoming. She slowly put her hand in his, testing her own boundaries given how sensitive her heart felt, and was happily surprised when she felt a thousand times better with his hand gently folded around hers. "And what about the emotional and mental side?"

She bit the inside of her cheek. "Not so good."

"Yeah?" He said, welcoming her to talk. She smiled when she realised she'd picked that up from him years ago.

"I feel jittery. And I guess jumpy. If I even think about moving from here my heart jumps, and it's all because I'm nervous, but I don't need to be," she said, trailing off at the end.

"Why's that?" He asked.

She bit her lip. "Will you keep a secret?"

He sighed. "You know I don't like keeping things from the others, Cub."

"I know. Just until I can talk about it more," she said quietly, get stomach clenching horribly. She put an arm around it.

"I suppose I can do that for you."

She took a deep breath and swallowed her bile back. "I killed him."

"Who?"

"The one I – the one I had to push out the ring. They forced me to fight, but it was just that idiot Scapegrace, we need to find out where his carer is by the way, and I beat him by a mile, obviously. The guy in charge wanted me to kill him, but I refused and I said wanted to know where Solomon was. He said after that that if I pushed someone out the ring, he would tell me, and I agreed seeing as they'd already taken my top and trousers and I had no way out with so many people around. They got this massive guy and put him in the ring with me. He was–" she swallowed the throw up that pushed itself to her throat and a moment later took a breath and continued "–he was naked and was mostly big rather than a good fighter, and he really frightened me, but I got him out the ring, without magic, and he was the one that pulled my – my bra off and scratched me. The guy told me about The Old Mill because I _had_ done what he said."

"And then what happened?"

"He said I was the newest attraction and the audience got on stage and the guy I had just pushed off was holding me and – and he – well, I had no magic, I was just panicking so much and without my ring it was useless. I don't know what happened, Wolf, but I was panicking and I started hyperventilating and I just felt some magic burst from inside me and I just freaked out and I got him with this magic when he groped me and he – he turned to dust Wolf. I don't even know what I did."

He took a deep breath and nodded. "It's alright Cub. Trust me, no one's going to miss that guy, and if you hadn't, me and the boy's would be making plans for him."

She smiled in spite of her rolling stomach. "You and the boys?"

"Yes. That's me, Saracen and Erskine in case you were wondering," he grinned.

Her smile faded. "Have you heard from Crow?"

"No," he said, an edge to his voice. "Me and the boys will be dealing with him after we get Solomon back."

She smiled without feeling it. "At least you're having fun."

He gently squeezed her hand. "Don't think that, Val. I feel sick. I want to lash out and get mad, but what use will that be? Skulduggery has to make his own mistakes, but that doesn't mean I want to have any part of it. I'm with you to the end. You're my baby sister. God, I remember when I found Erskine stumbling around a battlefield. He'd followed Mevolent's troops to get his way back to us after he'd secretly betrayed the Spiders, and we were just astonished to find him there. We didn't know yet what had happened and thought he was sick back at base, and we pulled him into our tent and he just broke down and told us so much shit the Spiders had told him and done to him. I still have nightmares about it, and I don't think he’s ever told us everything. But you know, babe, we were with him every step of the way to getting better and I never once faulted him. I sat through every nightmare, helped with every panic attack, and I washed him every time he got himself into a depression just so he'd be clean, and I'll be _damned_ if I can't do the same for my sister."

Well, she just started crying and held her arms out for him.

"Aww, hon, I didn't mean for you to cry," he whispered and sat on the edge of the bed for her to cling to.

"He tried to rape me," she whispered into his shoulder. "It was so scary."

He took a deep breath against her head and held her tightly. "It's okay now. He's dead and gone. I won't say a word, I swear. I'm so, so sorry I let you go down there alone. I should have known better."

They stayed like that until she fell asleep against him and he lay her down on the pillow with a small kiss on her cheek.

**.*****.**

She woke next to the sound of voices and yawned before fluttering her eyes open. She frowned and looked around her before settling into the parlour settee comfortably, the sun warming her legs. It was much better to be back home, listening to her family’s voices in the next room while she sunned herself. She noticed her phone was on the coffee table flashing, so she held out her hand, moved her palm and…

Nothing. She tried again. She sat up and did it again. "Wolf?"

The voices went quiet and Wolf, Snake, Weasel, Bear, Tanith and Panda came into the room. "S'up," Wolf said, waving.

"I can't use my magic," she said.

He frowned. "What do you mean?"

"I mean I can't use my magic, don't I?" She snapped. "Look." She extended her arm, tried to draw her phone towards her using the air, and nothing happened. "I don't have a problem with air like this. I have a good grasp of air. This isn't normal." She clicked her fingers and no spark came, so she did it a few more times. "See?! Nothing!"

"What about Necromancy?" Tanith asked.

"I lost my ring," she said. "And I can't feel it either. I can't feel anything when I try to do any Elemental magic, and I can't feel my Necromancy magic at all."

Her family looked between themselves and Weasel took a seat. "I might have an idea," he said. They all nodded and waited. "It's not my magic, it's an idea."

They made faces but sat down anyway.

"I heard once of a guy in Peru who claimed his son had been attacked and lost all his magic abilities. A few years later they came back. No one believed him, but maybe there was more to it than that."

"So you're saying I have no magic?" She asked him.

"No," he hesitated. "Just that whatever happened when you were gone–" he glared at Wolf who kept his mouth firmly shut "–may have affected your ability to use it."

"So I can't use magic? But I have it?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. But maybe."

She took a breath and thought about it, trying to feel inside her for her magic. Something was there, something she could feel but didn't know how to approach, didn't know how to draw out, and she had a feeling she knew what was wrong.

"I think it's something else," she said slowly. "I think I'm using a new magic. When I was there, I used a magic I never had before. I think I can feel that."

Tanith jolted up. "I know what it might be! I grew up with someone who suddenly used a new magic in a fight against someone and it took over all their magic. It's almost like you picked it in the Serge, but without the Serge."

"What happened with them?" Valkyrie asked.

"Well, they studied his magic, but I don't know what it was. He could only use that magic from then on. I never really knew him. He died when I was still in my teens."

Valkyrie deflated. "But he could use that magic?"

She nodded. "As far as I know, he could."

"So I don't get a choice," she sighed. "I _have_ magic at least."

"Thinking positive, that's good," Wolf grinned. "We'll have to explore that later. For now, you might want to look at your phone."

Valkyrie's eyes widened and she grabbed it. Twenty-three messages and forty-seven missed calls. All from Nadia. "I have to call her back."

They chucked and she went up to her room as she read through the messages. They were mostly along the lines of 'I love you', 'how are you?', 'Are you busy?', 'Valkyrie?', 'You're worrying me', 'Call me when you see this', 'You're scaring me', 'I'm really worried', and progressively more panicky as it went. She called her just as she got to her room.

It was still morning, almost eleven, so it didn't take too long for Nadia to pick up. "Valkyrie?"

"Yeah, it's me. I'm so sorry, baby, Solomon was kidnapped two days ago, and I was out trying to find him, and then my phone died and we were meant to get a charger yesterday morning, but we got a tipoff, ran there, and I had to try and get information by myself and some awful things happened and I was at Kenspeckle's overnight and now I'm home. I'm sorry I worried you," Valkyrie rushed quickly. "Are you okay?"

She took a breath. "I am now. I was really worried, Val. I got so worked up. What happened?"

She bit her lip. "Honestly? I don't even want to talk about it. It was just awful." She laughed darkly. "I've only told Wolf."

Nadia was quiet for a moment. "Really? Val, you should talk about it."

"I know. But not yet, okay?" She said, grabbing her towel from the back of her door. "Come on, tell me what you've been doing."

"Well, Mum and Dad got into a big fight two nights ago," she said quietly. She could feel her anxiety from over the phone. "They haven't spoken since."

"What did they fight about?"

"What school to send me too. Daadii didn't say they couldn't send me to India, she just kind of said they shouldn't, and Dad wants to send me back early for summer tutoring, but Mum wants me here," she said. "I only know because they started screaming at each other. They were saying other things too. Like how me being quiet at home is because Mum never let me express myself as a child, and the reason I won't spend time with them is because Dad wasn't here with work a lot when I was a teenager."

"Oh, sweetie," Valkyrie said quietly, wishing she could hug her. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. It sounds like you had a worse time than me anyway," she said and Valkyrie could imagine her picking fluff off her bed or desk chair, whichever she was sitting on. "I just feel so down all the time. I have no energy, and I either sleep too little or too much so I'm always tired, and even when I want to eat I can't because they keep trying to eat together and start fighting so I can't go downstairs at all. I ran out of toilet paper and waited for hours to go get more just so I didn’t have to run into either of them. I hate leaving this room so much but I’m so utterly _sick_ of it."

Valkyrie bit her lip. "I know baby. If you ever want, you can stay here. I know you don't want to that much at the moment, but at any time, I will get you and you can just stay here, even just for a day, I promise. I just want you happy."

"I know. I miss you so much."

"I miss you too. I want to see you soon," Valkyrie said, her throat closing with emotion as she realised just how much she missed Nadia. "I really need to see you."

Nadia was silent for a long moment. "You could visit me later."

"You mean, like, sneak into your room?"

"Yeah. Come see me for a few hours," she said, and there was a little waver to her voice.

"You sound nervous," Valkyrie said carefully.

"I am," she admitted. "Way more than I thought I'd be. But I'm so lonely here. I'm in my room all day, I have nothing to do, nothing to eat, I just want to see you so badly."

"I'll be there. I'll bring dinner and some other things, okay? Is there anything you want?"

"I just want to see you," Nadia said quietly.

"I'll be there. I promise," Valkyrie said and then gasped. "Oh, but I have to tell you something."

She explained to Nadia what had happened with her magic, keeping vague on the attack and explaining that whatever magic she used to have was theoretically replaced and she would need help getting into the window. Nadia laughed, finding it incredibly amusing that her "talented" girlfriend had been earthbound and needed her help before softly saying she'd of course sort it. They spoke for an hour more before Valkyrie really had to pee and they hung up.

She felt a lot better.


	102. Emotional but cute

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 102**

"Can I borrow the car?" Valkyrie asked Wolf quietly.

He was sat on the edge of his bed delicately because Weasel and Snake had fallen asleep in it. He sighed quietly, grabbed his keys and came out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind him. "What do you need the car for?" He asked.

She walked with him down the stairs. "Nadia said I could visit her. She's going to pull me through the window."

Wolf snorted and grinned. "She isn't strong enough."

"I am not fat."

"She's still not strong enough."

"How dare you. For your insult, I require the car keys," she said.

He pulled the keys for Gordon's old car that the Idiots commandeered most days and handed them over. "It's your car anyway. We need to get you a real licence."

"I just need to take the test," she shrugged. "You and Tanith taught me to drive everything. I can even drive a van with no back window, so I think I'm good enough to pass."

"I'm not disagreeing, just saying it would be more legal like that," he smiled.

"Legal smegal," she grinned, opening the garage door.

"Hey," he said suddenly and she turned back to him. "Are you sure you're alright?"

She shrugged. "As alright as I can be."

"I mean to see Nadia," he said softly. "I know you're older now and you can make your own decisions, but I'm your brother. I just want to make sure you're not going to rush into something."

She bit her lip. "I'm not going to, like, jump right on her as soon as I get there if that's what you're thinking."

He breathed a laugh. "I didn't think that. It's just that some people, after a traumatic experience like yours, go out and have sex to feel better. Which is fine for some people, but you're my sister. I'd rather bundle you up with hot chocolate than let you do things on impulse."

She hugged him tightly. "Thank you for thinking about me. But be real. Even without me feeling bad, I haven't seen Nadia more than once since we got back together, and she's stressed as hell at home, and she hasn't eaten properly since the Ball. What do you think this bag is full of?"

"A change of clothes?"

"No. It has leftovers, biscuits and snacks. I'm getting fast food on my way to hers too," she said. "I was worried for a while that she wasn't eating because she was getting an eating disorder, and I had no idea how to even talk to her about it, but she said she's really is hungry and wants to eat, so she'll be fine. Right?"

He hugged her tighter. "I hope so. Nadia's a good girl. With you helping her, I bet she'll get better in no time."

"I hope so," she smiled and pulled away. "I'll see you later, or tomorrow."

"Depends if I get my bed back," he said with a roll of his eyes.

"You can sleep in my room," she laughed. He waved her away as she drove Gordon's old car out the garage.

After a quick trip to McDonald's and a rearrangement of bags, she drove over to Nadia's house and parked a whole street away by some different houses that she hadn't parked at before and snuck around to the very back of Nadia's house. She expected her father, if not both her parents, had gotten some new security in the last few months so she was careful about where she hid. She figured the house nearer to Nadia's room was best in terms of being hidden but was harder to get to. She braved the bushes and called Nadia's phone. Once she got the all clear, she ran across the garden and sucked in a breath when Nadia suddenly and very quickly pulled her up to the window.

She grinned as soon as her fingers caught a hold of the sill. "Hey baby," she whispered as she crawled in. Nadia shut it behind her and was then in her arms, hugging her as much as her little muscles could. "I missed you so much."

"I missed you worse," Nadia said quietly into her collar bone. She wished the moment lasted longer, but Nadia pulled away. "Did you bring food?"

"Yeah, go sit on the bed," Valkyrie told her and opened up the bag. "Ta-da!"

Nadia smiled. "A Happy Meal?"

"Look inside."

She opened up the cardboard and giggled. "You filled it with chicken nuggets."

"I bought the big box of nuggets they do and asked for a Happy Meal box. The lady thought it was so funny she did it," Valkyrie smiled. "There are chips at the bottom, and I got a few other things."

Valkyrie tipped the bag upside down on the bed. Dozens of treats, snacks and packets of all sorts of food fell out. "Oh my God Valkyrie," Nadia laughed quietly. "You never change."

She grinned. "I try. And I know not all of these can be eaten alone, but I thought I'd get some of this packet soup and noodles and stuff that's super quick to make. Then at least it's easy, you know? And more filling than a couple of biscuits even if you don't want to make a full meal."

"Thank you," Nadia said, a smile on her pretty lips. Valkyrie's heart jumped in her chest and she was grateful to be back with her again. "I really appreciate your help."

"It's alright. I love you," she reminded her and when Nadia went in for a kiss, Valkyrie pecked her back.

They sat and ate together, sharing a burger, the chips and barely eating all the nuggets before getting into the chocolate biscuits.

"Will you tell me what happened?" Nadia asked her. She was sitting with her back against the headboard and had the little Happy Meal toy sat next to her.

Valkyrie finished her bite, put down the biscuit and wiped her hands. "You mean yesterday?"

"Yeah."

She sighed. "I really don't want to talk about it. It makes me feel all weird just _thinking_ about it."

"Maybe if you just tell me the basic idea?" Nadia said hopefully. "I can see how upset you are Val. Even after being away from each other for months I can see it. Talk to me."

"If you really want to know," Valkyrie said, rubbing her face in her hands. She told her about the case to start, telling her about the Shunters and warming up to the dead body, then onto Raven being gone at which point they held hands, then she told her about going on the search with Wolf and how they had argued and Crow had been a dick, and her eyes filled with tears when she said how she couldn't talk to her that night. She cried when she said about the fish mongers and ended up blubbering and telling her about the fight and how naked the man had been and how uncomfortable she'd been and how disgusting his body had felt touching and being near her own. Then she sucked in some breaths and told her about the magic and that she'd killed the man before rushing and saying she escaped and Crow hadn't acted at all like he cared.

They were silent and thought to themselves for a long time. Valkyrie stared at the purple bedsheet. After minutes of this, Nadia squeezed her hand and sighed. "You did the right thing."

She looked up and realised Nadia had silent tears on her cheeks. "What do you mean?"

"You killed him. That was the right thing. Someone like that doesn't deserve to live. And I'm sorry Skulduggery isn't talking to you," she said.

Valkyrie nodded slowly, biting her lip and feeling heavy but not altogether guilty. "I didn't mean to do it."

"Well, it doesn't even matter then," Nadia said, putting on a fake smile and sitting up. "It was an accident. No one can fault you for magic going out of whack, right?"

She shrugged. "I don't know."

"I don't think so." They smiled at each other for a few moments before the front slipped away and they felt sad again.

"Will you tell me why you weren't eating much at school?" Valkyrie asked softly.

She sighed. "I was eating, just a little less than I normally would."

"Why not the normal amount?"

Her shoulders sagged. "I just wasn't hungry. I guess when I'm stressed or upset I just don't. But I tried to eat something at every meal, or, I did at school anyway. I've lost more weight since I came back here."

"Because you're staying away from your parents," Valkyrie concluded.

"Yeah. If they aren't fighting, they're telling me to do things. To eat, talk to the other parent, tell them why this or that happened, asking me to study more. They don't care about making it better, they just expect it to happen. No questions asked. You know?"

"Yeah. Crow can get like that sometimes," Valkyrie nodded. "But I've never been in the middle."

"I'm not in the middle. I'm on the side-lines," Nadia said quietly. "I want this to be better. They're the ones not shutting up long enough to listen."

"And they haven't decided anything on your school?"

"No. Daadii said they shouldn't send me to India, I think I told you that. But she never said they can't. She doesn't really like to play dictator, but she does expect what she wants to happen too, you know? But she's one of those silent 'I told you so' people where you know they think you're making a mistake. Dad just used to be kind of like that, but he always humoured me or Mum even if he knew something wouldn't work. This is just him being mean," Nadia explained. "I just want him to stop being over protective."

"You think it's over protectiveness? He's being downright horrid!"

"I know, but that's what _he_ thinks it is," Nadia said darkly. "I get that he thinks you'll hurt me and this school is meant to be amazing, so I can see why him and Mum like it, but if I'm not even getting good grades, why keep me there? I want to stay here and see you on the weekends like before all this."

Nadia reached over and Valkyrie pulled her so they were side by side comfortably on the bed. "It's okay. Look, even if they do send you back there in September, you only have to be there until your birthday, right? That's less than three months, and I can visit you, send letters, talk on the phone. We can make it work, and when your eighteen you can choose to transfer school yourself, or drop out, or whatever you want. Okay?"

Nadia nodded. "I know. But Mum loves the school and won't be happy, and Dad will hate it if he's still trying to force me into doing every little thing he wants."

"You might have to do things they don't want sometimes," Valkyrie said, perhaps a little sulkier than she meant to.

Nadia smiled. "I know, don't worry. If they send me, I will leave when I can, it's just the point of them doing what I want. You know?"

"Yeah," she smiled, and they kissed again.

"Your breath smells," Nadia whispers.

"So does yours," Valkyrie smiled, and kissed her again. "Does this mean you want to go to school next year?"

"I haven't decided," Nadia shrugged. "I was thinking for a while I might just do it to get out of here, but I don't want to as well."

"Or, you know, there's always my house," Valkyrie said with a half-smile. "Like always."

"I know, Valkyrie," Nadia rolled her eyes. "I'll stay over when Tanith has the baby. I really want to help her."

"I'm glad your excited," Valkyrie smiled. "The guys are too but I don't think they've worked out yet that it's going to scream and cry and be sick and smell."

"All babies are like that."

"I know. But except for me they don't have experience with babies, and Gordon says they only got into the buying bits for me thing when I was about two or three, so the really little baby thing was never on their minds. I think they think Tanith will magickly clean the baby somehow."

Naida hummed. "Somehow I don't think that's been invented."

"I know. Me and Tanith watched some video's on how to change a nappy so we've got that sorted. And how to wash the reusable nappies. We worked out as well that the reusable nappies save you roughly two thousand euro, even more if you used them for more than one child, and they will last years if Tanith vacuum seals them. It's really economical, more so if you buy them second hand since they literally just need a good sanitising. And unless someone else buys the baby clothes, it's best to just get basic cheap onesies because it's all so expensive. Everyone buys you clothes for the baby, so there's no point getting anything other than the cheapest when they're little and just save the money for when they're older and want everything their little friends have."

Nadia shook her head. "It sounds like you and Tanith are the parents. And planning for a few more babies."

"Ghastly's looking forwards to it too," Valkyrie said, a little frown on her face. "But I don't know if he's worked it out either. I think he's assuming he'll keep working? Skulduggery said he was working when his child was little, so I think they're expecting the same here."

"I bet Tanith doesn't like that," Nadia said.

"She wouldn't if I said, but she and Ghastly have been getting on a bit better now he's not pushing her around to relax all the time, and he spends more time without her at work so they're not together so much getting on each other's nerves day and night. I'm hoping, since Tanith says they stay up talking a lot, that they'll kind of talk about baby responsibilities or whatever and kind of work it out. Tanith knows she has me so she isn't panicking, but at the start, before she even told Ghastly, she was really worrying because she doesn't think she can do it alone. If they wait until they have a baby in their arms and Ghastly just tells her he's off to work, there might be a few problems."

"I doubt Ghastly saying he doesn't want to do the gory bits will help him," Nadia said warningly.

"I don't think it's that bad, he's excited to be a dad, I just don't think he knows how much effort it will actually take," Valkyrie reasoned. "I don't know. I feel like my whole life is just this baby and being a detective. I need time off but I can't exactly not turn up to work, and I can hardly get away from the kid."

Nadia nodded and patted her knee. "There there. You've lived through worse."

She snorted. "I know, I'm not complaining. Just saying. I need to spend more time with you, being a teenager and going on dates and stuff."

"You do. I get lonely up here all alone without my warrior princess."

"Please don't say that name in public," Valkyrie asked.

Nadia smirked.


	103. The Old Mill, err, it's a dud

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 103**

Valkyrie stayed till four in the morning at Nadia's house, quietly laughing, eating and joking with her girlfriend until Nadia looked as if she were about to fall asleep. Nadia had helped her out the window and blew her a kiss as Valkyrie ran away. It was sad leaving her because for those nine hours she had stayed in Nadia's house – she'd stayed a long while – everything else had disappeared. No killers. Raven wasn't missing. Snake wasn't having panic attacks. Crow cared. And best of all, she was a normal girl with a normal life eating snacks and not scared of anything.

At least she fell straight to sleep when she got home.

That sleep was a strange one. She had some weird dream where she couldn't escape a maze and ended up getting to the middle and realising she could have used magic all along to fly and frustrated herself so much in the dream she woke herself up, just to remember she couldn't use that magic at all and got even more frustrated that she had woken herself from her dream with lies.

Rubbing her face, she checked her phone and realised she had to get up anyway. She took her time at first, getting a shower and cutting her toenails, before nodding to herself and deciding it was time to get moving and find Raven even if she wasn't happy with Crow. Raven had done nothing wrong and needed help, so she would do just that.

"Hey Val," Wolf said as soon as she came in.

"Hi," she smiled. The others, that being Tanith, Panda, Snake and Weasel, were eating their breakfast. Wolf looked as tired as her and just as serious. At least they were on the same page. Tanith seemed to be engaged in an eating competition with Snake though if she knew about it was a mystery. Snake was definitely trying to keep up. "Have you heard from Crow?"

"Nothing," Wolf said, tapping the table and leaning back in his chair. "As soon as you're ready I thought me, you and Saracen could go visit The Old Mill and go from there."

"So we're following Crow's footprints now?" Valkyrie asked moodily.

"Yeah, this might not be the time, but I get the feeling Crow's been captured," Weasel said. "I know we're being anti-Skul and all that, but we probably shouldn't let him be pulled apart either."

Valkyrie sagged. "He got captured."

"I don't know!" Weasel said quickly. "Me being confident something happened and my magic saying something happened are similar feelings, so if this is just my past experience of him getting captured getting in the way, I'm sorry, but that's what it looked like from my point of view."

"Let's be honest, he probably got captured," Wolf said and the others nodded.

"I think he enjoys it," Valkyrie muttered. "I also think I told him something like this would happen if he went off alone and oh no, here we are with nothing while he's gone by himself and got captured god knows were. Whatever will he do stuck in a cage being tortured while knowing this is his fault? Hopefully regret it."

"If he's being tortured in a cage I imagine he's trying not to feel anything," Tanith said with all her wisdom and looking for all the world as if they were talking about having tea rather than their friend being double killed. "And Val, you need to eat some fruit."

"Really?" Valkyrie asked.

"Yes, really. You need energy," Tanith said again as if nothing else in the world mattered.

"Is that you or the medicine you take in the morning talking?"

"The medicine," she replied. "Inside I am really angry and I'd probably be throwing my plate at the wall by now, but the medicine is mellowing me out really well."

Valkyrie shook her head but grabbed some of the melon Bear had prepared before going to the hotel that morning to go with her cereal – but not in it, she wasn't getting pregnancy cravings, although that would have been a twist – and glad in a way that she and Wolf were keeping what happened in the basement place a secret. Tanith would not have coped well with the news.

She ate her breakfast with half an appetite and half an hour later she, Wolf, Weasel and Snake where in the car and off to The Old Mill. Snake wasn't meant to come but had insisted he couldn't be left out of their group any longer. So it was her and the Idiots. Together at last.

"Right, before you two start arguing," Wolf said, looking in the mirror at Weasel and Snake like a disapproving dad, "we need to have a talk. Our mission today is to find Skulduggery. If the day goes well, we can spend the evening getting him back and the night getting Solomon."

"Unless the day is really good and Skulduggery isn't captured," Snake nodded.

"Yes, but that's unlikely," Wolf conceded. "If the day goes bad, and let's be honest it probably will, we'll be spending today looking for clues to find Crow and hopefully find where that is, and then I’ll have the Sanctuary, Anton and Corrival get ready. Corrival will keep tabs and make sure all goes well in the event the Sanctuary doesn't send help when we find enemies, or more likely, in case something stops us from contacting him, he'll be able to do something about it. Do we understand?"

"Yes sir!" The three others said.

"Good! Now we'll listen to these sick beats like the cool kids and feel hip!" Wolf grinned and turned on the radio.

Valkyrie laughed but Wolf did put on some good songs and by the time they got to where The Old Mill supposedly was, they were all screaming the lyrics and speeding at horrifically illegal speeds. Grinning, they checked their concealed weapons in the car – the Idiots had no problem giving Valkyrie knives and a gun, especially since they knew _something_ had happened the day before and they wanted her safe because why wouldn't they.

They exited the car and looked around. They were in the west of Ireland, though much further south than the fish market and a bit further inland. Valkyrie didn't know the exact location, but it hardly mattered.

"See that building over there?" Wolf said, looking at a tower not so far from them. "That's it. Under that is The Old Mill."

"How do you know?" Valkyrie asked.

"I asked some friends at the Sanctuary while you were out last night," he revealed. "I might have used Saracen to get us in. Saracen, you have a date with a guy call Jerad."

"I won't go," he nodded.

"I know, but I said you would so he'd tell me where it is. He used to work for a gang that once used this place as a hideout, so he was able to tell me the way around. That was a few years ago now, about forty, but I doubt the layout has changed."

"Unlikely," Weasel said.

"So we just need to get in the door and from there we go down to the dungeon, have a look around, liberate anyone we can, and leave. Understand?"

"Understood."

They trekked for half an hour over to the tower, and the door itself wasn't hard to find with a man like Weasel on their side, but without him, she knew they could have searched for a week on foot and never have found it. Weasel frowned at it and gave it a small push and the whole door slowly fell back until it crashed straight down onto its back and lay there.

"Dead as a doornail," Snake whispered and they walked over it, guns out, into the tunnel.

The place was full of dust, and although Snake lit a flame, it felt as if the stone absorbed the light. They found a staircase and followed it down quickly, finding the door below had been blown off its hinges and left where it was.

"Someone already attacked here," Weasel said suddenly.

"No shit," Valkyrie muttered, almost slipping on bullet shells.

"A group of trained soldiers. With a machine gun," he said, and shone a tiny keychain flashlight into a room where they caught a glimpse of a machine gun that looked to have been exploded and abandoned. That had obviously been on the side of whoever had been there first. He stood up straight a moment later. "Everyone's gone."

"Even prisoners?" Wolf asked, standing up too but not putting away his weapons.

Weasel hesitated. "I'm not sure. But there are no enemies. Guaranteed."

Valkyrie tutted as she put her gun away. "I was having fun with that," she said and gave Snake a smile when she saw his look of relief. "Come on, let's check the dungeon."

Said dungeon had magic dampening on it, but that shouldn't have been able to affect Weasel's magic from above so they were safe, and with Weasel's keychain flashlight, they could also see a small circle of stone in front of them wherever they pointed. It was actually so boring looking through one cell at a time, Wolf spent the time calling Pa and telling him what The Old Mill looked like while the other three looked for clues and any prisoners.

Valkyrie picked up a bullet or two and found a necklace she took also, as well as a bullet with blood on for analysis and a jacket. It was probably useless, but perhaps they would be able to identify the owners and know who they were up against. Unfortunately, forensics weren’t too big of a thing in the magic world up until the last twenty or so years, but it had some potential.

They had to move debris from some areas to look into cells just in case someone was in there as they couldn't be too sure considering Weasel couldn't detect for certain if any prisoners were down there. In the meantime, Valkyrie and Erskine worked out what happened – a group of soldiers between four and eight members had been the captors. One man had entered and attempted to take them out, only to be overwhelmed in one corner and ultimately surrendered. They believed at that point the whole group decided to move.

An hour into the investigation, three Cleavers turned up to help them. They had to go up so the Cleavers could find the hidden entrance, and within a few minutes they had scouted the upper area for anything they might want and then helped in the dungeon. As expected, it was only in the last row of cells they finally found something tangible.

In one cell was a hat, Bespoke made and obviously Crow's. Valkyrie picked it up with a sigh, somewhere between tired and irritated, and put it on her head. The cell opposite held half a broken cane. Raven's.

"They were here," Wolf concluded. "It wasn't a trap then. Not that I doubted your detecting skills."

"And the ones that got them left these on purpose," Valkyrie continued tiredly. "They want us to know they were here and aren't any more. We need to work out where they went. I’m also concerned that there doesn’t seem to be any blood or bodies. It isn’t like Skul not to take someone down on his way."

"You're right," Weasel agreed, nodding. "The problem is that I don't trust Skulduggery to act predictably anymore. I mean, he's never been predictable, but we could assume what he wanted even if he did it unexpectedly. I don't know if Skulduggery would have really tried if he didn’t think he could win and get Solomon out."

"You think he's purposefully staying captured?"

"I think they might be manipulating Skulduggery to keep him controllable and they knew it would work from the first moment they captured Solomon," Weasel clarified. "And I know for a fact it’ll continue to work."

"Fuck," Valkyrie said, rubbing her face. "Could that mean they'll be able to get Crow to do things? Tell them information and stuff to keep Raven safe."

Wolf nodded. "That sounds about right."

"Right, well, let's just find them faster then," Valkyrie said, feeling the irritation, however irrational, building up. "Any ideas on where they went?"

Weasel shook his head. "I didn't detect another entrance."

"Or just in general?"

"Nothing Cub," he sighed. "Sorry."

She sagged. "Okay. Well, they must have gone somewhere, so let's have a look."

They did, but even after three hours of searching up and down every inch of every cell, the floor, the ceiling for secrets, and all over the mud and grass on the surface, they didn't find any direction they went in. Wolf recalled an American Sanctuary having a series of passages under and around it that could only be opened or activated by signals drawn into the user's skin, and they had to leave with the assumption that was what had happened, or something equally sneaky. It was very common in old builds such as this. It was frustrating, but a start.

"Stupid skeleton," Valkyrie sighed when she sat back in the car. She threw his hat on the passenger floor. She hoped it got muddy.

"Cheer up, Cub," Wolf said, patting her shoulder. "We know they’re together at least, and we know a little about the people we’re up against. It wasn't a loss."

Valkyrie sat there tapping her finger as they pulled away from the road and began driving. "God, let's just get some food and then I can think more," Valkyrie told them, and they all agreed.


	104. The Visions

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 104**

Valkyrie and the Idiots went to a fast food restaurant for lunch, though it was closer to dinner, and ordered three times what the average person could usually consume, each, and also got ice creams to go on their way out.

They had barely sat back in the car when Wolf's phone went off and he had to search his thirty pockets for the device. He grabbed it out of one with a victorious grin. "Dexter," he said. Someone spoke on the other side and his eyes widened. "Of course, we'll be there soon. Thank you. Bye."

"Who was that?" Valkyrie asked.

"Cassandra. Do you know who that is?" He asked. She shook her head. "She's a Sensitive, her powers are unrivalled. She said she's Seen something _we_ need to see so we're going there now."

"Does she have food?" Snake asked from the back, a mouthful of ice cream.

"Ravel, we aren't there, how am I meant to know?" Wolf asked as he pulled into traffic.

They finished their ice creams and Valkyrie pulled her phone out for the drive. She had a text from Nadia and quickly read it.

'Any progress, my mega strong princess?'

'Please don't make variations. And kind of. We searched the place and found a few bits, we’re going to the Sanctuary but now a sensitive wants to talk.'

'What about?'

'I don't know, we're going there now. Hopefully information so we can get this done and I can see you again.'

'Not to see your family whole and together? ;)'

'Not really.' She typed, and send after that, 'I want Raven back but when we get Crow I'm locking him out the house security. That's my plan.'

'It's good revenge,' she said. 'But isn't he in control?'

'Not if I take over, which I can. Who’s going to stop me? I was right, even he will have to admit that. But I don't want to talk about that. How are you?'

'Today was okay. Mum went out with friends and Dad's in Northern Ireland for work for a few days, so I ransacked the house of more food, watched telly, had a bath. It was pretty good. I got out my old baby shoes for Tanith too.'

'Guess you'll have to come visit me?' Valkyrie wrote before tagging on a question mark.

'I will, don't worry. I want to see your new kitchen.'

Valkyrie smiled at her phone and spoke with Nadia silently for the two and a half hours it took to get them to Cassandra's house. When she got there her neck was aching from looking down so much, but she was far happier, as if she'd been rejuvenated. She said goodbye to Nadia, got out the car and stretched before following her brothers to the house.

Right as they got to the little, paved path going up to the house, the door was opened by a lady with grey hair, pale skin with many lines, wearing a grey dress. Behind that Valkyrie could see a pretty woman, and her eyes were happy and worried at once.

"Cassandra," Wolf smiled, and he and the Sensitive hugged for a moment. "I haven't seen you in a while."

"No, but you have been busy," she smiled and held a hand out to Valkyrie. "You have been raising a child. Even I've heard stories about you out here."

She smiled awkwardly. "Hi."

"Come, come in," she said, and they all went into the house. It was a warm cottage with beams and a cute little kitchen, squished sofas and weird little string dolls hanging and sitting in every imaginable place. "Would any of you like some tea?" She asked.

"Actually, we're on a mission," Wolf said when everyone else shook their heads. "I don't want to be rude, but Skulduggery and his boyfriend Solomon Wreath were captured and we need to find them."

"I am sorry to hear that," she said, standing close to them. It made Valkyrie more than uncomfortable. "Unfortunately, I don't think my vision will help you. But still, it is important, and you need to see it."

She nodded to herself and Valkyrie had her own little vision of millions of cats around the house. It would have fit the scene. Then again, the creepy dolls made up for the lack of cats.

She went down into the basement with her brothers, pushing herself against the wall firmly when Weasel and Snake did. Cassandra asked Snake to put fire under the grate, and soon it felt stiflingly hot. Cassandra opened up an umbrella and turned a valve and moments later Valkyrie had to shut her eyes against the sudden steam that filled the room.

Wolf squeezed her shoulder and she carefully opened her eyes to see the vision Cassandra was projecting.

She could see people but not a definitive place – there was Wolf, with Weasel in his arms, crouched down and shielding him protectively with his own bleeding body. Bear was there, in the distance and almost indistinguishable, holding something in his arms and running from them, away from the fight. Crow was there, shouting and telling mages, ones she recognised from the Sanctuary, where to go and what to do.

And then it felt as if they were flying and they watched as Valkyrie fought a Spider, something as big as her, throwing shadows and using a white light – and behind her was Nadia, tears on her face and holding a child that was wrapped in a big coat and facing away from them, her eyes determined and her free hand wrapped around a gun. She raised the gun to something out of view and at the same time she shot, Valkyrie was jumped on by the Spider and began screaming silently.

The vision moved to some room they didn't know where Snake stood, naked and alone, except for the millions of tiny spiders crawling up the walls, the floor and ceiling, leaving a gap around him where he stared all around him, terror in his eyes. He'd wet himself with fear and his arms were scratched horribly, his hair in bunches around him – and it didn't look like anyone was coming any time soon to save him.

The lights came on so suddenly Valkyrie tried to take a step back and her head thudded against the wall. She realised she was crying and grabbed onto Snake, pulling him into a tight hug before the other two could.

She could feel him shaking, but he still stroked her hair comfortingly as Wolf and Weasel ushered the two up the stairs, Cassandra bringing up the back. They were taken to the living room and Valkyrie dried her eyes on her sleeve and apologised to Snake for ruining his shirt, but he said he didn't mind.

Cassandra came in with a tray filled with cups of tea and they all took one gratefully. Wolf was deep in thought on the other sofa, holding Weasel's hand. She took the tea with a thank you and they all sat silently for long minutes as the drink cooled and they calmed themselves.

"Knowing the future can change it," Cassandra said with a small smile. "I've seen so many disastrous things that have been averted simply because I showed them to the ones involved. I hope you'll be able to use this knowledge to make the future a better place."

They all nodded and Wolf opened his mouth to speak when his phone went off. "Sorry," he said and answered it. "Hey, Finbar." There was some talking on the other end. "Sure, I'll get there soon. Ha, it's funny because we're actually at Cassandra's right now." Some more talking. "Finbar says hi."

"Hello Finbar," Cassandra smiled.

"She says hi too. I'll be there soon, thank you."

Weasel sighed. "Thank you for sharing with us," he said, standing up. The others did the same.

She shrugged in a way that wouldn't have been out of character of China. Only they looked drastically different. "I knew you had to see."

They said their goodbyes and left, all very happy to be driving away from that house. It wasn't Cassandra's fault the vision was what it was, but she didn't want to think that was in their futures either. She comforted herself with the fact that she and Nadia had looked a few years older in the vision, so they had perhaps two or three years to prepare and learn to fight. Plus, she'd been using magic, which was incredibly comforting.

They were quiet on the way to Finbar's, lost in thought, and as soon as they got out the car Valkyrie realised she should have spoken to Nadia and that would have put her at ease, but it was already too late. She took a deep breath, decided there was nothing she could do at that very second and put the whole mess out of her head. A problem for when they had Crow and Raven back.

Finbar let them into the shop and they went into the back and sat around his kitchen table.

"You don't look so happy," Finbar said to Valkyrie. "Naw, none of you look happy. What happened?"

"Cassandra showed us a vision," Valkyrie said. "She showed the Children of the Spider attacking us. It – it looked like war."

"It did," Wolf said quietly. "We have a few years though. We'll train, get stronger, teach you more magic."

"I think that vision showed what magic I have," Valkyrie said. "The white magic I told you about. That has to be it."

"We'll train you to be a master of it," he smiled, and she felt a world lighter already. "And we'll teach Nadia how to use a gun properly."

"Sounds like a big vision," Finbar noted. "I spoke to that dude Skulman told me too, and you were right. Paine _did_ block my visions. But it's all good now, I'm clean and clear of his magic in my head."

"That's great," Valkyrie smiled.

"Yeah, it was. I saw a vision, too, so I called you here," he said, and reached under the table and brought a map out. He spread it over the table and they held it down flat. "I had a vision of something right here."

"That's Roarhaven," Snake frowned.

"Yeah, man, it was weird to have a vision there. I saw Skulman and Val there, and they were fighting real bad, and then I woke up and thought, wow man, that was weird. They don't fight. And I went to make some tea, 'cause my nerves weren't so good after that, and I got another vision of Skulman and Wreath, that Necromancer Skul's dating."

"Where was it?" Wolf asked, sitting up.

"I'm thinking it was around here, dude," Finbar said, drawing a fairly large circle around perhaps a fifth of Ireland. "Sorry I can't be more precise. But here, I saw the room they were in too, and I drew it out."

They looked at the little sketch of Crow in a room, and Valkyrie realised it was more of a hall than a cell, and she could also see other people there, some tied up and others walking around, in a place with no windows. The only real distinguishable features were the panelled walls and a big picture.

"What's that of?" Valkyrie asked and her brothers leaned in so close all their heads were touching. It was a good job Finbar was such a good artist.

"That looks like… is that Bliss' house?" Wolf asked.

"That's definitely Bliss' house," Weasel confirmed.

"Mr Bliss has Crow and Raven captive?" Valkyrie asked. "I haven't seen him for ages, he was pretending to be dead."

"Bliss always has his own motives," Wolf said darkly. "We should go to the Elders with this one. Finbar, can we keep this?"

"Go for it dude," Finbar shrugged. "I'm just glad to be of help."

"You were, thank you," Wolf smiled, and ushered Weasel and Snake out the door. "Sorry, but we better go straight to the Sanctuary."

"That's cool, that's cool. Hey Val, you want a tattoo?" Finbar asked suddenly.

"Yes!" She grinned, and Wolf laughed and pulled her from the room.

"Year and a bit to go babe," he grinned and tickled her so she'd run for the car.


	105. Is Bliss kill-able?

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 105**

When they got to the Sanctuary, they had Valkyrie go to Tipstaff and talk to him since she was his favourite and somehow immune to Wolf's charm and Weasel's… well, she couldn't even put a name to the magic Weasel did. Perhaps that really was his magic. And the rest was just really amazing guesses.

"I'm afraid the Elders are in an international meeting at the moment," Tipstaff told her as he sorted something on his desk. It was perfectly neat and organised with the largest in-out trays Valkyrie had ever seen, each half-full and stacked just as neatly. "But, I will put in their schedule to meet with you as soon as they are out. Is that acceptable?"

She grinned. "That's great, thank you Tipstaff."

"Good," he smiled. "Now, this paperwork is a backlog I need you to read, fill out, sort and or bring it to the attention of various people. Yourself and Detective Pleasant have, obviously, been rather busy this last week and we've had a few changes brought in by Elder Deuce while you've been gone."

She sagged a little but took it. She was Co-Head of department. She had _responsibilities_. "Sure. I'll do this in the office. That's all clean, right?"

"Absolutely. You'll find additional paperwork there, but I was kind enough to ask my assistant to split it into an order of priority. This paperwork has to be before all that."

She nodded and made her leave before more work was thrown on her, going up to the office with the three Idiots. They sat around on their desks and Valkyrie found a sticky note on her desk telling her to clean it. She put the stack of paperwork on top of that.

"Can you guys clear the desks and read a few of these for me?" She asked, sitting down in the comfiest of chairs her butt had ever felt.

They agreed. The men wandered around the room, talking in low voices about Bliss' house and how to present their findings to the Elders while Valkyrie got through the paperwork. The stack Tipstaff had given her was primarily reading and signing to say she knew the new laws, essentially, so she got through that in an hour via skim reading because she herself was technically immune to some of the laws due to her position of power as well as some of it being just irrelevant to her job. She stuck her head out the room and asked someone if the Elders were done yet but apparently they weren't, so back to work for her.

"I hate reports," she whispered to herself.

"Cheer up, Cub," Weasel grinned, his feet up on his desk at the back. "You get paid for doing them."

"No I don't," she grumbled.

"Err, yes you do. You're an employee. It's a part of your job."

"No, I get paid to catch criminals, keep you on track, get Crow to shut up for more than five minutes, and look pretty," she informed him. "Reports is something I have to do because a certain dead guy decided he couldn't act like an _adult_ for more than a few hours alone."

"Same thing," he smiled.

She rolled her eyes, but in that next hour the Elder's were busy she did get through a bunch of work and got Wolf – the only one she really trusted with the job – to look through the least priority pile for what her opinion would be, since most of it was just complains, suggestions and ideas, as well as badly written memos that were so badly written or worded they didn't get a good ranking even if they were about really important stuff. Tipstaff's rule. It worked, for the most part, in getting people to communicate effectively.

"The Elders are ready for you," a lady said from the door.

Valkyrie threw her pen down and jumped out of her chair. "Thank God," she said and was still stretching all the way to the meeting room.

They didn't knock when they got there, just opened the door, closed it behind them, and sat straight down. "Detective Cain," Meritorious said, a hint of a smile on his face. "I assume this is to do with the rumours of Pleasant being taken prisoner?"

"Just about, sir," she said. "I think it would be best if I told you the full story, but I request the use of extra security considering the information I am about to tell you."

He nodded and Pa simple jammed his finger against a couple of signals on the desk to activate the wards. He nodded. "Tell us," he said shortly.

"Three days ago, as you know, we were sending out messages about a missing Shunter, so we went to visit the other Shunter in prison, which you know about, and when we returned, the missing Shunter was dead in the Dead Men's office, and Solomon Wreath was missing. Although our mission is to find what happened to the Shunter, I will be honest that we were side-tracked by Solomon's disappearance although it can be presumed that wherever Solomon is, the killer will be there also."

"Agreed," Pa nodded gruffly, crossing his arms and brow frowning deeply with thought.

"The first day we spent driving around in hopes of catching up with the suspect, but we didn't find them. The next day, Skulduggery got a tip off and we followed it. It ended up being correct," she said, her body tensing with irritation and anxiety. "The suspect was seen at the location with Solomon. However, they had already left. Unfortunately, Skulduggery forced me to go alone to get the information from a highly illegal place with incredibly disgusting practices, and I left immediately after. No arrests were made."

"Where?" Pa asked, getting a notebook out.

Wolf answered for her. “Griever’s Down. I didn’t know that was where we were until later, or I wouldn’t have allowed it. I am absolutely sure Skulduggery knew what he was sending Valkyrie into though. He forced her into it.”

All of the Elder's lips thinned and a vain in Pa's jaw throbbed. "Right. Continue."

"Myself, Dexter, Saracen and Erskine picked up the investigation this morning. We checked out the place I was told about, The Old Mill, but there was no one there. I've got evidence for analysis on who might be there, but I'm not hopeful. Then we went to Cassandra's on an unrelated visit, but important for another meeting, and then to Finbar's where we got the information we need to talk to you about."

Meritorious nodded. "Before we get to that, am I to believe Skulduggery didn't talk to any of you before being captured?"

"Yes," Weasel said. "We called him, but either he ignored us or was captured immediately after Valkyrie and Dexter left. We know for certain Skul and Solomon were kept at The Old Mill, so we assume he went there alone and got captured when he was overpowered."

Pa scoffed. "Stupid boy. Valkyrie, what did Wrong say?"

"He had a vision of Skulduggery and Solomon," she said. "At Mr Bliss' home."

The three sat up a little straighter and the alarm immediately set into their postures. "You are certain?" Meritorious asked.

Wolf got out the picture Finbar drew. "This is a drawing of the vision."

The Elders looked at it. "That's it, alright," Pa nodded. "Can't forget it. And it's not the first time Bliss worked with those defying the Sanctuary, or the Dead Men for that matter."

"He blew up the Sanctuary a few years ago," Valkyrie said. " _And_ tried to kill Skulduggery."

Elder Crow and Meritorious looked at each other, their eyes moving. They spoke in a way only those that had known each other for centuries possibly could. "Can we risk sending the Dead Men in?" Elder Crow asked warily.

Valkyrie sat up carefully and they looked at her. "As it is, we have us four here and Anton. Honestly, from what I know, the only thing we have strong enough to kill Bliss, if it came to it, is Anton's gist."

"He's used it against him before," Wolf said darkly. "He's too fast for the gist, and the vision shows dozens of people. Anton won't risk hurting an innocent person."

"What _would_ kill Bliss?" Valkyrie asked.

The lot of them thought about it. "The problem isn't killing Bliss," Pa said after a moment's contemplation. "It's how to hold him down long enough to do it. Bliss has been thrown straight through walls and stood up. He can run through armies without getting hurt. But if we get him still for a long enough time, we could do something about it."

"He'll run at the first sight of trouble," Wolf said.

"Wouldn't he fight? He's stronger than us," Valkyrie said.

"You'd think," Pa said, resting his arms on the table and leaning in. "But he knows his weaknesses. We don't, but he's human, for one, and he's shown his hand enough for us to have an idea of what could hurt him."

Valkyrie tutted. "Tanith will wish she could join in."

Pa smiled. "She's a hell of a fighter. It is a pity she can't help, but what can you do? Our main objective is to secure the place, which means dealing with the criminals. I'll leave that to you I suppose."

"Yes, let's," Meritorious said drily, standing up. The others did too, and he looked directly at Valkyrie. "I give you permission to use all means possible to stop Bliss and anyone he is working with, assuming he is guilty. But make it clear, this is not a Search and Destroy. This is a Sanctuary mission within the bounds of the law."

She nodded. "I understand, Grand Mage."

A twinkle entered his eye. "Good luck, Detective Cain," he said and went to leave the room from a back door before stopping and turning to her. "And congratulations on getting your girlfriend back."

She grinned and was sure he was laughing as he left. Corrival was, and Elder Crow was certainly amused.

Wolf wrapped an arm around her shoulders and led her from the room, the other two on their heels. "You know what this means, right?" He asked.

"We can go home, sleep, and start in the morning?" She asked.

"Exactly! And tomorrow, we go to China," he smiled, kissing her forehead. "I've no doubt she has some ideas on killing her brother."


	106. He needs some milk!

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 106**

"Dexter," China smiled when she saw them. "And Valkyrie, what a pleasure to see you both."

"I like your dress," Valkyrie replied. It was a black suit dress that stopped at the knee and had a slit up one leg. China also wore four-inch deadly looking heels that put her level with Valkyrie. It would have got her heart going, except she'd seen China in many outfits on many occasions and had become almost as immune to her powers as her brothers, although they had given in to China willingly in the past. It was easy to see why someone would willingly allow themselves to fall to their knees for China. She’d had a dream of it once.

"Thank you, Valkyrie," she said, a bit of playful flirt in her voice. "I'm glad you like it. Come, let us talk in the apartment. I know what you're after."

Valkyrie and Wolf smirked at each other and followed the woman. Valkyrie admired it for a moment before sitting with Wolf across from China.

"Have you heard anything about the ones that captured Skulduggery and Solomon?" Wolf asked.

She nodded once, slowly. "I've heard a lot." She spoke seriously. "I will tell you what you don't know first. You're dealing with mercenaries. A group most commonly called the Wild Brothers."

"Never heard of them," Wolf confirmed.

"I know. They're led by a man called Pippin Black. He started the group about a century ago with a handful of men and boys doing small jobs and heists, but in the last thirty years they've been picking up speed, so to speak," China told them, moving a pen ever so slightly. "But they haven't done anything of this level before. To take on the Dead Men, within the Sanctuary, and capture Skulduggery himself? I can only assume Skulduggery is blinded by love."

Valkyrie grunted and nodded. "Who’s their employer?"

"I don't know," she frowned. "There are many mages that would like to hurt the Dead Men, Necromancers and Skulduggery in particular, so you have a lot of suspects. Or there's the chance they’re doing it for the personal gain. Reputation."

"Do you know where they are right now?" Valkyrie asked.

"I heard they travelled to The Old Mill," she nodded, giving Valkyrie a look that said she knew everything that happened before that also. She nearly blushed, but China's serious look gave her hope she wouldn't let the cat out the bag. China was particularly fond of Valkyrie, so she doubted the lady would _want_ to out it. "I also heard a rival mercenary group attacked them."

"Who?" Wolf asked quickly.

"Patience," she laughed softly. "I do not remember; they were an insignificant group of up starters. Regardless, they never came back. I heard the Wild Brother's travelled south from there."

"To your brothers’ home," Valkyrie told her.

China raised an eyebrow. "Is that right?"

"We've been given permission to kill Bliss if we have proof he's on their side," Wolf said, an edge to his voice, some warning, some hardness.

She shrugged lightly. "If you can, you should. I haven't seen him since he tried convincing me to join him in serving Serpine."

"We were actually wondering if you had any ideas on how to kill him," Valkyrie revealed.

She smiled again. "Advice? I can certainly tell you his quirks, but they wouldn't help you kill him."

"We think we have a way," Wolf told her, sitting forwards. "But we need your help."

"You want me to help kill my brother?"

"You've tried before. He's tried to kill you too. I'm bagging on you wanting to win your little competition."

She laughed and it sounded like little bells. "I always win, Dexter. Perhaps if you tell me what your plan is, I might be convinced."

**.*****.**

Valkyrie, Wolf, Snake, Weasel, Bear, thirty Cleavers, China, China's two bodyguard's and seven Sanctuary members were driven to Bliss' house in unmarked vans at different times and from different places. They stopped by the outside wall and just China got out, going straight to the wall and putting her hand on it. A signal flashed on the back of her fingers and a moment later a section of wall lowered and the vans went through without stopping.

Perfectly timed.

China jumped back into the van Valkyrie was in and they followed the fleet of vans down to the house. Valkyrie caught a look at it between the driver's neck and headrest, seeing that it wasn't a grand mansion or castle, but an old estate house must have had five beds and once been grand but had been left to get dirty bricks, allowed to have ivy grow all over it, encouraged the weeds to grow high. It only needed a clean up to be pretty.

"He likes to keep up appearances," China said dryly, looking at it also.

"You're sure you know the wards?" Wolf asked once more.

"I do," she said, gently moving a piece of hair from her eyes as they came to a violent stop.

The doors at the back opened wide and they all ran out, Valkyrie holding her large gun safely and ready, running with Wolf and the bodyguards to keep China safe. They went to the front door and China merely needed to press her hand to it for a series of locks to open and she turned the handle into her childhood home.

The Cleavers jumped in front of them after that, leading them around the house. As soon as they were in the entrance hall she could hear shouts and they followed them at a jog to a room that had been stripped bare except for the tapestry on the wall. At the far end was prisoners, tied up, gagged, on their knees – one of the Wild Brother's raised her gun to the back of a prisoners head, and Valkyrie and Wolf shot at the same time, killing the mercenary.

The Cleaver's ran at the charging killers, taking them down with ease while the Sanctuary workers followed to secure the prisoners and arrest any mercenaries that might surrender.

"There's more in the other room!" Weasel boomed and half the Cleaver's and Sanctuary members split, and they all followed Weasel to the next room further into the house.

They'd had more time to prepare, so they flattened themselves against the wall and waited for Weasel's signal. He held up a hand and flashed that there were eight mercenaries and signalled there were guns. Bear and Wolf nodded to each other and kicked down the door with their guns forward, immediately shooting down mercenaries before ducking out the way as bullets flew down the corridor.

China stepped forward when the bullets stopped and pulled a shield around herself, stepping into the room. With just a few taps of her skin, she sent beams of light into the mercenaries that could bring themselves to kill the gorgeous woman, killing most of them.

The Cleavers and Sanctuary workers took over once more. Keeping to the plan. Efficient.

 _Where_ was Bliss?

Without stopping, they followed Weasel again around to the front of the house and up the stairs and stopped still. Valkyrie pointed her gun down a hallway and Wolf did the same down another, Weasel looked down the stairs warily and China dropped to the floor to begin her work. It was tense, listening to gunfire and shouts, the pleas for help from prisoners while she just stood there still. She felt sweat drip down her back.

"Are you done?" She called.

"Not quite," China said behind her, working on her knees. "I need three minutes."

"We don't have that long," Weasel shouted. "He's coming. I don't know where from!"

Valkyrie gripped her gun tighter. Bliss was strong enough to kill her with a single finger in less than a second. He could easily rush her. She needed to be ready. Her brothers didn't move, except for Wolf calling Weasel useless.

"There!" Bear roared and they all turned and pointed their guns at Bliss.

"Dead Men," he said calmly, stepping slowly towards them. She almost couldn't hear his soft voice over the noise below. "Sister."

China didn't answer, just worked, so Wolf filled in. "If you give yourself up, we'll let you live!"

"I've already pledged my life," Bliss informed them, his face not moving.

"You're working for someone else. Who?" Weasel asked. Valkyrie moved her gun slightly so it stayed trained on the slowly moving man as he came down the hall. At his speed, if he didn't charge, they had thirty seconds. China needed more time.

"The Spiders," he said.

"The Children of the Spider?!" Wolf roared. "Why would you align yourself with them? You've never been interested in them before!"

"I have not," he said just as softly, not being tempted by Wolf's anger. "But when they came to me with an offer, I could not refuse."

"What was that?" Valkyrie asked him quickly when his hand twitched slightly. He was an Adept, the Enhancement branch, meaning his magic made him physically strong with traces of Bonebreaker and Kineticist. She needed to be on her guard, but even with enhanced physical strength, he was human. No matter what.

"They offered a place in the new Kingdom of Spider's," he told them. "When The Torment and Council of Spider's rule, I will have a portion of land for myself. They will not attack anyone there."

"Why would you agree to that? They'll betray you in a second, and you know we'll stop them!" Wolf shouted at him.

Bliss shook his bored looking face. "They also offered China protection. So long as I help, they will give us a place of peace and security where myself and my sister can live."

"China won't follow you," Valkyrie said before the others could. "She won't have to."

"Valkyrie Cain," he said, stopping about ten metres away from them. Her gun was trained on his throat. "You are called the face of a generation. A future ruler of our society. I want to offer you a place in the new Kingdom. Do you want to live? Or will you try to kill me?"

Valkyrie shot.

He moved so fast Valkyrie didn't see him do it, but the others opened fire, spraying bullets in every direction to keep him back, Valkyrie joining in and trying to get any type of hit on the man.

He ducked behind an antique chest of drawers and they gave him a relief, which he took, and they opened fire again. The bullets really had no effect on Bliss, and he somehow ran through them and right at the Dead Men. He tackled Wolf before any of them realised he was close and Valkyrie sucked in a breath and turned. Snake didn't waste time using the air to separate the two and slide Wolf's unconscious body across the floor.

Bliss looked at China, but she kept working on the last of the signal.

"Sister," he said. "You're trying to trap me, but it's already too late. Even if you recover Skulduggery Pleasant and the Necromancer, The Spiders will kill you. If you want to live, you must join me."

China made one last dot on her work, stood, and looked at him. They were on opposite sides of the big signal and the others watched nervously. Valkyrie ground her teeth. "Brother," she said with that little smile. "I'm afraid I've already made my decision. I stand for myself, by myself, wherever I please. Though I could stand with you, I will not. The Dead Men make better company than a manipulative drone covered in spiders."

She tapped her shoe against the massive signal and it glowed impressively, drawing in Bliss. An old vial of blood China had kept specifically for this moment, absorbed into her signal equipment.

Bliss said nothing, and his face didn't change from his stoical, bored look, but he certainly moved his body. He turned on the Dead Men and they opened fire, Valkyrie's arm burning with the effort it took to use the gun, trying to slam bullets into him and force him into the bubble that had formed around the signal, the deadly aura made just for Bliss.

Snake ran out of ammunition and used the air to push Bliss back but whatever trick he used with the bullets applied to the air now, and he shimmered through the magic, barrelling into Snake and slamming him against the wall. Weasel shouted and Bear ducked, missing having his head crushed, but Bliss used that fist's momentum to jump over Bear and came at Weasel instead.

Valkyrie opened fire with Bear and Weasel and one of them scraped Bliss' skin, barely more than a graze with a tiny piece of blood, but it was something. The victory hardly lasted. Weasel was grabbed by the throat and throw over the signal, over China and down the full flight of stairs to land at the open front door. Who knew if he was alive, but Cleaver's saw and she heard them coming even with the fight raging downstairs.

That second she spent looking at Weasel was a wasted one. Bliss stared at Bear, the only one other than China he considered a threat, and Valkyrie knew they only had one chance. Her eyes hardened and she looked at China, who was crouched and nodded to her. She glanced at Bear and knew he was ready too. She tapped her foot once and they struck –

Bear let his gist out and Valkyrie rained bullets, pushing the man back while China used more signals to pull him in and the bodyguards used their Elemental magic to push him back with fire and air.

He took a step back.

He grabbed the gist.

Bear screamed, a bloodcurdling, agonising scream that made Valkyrie's knees so wobbly and head so weak she stopped shooting. She couldn't even breath from fear as Bliss looked at the gist and held his arm out as if offering the bodyguard to the gist. Of course, the gist only wanted to kill so when it saw the bodyguard it jumped and killed him and when it tried to go to China, Bliss grabbed the trail going to Bear and yanked it back and pointed at the other bodyguard, who was promptly killed.

The gun slipped from Valkyrie's fingers and she watched with morbid fascination, absolute horror and fear. Bear must have passed out because the gist came reeling back, using its claws and mouth to try and stick around but there was nothing it could do – except cause Bear as much damage as possible before it was gone.

She started at Bear with an open mouth for a long moment and took a deep breath to keep the panic back. _There's no time for that_ , she told herself, and looked at the enemy. The signal bubble had grown so that the only way down the stairs was to go through it. They didn't trust Bliss not to jump and come around. But they also trusted Bliss wouldn't kill his sister. That left Bliss and Valkyrie on the same side, but he didn't care a whole bunch about Valkyrie being with him. She had no bullets. She was shaking like a leaf. What threat was she? He didn't even know she had no usable magic.

China was standing on the other side, looking at her brother as if there wasn't a ball of death between them. "What's your plan? To live in this house alone and never leave?"

"I will be of service to the masters. You should live here safely. I made a bargain and they know they can't risk me betraying them."

"Then why not kill them?" China asked. "Surely you're finished being controlled."

"I merely wish to live," he said, his tone level and even. "You have never picked a losing side before."

China observed him for a long moment, long enough for Cleaver's to come and back her. "This may surprise you, brother, but I made a decision two years ago to make a change. A promise to myself I would always be free. Free or die trying."

"You will sacrifice yourself for freedom?" Bliss asked.

"No. I will die trying to get my own freedom. I will kill, destroy and manipulate whoever I need to, but if a time comes where I am alone, facing an enemy… I would rather die than lie down and have a master."

Bliss observed her, and then nodded. Valkyrie took a deep breath and watched the siblings, her strength coming back. Standing tall, she watched as China pressed signals on her arms and legs, covering her in dim blue light and step into the bubble.

That was not a part of the plan.

She wasn't sure what China's plan had been, walking into a signal she created to _kill_ people, but she had done it and now she writhed in pain. Valkyrie shouted China's name and stumbled forward next to Bliss and fell to her knees, watching China begin to scream as the blood she shared with Bliss began boiling and destroying her own.

"What are you doing?" Valkyrie shouted as China began to shake violently.

Valkyrie took a deep breath. She had no idea how this worked, or what to do, and the one thing that came to her fearful and panicked mind was simply to do something – so she reached her hand in.

It felt as if she was being sucked into the bubble the moment her skin made contact, and there was nothing her brain could imagine other than stepping in, so she jumped straight into the bubble. She could feel pain, something that made her break into a cold sweat, but it didn't hurt like whatever made China scream, and she used her strength to grab China and try to push her out.

And realised there was no out.

She held the woman who was now spasming and burning hot to the touch, and looked at the Cleavers. Nothing they could do. Her family was sprawled around, possibly dead, there was nothing she could do, she was all alone and beginning to feel really sick.

Someone grabbed her shoulder and she shrieked. Bliss grabbed China by the shirt and threw her out the bubble with a great force and she hit the stairs. Valkyrie looked at Bliss, noting the sweat on his brow and noticed how much he was shaking.

He fell to one knee. He grunted in pain. He squeezed Valkyrie's shoulder so tightly the bones were crushed in his fist, and she screamed out now, screamed so loudly her voice cracked and wavered. She fell to the floor and felt her vision come and go, saw Bliss staring at her, and then him looking red as he boiled, then his head slumped, then him shaking, and then she was looking at him from the floor and watched as a small trickle of her blood touched the signal.

She shrieked.

There was no pain like what she was in – god, her crushed shoulder felt less than a paper cut to the agony she felt, and she couldn't even breath after she screamed, just immediately began to shake and froth and clenched her fists and –

She felt herself leave the bubble and got a look at China's face, a single tear on her beautiful skin, before she passed out.


	107. We'll hunt tonight

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 107**

Valkyrie took a gasping breath and her eyes flew open. China was kneeling above her, a hand on Valkyrie's face, and it took a bewildering moment for everything to come back to her. She gasped and sat up, patting down her body wildly. She wasn't in pain! She looked at China.

"Silly girl," China said weakly, a smile on her face. "I knew what I was doing."

"I panicked," Valkyrie whispered. "I didn't know what to do."

China stood slowly and Valkyrie did too. "Go. The fighting has stopped downstairs. It took a few minutes to get you awake."

"Thank you," Valkyrie said.

China put a hand on Valkyrie's cheek fondly. "Just promise me you'll visit so we can have a chat again. I do enjoy it."

"Promise!" Valkyrie said and ran down the stairs. It was like she'd been packed full of adrenalin, which probably was the case. "Crow! Raven!" She called.

She ran straight for the hall with the tapestry on the wall, remembering it from the drawing, and looked around. The Cleaver's were guarding a few of the Wild Brother's who were all brutally cut up and in cuffs on the floor bleeding out while the Sanctuary got themselves together for transportation. She looked around at the prisoners and around at the staff moving between then, but when she looked took a deep breath and actually took it all in, she could see the window was broken and a few people missing.

"Where's Solomon and Skulduggery?" She asked, addressing the crowd of detectives. "They are here, right?"

The detectives looked between themselves and one of them stepped forwards, Detective Sickle, the one that had been mad she opened the Puzzle box. "Hey, kid," he started off, making her glare at him, "look, there's some bad news. Some of the Wild Brother's were able to get away in the fight through that window."

Valkyrie nodded once. "And they were able to take two prisoners with them, is that what you're trying to say?"

He hesitated.

"They took the two prisoners we were actually trying to retrieve. So we failed the mission," Valkyrie said, her eyes hardening over the group of Sanctuary workers. "We _failed_!"

They looked down or away from her like little children, but Valkyrie didn't have it in her to be mad. She was quickly becoming slower and more tired the more she moved. She turned to two Cleaver's that weren't busy. "Saracen had a nasty fall, he's by the front entrance, and then Anton was second most hurt. The other's need help too."

They took that as it was meant and went to go find her brother's. She rubbed her forehead before turning back to the detectives to take charge.

.*****.

"It went awfully," Valkyrie said, rubbing her eyes and sitting back in the chair in Corrival's office.

"We have some of the Wild Brothers," Pa said, both comfortingly and gruffly. "At the least, we know more about the Spider's plans. To take Bliss out of it is good for us."

"Not as good as him on our side. Plus we only know the basic big plan. Not what they're going to do to get to that point."

"No, but that's war, and what the Spiders are looking for is war," Pa said, then took a mouthful of cake. "You took charge well from what I heard."

"I did what you taught me," she said, a little softer. "With my brother's down it wasn't like I had a choice, but I was surprised the other detectives listened. They tend not to at the Sanctuary."

"They'll learn," Pa shrugged. "I think that just about sums up your report."

"Good," Valkyrie said and got out of the chair. "I've set some Sensitives on the Wild Brother's since the last time the Spider's had anyone here, they busted them out. I want information immediately. I've already spoken to the other prisoners, but they were all mercenaries and other people that hate the Wild Brother's. Just lucky to find them and unfortunate to get captured. We'll put them away for unrelated crimes, I bet."

Pa grunted. "I'll offer them better sentences if they can tell us anything overheard."

"They'll tell you anything," Valkyrie sighed, before saying her goodbye and heading out.

She had to take the bus over to Kenspeckle's as she hadn't dared tell Panda in case he told an already sick Tanith, so it was almost forty-five minutes later she arrived at the hospital. She jogged up the stairs and when she didn't see anyone in the foyer, she went through to the ward at the back. Sure enough, all her brother's except Bear were in there.

"Hey," she said, sitting in her usual bed with a sigh. Civet was there serving food to keep the men's energy up. "How are you doing?"

"Not so hot," Wolf said with a little tension in his voice. He was topless and his whole chest was covered in mud to help heal his broken ribs. "Saracen just out of surgery."

"You okay Weasel?" She asked.

He grunted.

"I'm glad." She took a moment to yawn and then rested her chin on her knuckles. "Solomon and Skulduggery were taken by the Wild Brother's. Apparently the ones we got are like an outer circle group they use for smaller missions, while the inner group of the Wild Brother's run things. Whoever got Solomon the first time, whoever killed Signate, is in the inner circle – if it was even the Wild Brother's responsible for _all_ of what happened and not just some of it, which we don't even know. We need to try again, but I think this time it'll be smaller. They'll have less people, no Bliss, no backup."

"Unless they go to The Torment," Snake said from his bed. His eyes were closed and he was sweating from the pain of his injuries.

"Unless that, yes, but there honestly isn't much we can do about that. Especially when you're down," she said, downcast. "I have Sensitive's with the rest of the Wild Brother's while I visit you. They'll call me."

"Good job Cub," Wolf said, grimacing. "We'll find Skul and Solomon. Just as soon as we're out of these beds."

"I hope so," she yawned.

"Valkyrie," Civet said, a little smile on his face. "Perhaps you should stay and get some sleep. I'd be happy to watch your phone in case you get a call."

She smiled back and sagged a little with relief. "Thanks." She let him move some pillows for her and she lay back on the bed, kicking off her shoes. "Love you guys," she said tiredly, and they told her the same back.

.*****.

**_Craven's POV_ **

Craven looked into the room, his back straight and face blank, watching Skulduggery Pleasant and former Cleric Wreath sit closely in the cell. They couldn't see him through the one way shield around their solid iron cage, but he could see them as Pleasant ran his fingers through Wreath's shoulder length hair and worked out the knots and spoke soft words in his former colleague's ear.

He sneered at them. He had always known Wreath was erratic, irrational and quirky, to put it nicely, but he had never expected him to fall to the likes of Skulduggery Pleasant. It was sickening. Still, he was pleased to see how weak Wreath looked after just six days of being prisoner. Stolen had done a good job – Craven had heard the news by now of how Stolen had completed his mission of killing the Shunter as The Torment assigned, and had then dropped the body off within the Sanctuary and taken Wreath with him in the process.

Craven respected the man, even though he wasn't a Necromancer. One day soon, that would be a high honour.

He drew himself higher and turned his back on the disgusting lovebirds and went up to the higher levels of the new safehouse. Wherever The Torment had taken them, and Craven didn't know, it was so off grid there was no hope for the Dead Men and their little girl toy Cain to find them. Or, that's what Craven hoped was the case. He had to trust The Torment. Opening the large double doors, he strolled straight into the high courtroom and sauntered over to his seat with eyes watching him from every corner.

Spiders, in human form, spider form and the normal ones of all species the human one's created looked down on him. He'd become used to their gaze. The Torment sat as leader on his thrown, two younger Spider's sitting near him in hopes of becoming Queen. Craven doubted that. From what little he'd been told about The Torment from the other Spider's, The Torment held high the old traditions of having a 'mate' and never another once that 'mate' died. Not only that, but The Torment was utterly insane. He held it in better around the other Children of the Spider, but alone… even Craven didn't want to think of what The Torment might do to those young Spider's.

The hall waited in silence, other than the clicks of the larger spiders, and when the final mages had entered and taken their seats, The Torment began.

"Our numbers are growing," he said in a voice so quiet even the real spiders stopped clicking to listen. "Children of the Spider from around the world are gathering in Ireland, to us. Our numbers have grown by thirty adults in the last month. Five young ones are now able to complete their transformation. We have the numbers to attack."

The Spider's cheered and Craven watched as The Torment smiled around the hall. A moment later, he lifted a hand and the hall silenced.

"Our plan, then, yes, we must talk about the _plans_. Our goal is still to destroy our opposition. Stolen, our dear friend, has helped us _tremendously_. We hold Skulduggery Pleasant and his lover, a Necromancer, below our very feet. Of course, the mercenaries have helped us also in keeping the Dead Men busy, though we did lose Bliss in the fight. No matter, Bliss was merely something to show off. A full day has gone by since the attack of the Dead Men on Bliss' home. The Dead Men are healing, leaving the Sanctuary wide open."

Craven began to smile.

"Tonight, we will send an attack. But, it must be subtle. Merely a _distraction_ ," The Torment said, gaining disappointed muttering around the room. Still, The Torment smiled in that strange way of his and held his hand up once more. "Hush now, Children. I promise we will all get our chance for revenge in time. There are so many plans, so much revenge waiting for you all. But we must weaken the Sanctuary first. While you wait, you must train, grow, learn, ready yourself for the inevitable fight."

The Spider's nodded and with the barest nod, the room stood and made its way out. Craven stood after a moment, the only mage in attendance. He'd been warned not to come to the meetings, but as the Necromancer King, a peer of their own leader, he had a right to meetings. Even when they were short and not strictly necessary.

Moving quickly, he stalked past the Spider's and went to his chambers to think things over. He had to think of a suitable way to deal with Wreath. Mostly he wanted to harm Pleasant because that would please The Torment, but he also wanted to punish Wreath.

He sat at his desk to think, picking up a pen to write down his ideas. He had just as many ideas as The Torment had plans, starting with torture, ending in death, but most of all they all led to teaching the Spider's around him he was a force they needed to look up to the same way they looked up to The Torment.

There was barely twenty minutes between him taking a seat and the knock on his door. He considered ignoring it, but then considered his fear of the Spider's, and decided slighting them might not be the thing to do. He put on a glare and opened the door.

A girl, barely ten years old, looked up at him in a way Craven knew held no love or admiration. "The Torment summons you," the little girl said, and walked away.

He sighed under his breath. Little girls and boys would respect him one day. Ask how they could serve him and he'd send them on silly errands just for the point of using them.

He smiled to himself and took the short walk back to the meeting hall.

There was The Torment, a few of the Spider's Craven had not learnt names for, the assassin Stolen, and the Sensitive Paine. Craven strode to take a seat opposite The Torment and looked at him like an equal. The Torment shared that view, he had told Craven himself that they were equals. "What is it you called me for, Master Torment?" Craven smirked.

"My plans for tonight's attack," The Torment started, his voice getting higher pitched as his laughs took over. "We will _use_ the skeleton! Have him kill his friends to save his lover!"


	108. "Boom!" - Professor McGonagall

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 108**

Valkyrie tried not to fidget and attempted to concentrate on the meeting she was in with some of her brother’s, the detectives from her failed mission and Corrival. Corrival was heading the meeting and trying to tell them pointers on the Spider's, war, getting prisoners, and some other incredibly important stuff she really needed to listen to.

But she had a feeling, that gut feeling that told her something was going to happen, and it was really distracting her.

She waited because Pa had another meeting and was wrapping this one up. Painful minutes went by as Valkyrie focused just on the feeling, trying to work it out, but luckily enough Pa sent the others on their way with no more than a wave and they shuffled from the room quickly. Wolf grunted, moving his body into a strange position that seemed to be the only one that was comfortable for his ribs, and the others were more than worse for wear.

"Something's happening," she said quietly, and they looked at her silently. "I don't know what, but it's not a good feeling."

Pa nodded. "You've always had good gut instincts Cub," he said. "I have to get going, but this would be a good time to use those Co-Head powers and take action yourself. You're more than capable."

"What if I'm wrong?" She asked, standing.

He shrugged. "People think you're ridiculous. But they already think that about all of us, so I wouldn't worry." He left the room, shooting her a small smile. In his eyes, though, she could see the hard preparedness in there. He believed her. Maybe he felt it.

She looked at her brothers. "The most secure place in this building is the ballroom. Go there."

"Cub, we're injured, not incapable," Wolf said. "We're helping."

"Maybe if Weasel was here, but he's still out. So no. Get safe, I'll get the wards up, round people up, do a search, find nothing and come for you. Okay?"

"No can do," he said, got up, made a whining sound and fell back in a very tense, uncomfortable way. "Oh God," he muttered.

"Yeah, exactly. Get to the ballroom," she told him and kissed Bear's cheek goodbye on her way out.

**.*****.**

**_Craven's POV_ **

The skeleton walked fast, so fast Craven was jogging to keep up with him. Stolen, the assassin, walked just fine behind him, bring up the back in a very stalkerish way that made Craven uncomfortable.

"How much further?" Stolen whispered harshly. He had an accent, perhaps Nigerian, but Craven hadn't asked. The more he thought about the man, the more he felt sick. He'd be glad to get out of this tunnel.

"It's right here," Pleasant said in a flat, dead voice. In Pleasant's hand was a suitcase The Torment had Wild Brother's make specifically for this plan. Pleasant stopped and Craven nearly went into the back end of him before pulling himself to a grinding halt.

"Come on then," Craven harshly said, giving Pleasant no time to do anything. He still needed to make sure he knew who was in charge here!

Pleasant said nothing, but he did carefully open a grate to look out into the Sanctuary. Craven stretched to see too but Pleasant's shoulders were in the way, but it didn't truly matter because a moment later, he opened the section of wall and the three of them made their way out. They stood quietly behind a stack of boxes and Craven looked at Stolen as he got out his crude, handmade and incredibly enhanced Cloaking Sphere. He turned it, pressed the half together and it stayed there, no clicking, no sounds. They were invisible. They were in. Craven grinned.

All he had to do now was make sure things ran smoothly. "Let's move," he said commandingly, and Pleasant broke out of whatever stupor he was in and led them through the Sanctuary, past the Cleaver's, the busybodies, the paper pushers and young assistant's, moving quickly through the place until Pleasant stopped moving altogether.

Craven glared at him. "What are you waiting for, imbecile?" Pleasant did nothing and Craven wrapped shadows around the skeleton's neck. "Do you want me to kill Wreath? The only thing stopping me is your usefulness, and if you think you'd rather stop now, I'll be happy to oblige."

Pleasant tilted his head, the shadows having no effect so long as he didn't crush his vertebra. "They know we're here."

Craven dropped the shadow's and looked around. "How?" He asked quickly.

"The Cleaver's aren't where they usually are. They're on alert. Everyone's moving, patrolling, the worker's getting to safer places to continue while they wait for an actual attack."

"How could they know?" Craven spat. "You must have told them."

Pleasant moved his head so slowly it unnerved Craven all by itself. "I haven't had a chance to do that. If they knew I was here, they would have just evacuated the building and attacked us. No questions asked. I know too much about the Sanctuary for them not to worry considering I'm at The Torment's mercy."

Craven could see the reason in that, unfortunately, but didn't want to look stupid, so he didn't stop glaring suspiciously. "I'm watching you," he warned. "Get moving. Faster this time."

The skeleton looked away and kept walking, going down staircases and taking detours around whole sections of the Sanctuary to avoid mages, and when he got to the room he wanted, he turned to them.

"When I open this door, a wire will trip," he told them. "I'll set the bomb. I can't guarantee a way out."

"What?!" Craven shouted. Pleasant looked at him with his bony face. "What do you mean you can't get us out? What are we going to do?"

Pleasant shrugged. "I was told to set it off. Nothing else."

"I must complete my mission," Stolen said, and turned away.

"Wait!" Craven shouted, but Stolen left them there, taking the Cloaking Sphere with him. He felt himself go pale and turned back to Pleasant. "Quick! Before there's no time to escape!"

Pleasant got on his knees and began unpicking the lock, taking all the damn time in the world and not caring in the slightest that they were vulnerable.

This had to be Pleasant's plan. If they saw them, they could attack and stop the bomb. He nodded to himself, comforted by his ability to shadow walk away if things got sketchy. The Torment wouldn't be happy with him though. He needed this to go well.

The door made a click and as soon as Pleasant put a hand on the handle a high pitched, incredibly loud alarm began to warble. It got Craven's heart jumping like crazy as his fear set in. He was a King, he didn't fight! He was meant to have people for that, and the only person likely of killing for him had run off to do his own mission, leaving him with a skeleton he didn't trust! Pleasant backed out of the now bomb-armed room and closed the door, and though Craven wondered what the point in that was, there was no time. He could hear Cleavers in the distance.

"We'll go through a window!" Craven hissed, taking off after Pleasant when he began running.

"No," Pleasant told him, barely audible. "We go through the front door. They know we're here, so the windows will electrocute us."

Craven was going to say something, but Pleasant ducked out of sight so he did also. He could just leave, but he needed to stay with Pleasant. Pleasant had the detonator, and if he didn't detonate the bomb, Craven had to get it and do it himself. It risked death, but The Torment hadn't been subtle in his threats, and Craven believed him. It's what he'd expect of his own people.

He cursed himself and started off after Pleasant again when the Cleaver's had run past them.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

"Who was it?" She asked harshly into the walky-talky, trying to communicate with the Cleavers. So far she'd had no response, but she knew they could tell her. She growled in frustration and glared at the monitor, looking carefully for any movement that shouldn't be there. So many people were moving from the high alert it was hard to tell.

"Wait," she said. "Flick that back."

The man at the desk went back to the previous camera that looked to the front of the Receptacle. There were two Cleaver's, but something about them looked off. She picked up her walky-talky again. "I need a unit to take a look at the Receptacle doors."

It took a moment, but two Cleaver's ran to the doors and stood for a moment looking at the odd Cleaver's. "Cleaver's on the door, stand down," she said. There was no movement at all. "Cleaver's on the Receptacle door, stand down!" Nothing again. "Unit, move the Receptacle door Cleaver's."

They moved but could not get a grip of the Cleavers. Valkyrie's heart jumped.

" _Full lockdown_!" She shouted into the room, and the staff jumped out of their seats and started pressing buttons and slamming things shut. "Those Cleaver's are holograms!" Into her walky-talky, she said, "All unit's to the Receptacle. I repeat, all unit's to the Receptacle, this is a code black."

In the monitor she could see the Cleaver's running and the wards coming up, one by one, closing doors, activating pressure pads, setting off alarms. Worker's ran for the ballroom where she could see her brother's sitting in, looking worried but too injured to do anything still. Even Bear, the one she relied on to be strong even when he wasn't, was sitting hunched and in pain.

She took a deep breath. She knew there wouldn't be an attack on its own. She had to be prepared. She had to be ready for anything. While the Cleaver's went to the main attack, she had to be elsewhere. Ready for the real thing.

She went to keep watch out the front.

**.*****.**

**_Craven's POV_ **

Craven's heart jumped when he saw the front entrance, almost keeping pace with the skeleton as they made their getaway run out the door and he jumped right over the steps, panicked, and used his shadows to get down safely. Pleasant used the air, jumped himself and shot like a bullet away from the building. Craven had to shadow walk a distance to catch up to the skeleton, and for a moment, thought he'd just keep using the air to get away.

When he stopped, Craven glared at him for making him run so hard, but mostly he was wishing the mission were over. "Do it!" He snarled, glancing at the Sanctuary. Wards were going up like no one's business, which was bad news. "Now!"

Pleasant reached into his torn-up jacket and got out the detonator, looked at it in his hand, and turned to the Sanctuary. Craven clenched his fists.

"If you don't hurry up, I might kill Wreath anyway," he growled.

"The assassin hasn't left," Pleasant said.

"Who cares? He knew the mission," Craven said, quite happy for that creepy man to be dead and gone. "Do it before they see us!"

Pleasant removed the lid from the little, red button. He looked at it.

"Skeleton, if you're having second thoughts now..." Craven warned.

Pleasant put his hand over the device, ready to detonate, and Craven got his shadow's ready to shield from the debris. They looked at the Sanctuary.

Valkyrie Cain ran to the front door.

She shouted in the distance and dived behind the door.

"It's too late," Pleasant said quietly, and they both saw her body fly back even from how far away they were and begin to convulse. All the wards started to shatter away.

"See, Stolen's done _his_ job," Craven said. "Now do yours or I'll take it from you."

Pleasant looked at the Sanctuary, and with the smallest of movement's, replaced the lid.

Craven growled and dived for the detonator, but Pleasant ducked out of his way. He already knew he had no hope in a brawl, so Craven used his shadows in one swift move and wrapped them securely around the skeleton and squeezed, hearing the man scream and scream from within. He didn't have long enough to play with him, though he really wanted to give him a lesson, so he let the mage fall to the floor. Even with his obviously broken body, Pleasant tried to grab for the detonator. Craven respected that part of the skeleton. He really did.

He pressed the button and a shattering _BOOM_ shook him to the ground.


	109. Tanith's perspective

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

**Chapter 109**

* * *

**Chapter 109**

**_Tanith's POV_ **

"Do you want some tea?" Ghastly asked, getting up from his workstation.

Tanith smiled and nodded though she could already feel the nausea. She needed food to settle it, something of substance. "Can I have some water too? And a sandwich?"

He smiled at her, more than used to her laundry list requests by now. "Of course."

He left the room and Tanith moved carefully to sit up and closed her eyes again. It was getting harder for her to breath as the baby grew and obstructed her diaphragm, and she knew it was the worst of the pregnancy. Sure, the birth would be hard, but she had ideas and plans for that. There was nothing she could do to even pretend she had control over her lack of breath. At least when baby was out she could do more than one thing, namely, more than sit on her arse and try not to be sick.

The nausea went away and she tried to block out the negative thoughts. In the kitchen, she could hear the kettle boiling and Ghastly getting out mugs and opening the fridge. It was homey in the shop, and she could see why Ghastly had spent so much time trying to convince her to move in at least while the baby was in a crib so Ghastly could work and see his child at the same time, but it was still too small. She tutted aloud and tried to think positive again.

A moment later, Ghastly came in with her water and sandwich. "Here," he said quietly, bringing up the foldout table with his magic and putting the plate and glass on top of it. He sat beside her. "Tea's brewing and I've nearly finished that dress. We can go home when I'm done if you like."

"Could we make another sleeping onesie before we go?" Tanith asked. "The one that's like a blanket?"

He smiled and settled back into the sofa. "I swear, all you think about is the baby."

"It's hard not to when their head is pushing into my lungs and I have a foot in my liver," she told him and washed her bite down with water. "Only two and a bit months to go now."

Ghastly rubbed a hand over his face. "Only a two and a bit months and we don't have a name."

"We'll think of something," Tanith shrugged, a small smile on her lips. "I want to go visit my parents before the baby's born too. They said they'll come when they’re born too to help out, but I'm not sure I really want my Mum and Dad hovering around."

"I thought parents need all the help they can get with a newborn?" Ghastly asked, watching her.

Tanith smiled at him, enjoying the attention. "We do need that, but we also have all our brother's and Valkyrie. She said she wants to take time off to help with everything at the start, so I don't think we need much other help."

"I say we save Valkyrie for babysitting later and have your parents help at first," Ghastly told her. "Plus, your parents will want to visit their grandchild anyway."

"I expect them to visit, just not stay," Tanith said. "I'll talk to Mum about it more. It doesn't matter yet I suppose."

Ghastly smiled and stroked her back as she ate. At some point, the phone rang and he got up to talk to whoever it was, probably a client, in the shop entrance. She finished her sandwich while Ghastly spoke on the phone and realised as soon as she finished her water that she really needed to pee, and waddled as quickly as she could up the stairs. It took a few minutes to make sure she wasn't going to wet herself if she stood up and the baby kicked her bladder – she'd had an accident once like that, and it wouldn't happen again – and when she was certain, she wrapped the maternity trousers around her waist carefully and made her way downstairs. She found Ghastly pacing in the kitchen looking pale and worried.

"What happened?" She asked immediately, dread filling her up.

"Oh!" He exclaimed, and then laughed nervously. "Nothing, nothing."

"Ghastly Bespoke, don't you dare try and pretend like–"

"The doctor said not to wind you up–"

"You're winding me up right now."

He was quiet for a moment, obviously picking his battles, and Tanith made an effort to calm herself. After a thirty-second silence had been had and they had both taken a breath, Tanith congratulated her patience and started again.

"Ghastly, can you tell me what happened?"

"The Sanctuary," he said quietly. "Skulduggery blew it up."

**.*****.**

"Val?" Tanith asked softly, stroking Valkyrie's silky dark brown hair from her sleeping eyes. "You going to wake up?"

Valkyrie made no movements except to continue to barely breathe with the help of half a dozen tubes that had been inserted down her throat via her mouth and nose. Tanith still didn't know the full story, but she did know that Valkyrie had sensed trouble, had everyone go to the safe room in the Sanctuary and went to check things out herself and caught Skulduggery when he was about to blow up the Sanctuary.

Seeing his adoptive daughter hadn't stopped him.

Over thirty Sanctuary staff were confirmed dead already, and more missing. Elder Crow was among the dead. The Dead Men, her brothers, had been in the saferoom and were mostly okay. Practically all Irish Cleaver's were dead. Valkyrie was one of the only ones not in the safe house that wasn't missing or dead.

Tanith took a deep breath and put a hand on her baby belly, her fear for Valkyrie's life and what had happened, how close she'd been to losing her brothers and sister, upset the baby. She left the room with her head down to avoid looking at the miraculous few that survived the blast outside of the safe room. She'd already heard Kenspeckle muttering. Other than Valkyrie, he didn't expect many to live to see tomorrow.

In the waiting room was the Dead Men. They had their heads down and small injuries. All except for Skulduggery and Anton. Anton had been the strongest of them and had run through the flames and still falling debris to find Valkyrie and pull her to safety, leaving him badly burnt. His heart had stopped once already. They all knew he was counted in those not expected to live.

"Hey," she said quietly, feeling a lot like she was breaking a silent commemoration between the men. "I don't think she's waking up today."

"It's already night," Ghastly told her, a hand over his mouth holding his head up and muffling his words a little. "Did you see Anton?"

"No," she admitted. "There's a missing bed in the ward. I think he was taken to surgery."

"That was quick," Erskine whispered so quietly she almost didn't catch it. The hospital was so deathly silent it almost sent a shiver up Tanith's back to hear Erskine's hollow voice.

"They'll be alright," Saracen said, putting a hand on Tanith's back comfortingly. Ghastly was staring vacantly at the floor. "Kenspeckle's a genius."

Tanith nodded. She could hear the tense uncertainty in Saracen's voice.

There was a long, long pause before Dexter quietly asked, "What could make Skulduggery do this?"

Tanith felt the tensions rise immediately as the men thought of their theories. "We need to wait before we do anything," Tanith said before anything could happen. "When Valkyrie wakes up she can tell us."

"Meanwhile Skulduggery's in a cell in the middle of nowhere, safe and sound," Wolf said bitterly.

"We don't know what happened until Valkyrie tells us," Tanith whispered.

Ghastly sighed and rubbed his face tiredly. "Tanith's right. If we talk to Skulduggery now, we won't believe a word he says."

"How could we?" Dexter agreed. "No matter what, he's dug himself into this hole. He still came in and set the bomb, we’ve got the recovered footage of them leaving it in the downstairs boiler room. He did that. He didn't have to. He could have pretended and set off the alarms so we could dismantle it."

There was a long pause as they agreed. "Do we know where Solomon is?"

"Honestly, I don't give a crap right now," Dexter told her, leaning his head back against the wall. "Until Valkyrie and Anton are awake and healing, I don't give a crap about either of them."

Tanith had to agree, at least in her mind. She liked Solomon, and she didn't much like any Necromancer she'd ever met, and she certainly trusted no Necromancer except perhaps Solomon. Too many secrets. Too much pent-up hate within them. Too much superiority. Solomon was different, and Tanith appreciated and respected his willingness to admit how much was wrong with Necromancy and teach not just Valkyrie but also answer her own questions, which she knew was forbidden for him to do. But between being with Valkyrie or trying to find Solomon? She'd pick Valkyrie _every_ time.

Another family came into the waiting room a few minutes of silence later, the two children clinging to each other and their father practically in tears already. She had to close her eyes, knowing no matter if their other parent lived, those children would never unsee or unhear anything they witnessed tonight. She wrapped her arm around her belly protectively.

Hours passed, families coming in and out of the waiting room as they tried to find out if there was even so much of a body of their loved ones left, some crying, others putting up a brave front, but in the end, no one stayed all night the way the Dead Men and Tanith did, unmoving and solid even with their inner doubts and troubles. Even Tanith was comforted by the faces the Dead Men showed the world, enough to get a little sleep.

In the morning, at barely five a.m., Stentor came in looking pale and hands shaking with exhaustion. "We completed the operations Anton needed," he said, making them all look at him tiredly. "He's stable, but not out of the woods. He lost a lot of blood. We've ordered more for a transfer, but his body is weak and unhealed from his previous injuries."

The Dead Men nodded but didn't say anything.

"Civet says Valkyrie's status hasn't changed. She is healing, but slowly. We're flying in more doctors and nurses to help all the victims," he explained, holding on to the doorframe to keep up. "Sorry, I need to get some sleep. Doctor Synecdoche is supporting if you have any questions. We'll keep you informed on them both."

He left and Tanith stared at the doorway before forcing herself to stand. "We should go," she told them.

Dexter shook his head slightly, barely able to move more than that. "We can't," he said quietly, his voice groggy and slurred.

"They'll tell us if anything happens. No one's going to wake up any time soon, we're just hurting our backs. Come on," she encouraged quietly.

It took time, but she got Ghastly and Saracen up, which convinced Dexter, and between them they woke Erskine and got him moving out the door too. They were barely in the foyer when Fletcher and his girlfriend popped in front of them.

"Hey," he said immediately. "I just heard what happened. Is everything okay? Where's Valkyrie? What about Anton?"

"They're fine," Tanith said tiredly, feeling herself get lightheaded. "Teleport us home, Fletcher. I'm going to faint."


	110. Collecting Nadia

**Chapter 110**

Three days on, Tanith was suffering from nightmares that were stopping her from sleeping, leaving her experiencing more sickness, irritability and she'd fainted four times.

Ghastly had called the maternity hospital on her behalf – on her instruction when she was throwing her guts up – and they'd told her to go back on some medicine from when she'd been three months. Ghastly had had to explain Valkyrie had been in a car accident and was in a coma to give the midwives an idea of what had caused the onset of symptoms, and just hearing him make up a fake story of Valkyrie in a car accident had made her cry through throwing up. A few days off of seven months pregnant wasn't enjoyable, having her sister in the hospital wasn't enjoyable, and together she wasn't sure she could do this.

Anton had woken up briefly and was healing but Valkyrie hadn't changed at all. They'd found out from Anton that he'd found her with part of the staircase on top of her, and Kenspeckle used that to confirm it must have fallen on her head. He couldn't say what the outcome would be. She'd gone from the luckiest person to one of the unluckiest – survived a bomb just to be taken out by stairs.

They'd decided that a few hours ago. Now Tanith was left with decisions, hard decisions and conversations, that needed to be had. And she had to stand in Valkyrie's place as much as she could.

"We need to talk," she said, walking straight into Dexter's bedroom. He and Saracen looked at her from their places lying on the large bed and sat up so she could sit on the end more comfortably.

"I find nothing good comes from conversations that start like this," Saracen said with a serious face, and it made her crack a small smile.

"We need to decide what we're doing," she said quietly, looking at her knees. The belly was in the way of her lap. "No one's told Nadia what's going on."

Dexter rubbed the back of his neck and crossed his legs. "Is that a good idea? She doesn't seem to be in a great place mentally already."

"I think if I go and talk to her, I could help. I think I'm going to convince her to move in here for a while. I'll tell her it's so she can visit Valkyrie more," Tanith explained. "Honestly, I just think it'll help Valkyrie to be near Nadia. They say you can hear things when you're in a coma."

"That is true," Saracen nodded. "Valkyrie's always pulled it out the box for Nadia. Even when she was a little thirteen year old she could make things happen to make Nadia happy."

"She doesn't want to move in right now," Dexter argued. "Valkyrie already mentioned it to her, and they are only kids. I'm not sure putting this type of pressure on Nadia is a good idea."

"Valkyrie wasn't in a coma then, and if she doesn't want to move in because she wants to travel herself, I'll say what I just told you. I think she'll do it to help Valkyrie, even if it is a bit underhanded," Tanith told them. "I want to be honest, but I want Valkyrie more. And I think I can get through to Nadia better if I see her in person. Plus, I can walk up into her room and ask."

Saracen shook his head. "It'll work better if your honest with her parents too. She doesn't want to betray her parents."

Tanith considered this and then nodded. Nadia was a good girl, more obedient than Valkyrie, although Valkyrie had been brought up with less restrictions. She'd kept six men giving her gifts a secret from her mother without ever being told to, she hardly had the supervision Nadia had. "You might be right."

"He usually is," Dexter said, staring thoughtfully into the soft blanket covering his duvet. "We need to check on Fletcher too. He didn't take the news well."

"His mother died in a similar way," Saracen revealed quietly. "I think it's brought back memories."

"We need to talk to him more," Tanith told him. "He's not so bad really. I think he could do with a few role models."

Dexter smirked. "You mean like me and Saracen?"

She smirked back. "Whatever goes."

They shared a silent moment of relief from the difficult conversation before Tanith decided to bring back her other concern. "I think we should try again on getting Solomon."

"They'll have moved by now," Dexter said immediately. "If we talk to Skulduggery, he'll either lie or send us to an abandoned safehouse."

"I think we should try. I don't know what happened, none of us do until Valkyrie can tell us, but that's not Solomon's fault. I feel like we're mad at Skulduggery so we're letting Solomon be punished because we agreed to hold out on Skulduggery."

"And I don't want to do shit until we know the truth. Period," Dexter said in a voice filled with warning.

Tanith narrowed her eyes. "They could be torturing him to death. He doesn't deserve that."

"Valkyrie doesn't deserve to be in a life-threatening coma."

"Valkyrie loves Solomon. She wouldn't want him dead, and you know it." Dexter clenched his jaw, making the muscles stick out as he ground his teeth together. "I really doubt Solomon had a choice in this. He walked away from his home and risked his life just to warn us the Necromancer's were after Valkyrie, I don't think he'd wish that away. Regardless of Skulduggery."

She let Dexter mull it over, and Saracen stayed silent too except to put a hand on Dexter's knee. Long moments passed before he nodded. "So we talk to Skulduggery."

Tanith nodded once. "I think so. I think Fletcher want's in on this, and with the Sanctuary down he has time. You're in charge, technically, without Val and Skulduggery, so you'll have to call Meritorious."

"He might not like this," Saracen warned.

"Then we do it anyway," Tanith told him. He watched her for a moment and then nodded. "Ghastly won't like this. He doesn't want to talk to Skulduggery at all."

Dexter and Saracen looked at each other, something passing between them and they nodded. "Skulduggery has a bad history," Saracen told her. "He's done bad things before, worse than this, and he's never said a word about it. We never told Skulduggery we knew because we knew he was remorseful, and he's our brother, but this has brought back a lot of feelings."

"Ghastly doesn't think he did it though," Tanith said, frowning hard. "He keeps saying he wants Skulduggery to rot, but that he didn't do it. I don't get it."

"It's the history," Dexter said quietly. "Knowing the truth might not be enough for Ghastly. He was hurt more than most of us."

Tanith considered asking, but decided that was a question for Ghastly, and something she was unlikely of getting a straightforward answer to. That was okay. Ghastly was three-hundred years older than her, he had a lot of time to have a lot of bad things happen to him. She knew very well that family could betray their own and still learn to forgive and love.

She sighed. "We'll just have to see," she said quietly, hopping from the bed. "I don't suppose you could give me a ride to Nadia's, Saracen? Since Dexter has a phone call to make."

"You make it seem like you prefer Dexter," he said in a mock-offended voice.

"I do," she said deadpan, and gave Dexter a sultry wink he returned.

.*****.

Saracen stopped a few houses down from Nadia's and they both looked down the street at their target. She wasn't entirely sure how this conversation was going to go, or if it would happen at all, but she had to do right by her sister, even if her feet were swollen and hurting and she was meant to be on permanent bedrest. She knew Valkyrie would do the same for her.

"I'll wait here for you," Saracen said. "Keep your phone on in case I feel anything."

"Thanks," Tanith replied, still watching the house.

"I can sense her parents are home, and their butler. I doubt they won't let you in, but I can't feel much else."

"We'll see how it goes then, I guess," Tanith sighed. She stared out at the house, putting a hand on her belly worriedly.

Saracen put a hand on her shoulder, massaging it. "Don't get upset. We're doing all we can given the circumstances, and everyone will know that when this is figured out."

"This would be easier if you could just sense who set that bomb off," Tanith told him quietly, and then regretted it when his hand fell. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that."

"No, it's true," Saracen said, his tone honest and kind. "All magic's have their drawbacks. Mine is that I know a lot, but never enough. It's an edge, enough to keep me alive, but in times like this when I'm not in a life or death situation, it's not much use. It's already happened, it's over. What's my magic meant to tell me to keep me alive from something I've already survived? It barely aids me outside of life and death situations."

Tanith nodded slowly, understanding his words. "Do you think Skulduggery did it? Personally?"

Saracen sighed thoughtfully and rested his arms on the wheel. "Personally? I don't know. If he saw Valkyrie then no, I don't think he could have. If he didn't, then there's a possibility he convinced himself none of his family was there to hurt. Then he could have done it. But I don't know what he saw. I don't even know if I'll sense him lying or telling the truth. No matter what, he brought that bomb in and armed it, I know that, I woke up at Kenspeckle's knowing that and we have the footage, so he's still in the wrong. He still caused this. It just feels worse if he set it off as well."

Tanith nodded and took a deep breath. "One thing at a time, right?"

"Exactly," he said, and gave her the small, genuine smile that made her like him all those years ago. "Bring Nadia back with you."

"Do my best," she smiled back, and left her friend in the car.

It was warm out, for Ireland, but even in late July there was a nippy breeze and not much sun through the white sky. Summer had been early that year, although warmer weather was predicted for two weeks from then, meaning it was probably just going to rain. The outside of Nadia's house was the same as it had been the last time she'd been, not even any new security cameras. Tanith knocked on the door.

It took a few moments before the butler opened it. He looked down on her blankly.

"I'm here to see Nadia," Tanith told him. "Something serious has happened."

He nodded once and stepped back to let her in. "Can I take your coat?" He asked.

She pulled her light jackets off and gave it to him, thanking him quietly as she looked around. "Could you tell me where Nadia is so I can talk to her privately?"

"I'm afraid I am not at liberty to do that, Miss Low," the butler said. Tanith tried to think of what his name was. "I shall inform the family you have arrived. Please take a seat in the parlour and make yourself comfortable."

Tanith sighed internally but took her seat gratefully. Two months and a few days until her September birth. Two months and a few days before she could breathe properly again. She was sat there waiting for a minute before a Mr Vinay and Mrs Kenna came downstairs without their daughter and sat across from her, smiling tightly.

"It's good to see you again," Mrs Keena started, folding her hands on her lap. "And congratulations on your pregnancy. We didn't get a chance to talk at the Requiem Ball."

"Thank you," Tanith replied plainly. "I was actually hoping to talk to Nadia."

"We'd like to hear what you have to say first," Mr Vinay said. He said it calmly but there was a command in his voice that expected her to do what he said.

She looked at him with hard eyes. "I'm here on behalf of Valkyrie."

Mrs Keena's eyes widened and tensed a little. "Is this about the explosion at the Sanctuary? We haven't heard anything about it yet."

"There are many deaths but Valkyrie felt something was wrong before the explosion and put the Sanctuary on high alert which saved most of the mages there. But she was caught in the explosion," Tanith told them solemnly.

"I'll get Nadia," Mr Vinay said, a hard look in his eye, but as he turned away Tanith saw his lip turn up.

Tanith bit her cheek and waited for him to return with Nadia. Mrs Keena avoided her eyes and seemed awkward. She was different from when Tanith had last met her also. Less confident in herself. Valkyrie had been perceptive enough to see the two parents were not in sync as they used to be, but seeing it confirmed Nadia's parents were suffering with marital problems. They'd been married about seventy years but she didn't know much about them. She _did_ know it would be hard to get Nadia to stay with them so she could spend as much time as possible with Valkyrie so long as her parents were around to argue against it.

Nadia ran down the stairs looking flustered and panicky, staring at Tanith with wide eyes from the doorway before sitting down opposite her. Tanith gave her a smile to try and be comforting but the stress didn't leave Nadia's eyes. Mr Vinay strolled in after with a self-satisfied look.

Tanith would have glared at him, but decided it wasn't worth it. Instead, she focused on Nadia like Valkyrie would want. "Don't worry," she said with a calm voice. "She's alive. Just hurt."

"I've been waiting for you to call," Nadia whispered, her eyes filling with tears immediately.

Tanith's heart went out to the girl. "Come here," she said, and Nadia obeyed, almost falling onto the other sofa and crying into Tanith's shoulder. It was a little uncomfortable with the bump but it was worth it. "It's been so stressful and hectic the last few days we've only just started to think of what to do today. We haven't even spoken to Skulduggery."

"They say he set the bomb off," Mr Vinay chimed.

Tanith glared at him, knowing fully well he was trying to escalate the situation to cut ties between Nadia and Tanith's family. "We don't have proof yet." She rubbed Nadia's back and started from the beginning. "Valkyrie, Dexter and Erskine were following an investigation to find Skulduggery and Solomon, who had been kidnapped and were being held prisoner. A few days ago, the Dead Men and the Sanctuary did a raid on Mr Bliss' house where Dexter, Saracen, Anton and Erskine were injured. Valkyrie jumped into a Death signal to get China out, I don't know all the details, but the mission ended with killing Bliss, the Dead Men critically injured except for Valkyrie although we still don't know how because China doesn't want to give up any of her secrets, and Skulduggery and Solomon were taken away by the mercenaries when they escaped."

Nadia nodded to show she was listening and had stopped her crying enough to concentrate. Tanith moved and held the girl's hand.

"The night after, Valkyrie and the some of the Dead Men were in the Sanctuary going over the case and Valkyrie felt something was wrong. Seeing as the Dead Men were still in bad shape and Saracen was still unconscious in the hospital, Valkyrie sent them to the saferoom and pulled a high alert for the Sanctuary just in case. I don't know all the details after that because no one was with Valkyrie that's still alive, but we believe she saw some dead Cleavers on a security camera, sent people to investigate and went herself to the front to look for intruders. We think she saw Skulduggery outside the Sanctuary and she tried to press the panic button, but someone messed with the internal signals which made them almost completely useless, and then Skulduggery set the bomb off. Of course, we can't be sure on a lot of that, but it's what most people are going with right now."

Nadia clenched on Tanith's hand and gave her a strong look. "What happened after it went off?"

"Well, in order, Anton was in the saferoom with most of the Sanctuary and was the only one strong enough out of the Dead Men there to move after the blast, and he ran through the building to find Valkyrie and pulled her from the rubble to outside. Both of them were badly burnt. Right now, we think that Valkyrie got hit badly in the head by the stairs falling on her, and she has some burns that are healing. She's still in hospital Nadia. She's in a coma."

Nadia nodded and started to cry again. Tanith wrapped her arms around the girl and held her tight. "Don't cry, it'll be alright. Valkyrie's with Kenspeckle, if anyone can make her come back, it's him. But we were thinking that it might help her if you see her and talk to her. They say people in coma's can still hear what's happening. She might respond to you, or at least be happy to know you've visited."

Nadia nodded quickly and tried sniffing to stop her crying but was so bunged up it didn't work. There was a box of tissues near Tanith so she grabbed them and handed the box to Nadia. After blowing her nose, she responded. "I want to see her."

"I know," Tanith assured, making her choice on how to handle the next part. "I wanted to ask if you'd stay with us at the house too. I know it's a lot, but I just – look, I honestly just think that Valkyrie will respond to you. She always does. I want to take you to see her as much as possible, and if you're at our house, I thought it would go smoother since we'll be going over every day anyway."

Nadia nodded immediately. "I want to help."

"Wait a moment," Mr Vinay interjected, a frown now marring his otherwise handsome features. "We don't even know if Detective Pleasant intentionally blew up the Sanctuary, I don't think I want my daughter in your home right now."

"With all due respect," Tanith said sarcastically, "you never do. Nobody knows anything about the circumstances. There's footage showing there was another person with Skulduggery, and rumour of another. We can't say Skulduggery did anything except arm that bomb, and for that, he will be punished. But blowing up the girl that's as good as his daughter, a child he's known since she was literally _days_ old, after actually seeing her? I find it hard to believe. He loves Valkyrie."

Mrs Keena nodded very slightly. "It does seem unlikely," she said quietly, getting an exasperated look from her husband. She narrowed her eyes and said in a louder voice, "I would never think you hurt Nadia even if someone else believed you did. Even if you did what we know Mr Pleasant did. It's not what good parents do."

Nadia stood. "I'm going to pack a bag. I need to help Valkyrie, Dad, it's not as if Skulduggery is at the house. I'll be fine."

"Thank you," Tanith said quietly, a little surprised at how easy that had been. Nadia hurried out the room.

"Thank you for coming in person," Mrs Keena said, avoiding looking at her husband. He stood up angrily a moment later and left the room also. "I'm sorry about my husband. He's very protective of Nadia. We both are. We don't want her getting hurt. You understand that, don't you?"

"I do," Tanith said, and then narrowed her eyes at the woman. "But you should know that Valkyrie would never hurt Nadia. Not intentionally. It's not fair to Valkyrie how you've treated her."

Mrs Keena took a sharp breath and narrowed her eyes back. "I will raise my daughter how I want, Miss Low."

"And I can disagree when your husband has smacked my sister," she snapped back. "He smacked a sixteen-year-old child. He pulled her from your house after she saved your lives. I shouldn't allow her here near a violent man, but I respect my sister enough to make her own decisions."

"You think I don't respect my daughter?" Mrs Keena snarled, leaning forwards in her chair. "I've worked my ass off to give her everything in life, and so has Anand. This last year has been the toughest of my life."

"Then let Nadia make her own mistakes," Tanith told her, trying to keep her cool as the baby kicked. She took a breath. "Children make mistakes, but Nadia is old enough to know the risks. If I didn't think Valkyrie understood them, none of us would let her on cases. If she hadn't proven her strength and abilities, the Sanctuary wouldn't have promoted her, and if I thought for a single moment she was lying or manipulating Nadia into thinking she couldn't get hurt being around Valkyrie, I'd have corrected them both myself. I take this as seriously as you." She felt the overemotional tears pricking at her eyes. Fucking _hormones_. "But I know Valkyrie is prepared for a relationship, a long term relationship in which she tries her damn hardest to look after your daughter. If that's who Nadia wants to love is that so difficult to accept?"

"They're still children," Mrs Keena said, her voice going high with her own emotion. "They're too young and I want to protect my child."

Tanith watched her as a tear fell and then Nadia was heard walking down the stairs. She put on a hard face and wiped the tear away so there was no trace of crying. She stood, Tanith following suit.

"One night," Mrs Keena instructed Nadia tightly. "You have one night."

"Mum," Nadia started.

" _No_!" She snapped loudly, clenching her fists. "I'm giving you one night at that house. I want you home tomorrow or I'll be there myself. Do you understand?"

Nadia looked at Tanith from over her mother's shoulder and Tanith could easily see the conflict. Respect her worrying, albeit controlling, parents or go to her possibly dying girlfriend's side? "I'm going until Valkyrie's better."

Mrs Keena would have said something back, or shouted most likely, but Nadia was quick and got the door open and was out before Tanith had even taken her jacket from the suddenly present butler.

Mrs Keena looked out the door at Nadia, who'd already run through the front garden with her suitcase and had spotted Saracen in the car, before turning back to Tanith. For a long moment they stood there like a showdown before Mrs Keena said quietly, "Maybe you'll understand when you have a child," she stormed away upstairs.

Tanith felt incredibly offended but was old enough and smart enough not to say anything back. She had helped raise Valkyrie, at least in her teen years, and she'd taught her, given up her time, her space, her money and for the most part, her career, to keep Valkyrie entertained, fed and educated. They loved each other as sisters, but she wasn't the only one to raise a sibling, and Valkyrie would repay her by helping to raise her child. The _child_ in her stomach. The valid, human life she carried and Mrs Keena deliberately excluded. Not just some bundle of cells, a _literal child_.

She put her jacket on in the foyer, took a few deep breaths and counted the twenty to calm her wildly beating heart. It worked and she was able to put on a genuine smile when she sat in the car for Nadia and Saracen.

"I'm sorry about my parents," Nadia said immediately from the middle back seat. "They think they're helping."

"It's fine," Tanith assured her. "Parents are like that sometimes. Come on, let's see Valkyrie."


	111. Nadia's perspective

**Chapter 111**

Saracen and Tanith filled Nadia in on the little details on their way, as well as some information about the Sanctuary she wouldn't know, such as Meritorious and Corrival being healthy and in a secret location – which they didn't reveal – while a new Sanctuary was secured, and that the other Sanctuary's around the world were offering support.

"That's good, though, isn't it?" Nadia asked.

"It would be if most of the quickest replies hadn't been from countries that we know want to take our government and keep it to have a Cradle under their thumb. Any time any of the three Cradles have an opening for an Elder or Grand Mage there's a guarantee on who will have put their name down as 'supporting' the country," Saracen explained. "We need to keep them out and get a Sanctuary building and new Irish Elder to show strength against our enemies and our allies."

"They don't sound like good allies," Nadia told him doubtfully.

He shrugged. "It's politics. It never makes sense."

Nadia hmphed and Tanith had to agree. It wasn't her scene either. Their information conversation took them right up until they got to the Hibernian Cinema, and it was a good job Nadia was an incredibly intelligent young woman or there was no way she could have kept up with everything Tanith and Saracen had told her. Tanith had ended up blabbing on about everything Kenspeckle had told her, but it turned out Nadia had been taught some basic medical lessons from her Indian boarding school and understood most of the details.

"Kenspeckle is still tired, so we need to be quiet," Tanith warned her, and Nadia nodded. At first, Nadia was slow going up the stairs as she seemed nervous, but the closer to the top she got, the faster she picked up speed.

She almost pushed past Civet to get to Valkyrie faster but he just shook his head good-naturedly. In the ward, Valkyrie was lying on her back still, tubes and needles connecting her to multiple machines, and a rolling table had been left close to her bed for easier medication.

Nadia stood over her girlfriend and looked her over. Tanith could see she was trying to keep it together, and it set Tanith off. She had to grab a hold of Saracen's hand to keep it back. By the bed, Nadia very carefully set her handbag on the floor and sat carefully on the edge so she wouldn't jolt Valkyrie or sit on any of the many things sticking into the girl, before leaning over her and kissing her cheek. So quietly Tanith almost couldn't hear, she started to whisper things to Valkyrie, stroking her hair and leaning over her so their torsos could touch just barely to, hopefully, give Valkyrie some comfort.

Saracen pulled on Tanith's hand and she reluctantly followed him out, dabbing her eyes dry with her sleeve. He took her to the couch in the waiting room and Tanith had only just got herself comfortable when Saracen's phone started ringing.

"Dexter," he said as soon as he picked up. There was a very long pause as Dexter explained what must have been the full conversation he'd had with the Grand Mage. "Okay. We'll come back in an hour." Saracen hung up the phone. "We have approval."

"That was quicker than I thought," Tanith frowned. "How did he talk to Meritorious so quickly?"

"Went to him through Corrival," Saracen explained. "He's in a different place to Meritorious, and easier to get hold of, at least for us Dead Men. It wasn't too hard to convince Meritorious, apparently, as all he's been asked so far internationally are questions about Skulduggery and if the Dead Men are compromised. People are worried that Pa is too, given our close relationship and him being an Elder."

"Damn, I didn't think of that," Tanith said sitting back.

Saracen shrugged. "Mages worldwide are wary of the Dead Men. They should be. We're a suicide team, and we've taken down every spy, assassin and mercenary group sent by them in the last two hundred years. And they think we're expanding too, with you joining us and training up Valkyrie, a Teleporter living with us, and not to mention a Necromancer dating Skulduggery."

Tanith nodded. "I can see why."

"It's just how it is."

"Who's going to speak with Skulduggery?" Tanith asked after a moment.

He pulled a face. "Ghastly won't want you coming," he warned.

Tanith narrowed her eyes. "I don't trust the rest of you not to let your feelings get in the way. I'm coming on Valkyrie's behalf."

"I'm not on his side," Saracen said quickly, raising his hands. "I'm just saying what he's like. God, I once saw a woman run across a battlefield with an axe, she must have been nine months with twins, utterly huge belly, and she killed more enemies than most of the fit men and single-handedly rescued the hostages. I have no doubts you're capable of merely talking to Skulduggery, even if bedrest is probably healthier."

"I don't think I can fight," Tanith grimaced. "I can barely walk upstairs, let alone run."

He snickered. "Other than you, it's me and Dex. He's calling Ghastly now, and then asking Erskine."

"They'll want to come."

"I know," he said, his face becoming more serious. "Anton will be mad he couldn't come with us."

"Hopefully Valkyrie can wake up soon and this can all be cleared up before he has a chance to get mad," she said quietly, glancing at the door that led to Valkyrie and Nadia. "Do you think it'll work?"

He knew what she meant. "I don't know," he said sympathetically. "I hope so."

They waited for another half an hour, but with the permission granted, Tanith went to tell Nadia the plan. The ward was quiet, other than Nadia's voice and the gentle beeping of four mages status', two of which being Valkyrie and Anton. Nadia didn't see Tanith at first, and she overheard her talking about her family. Feeling as if she were intruding, Tanith knocked softly on the door.

Nadia looked over. "Oh. Hi," she said quietly.

"Hey," Tanith said, coming a little closer to rest on the footboard. "We're going to question Skulduggery, so I thought we'd take you to the mansion so you can settle in and maybe come back later."

"I want to come too," Nadia said immediately, standing up.

Tanith smiled. "This is a Dead Man thing," she explained. "And considering what Skulduggery might say, it really is best if you to stay behind."

"If Valkyrie can be taken to Serpine's castle at twelve, I can visit someone in a cage," Nadia said strongly with a surprisingly mean glare. "I've heard some really awful things from Valkyrie of what she's seen and had to do. I can handle what Skulduggery might say."

Tanith thought about it for a moment and then shrugged. Tanith didn't even know what Valkyrie thought of some of the things that happened on her cases, and she knew something serious had happened a few days ago before Skulduggery was captured, Nadia was almost eighteen anyway. "It's your choice. It'll be difficult convincing the others."

Nadia just nodded silently, a determined spark in her eye. It made Tanith happy as she followed Nadia out with Saracen down to the car that Nadia still had that strength to stand up to people and for herself. She'd seen so many people get beaten down by life that they just stopped trying, so it was uplifting to see Nadia's strength.

"The others are at home," Saracen reported once they were in the car and had taken off down the street. "I told them you both want to come, and my phones had at least eight messages."

"What do they say?" Nadia asked from the back.

"I don't know, I haven't looked," he said. "At any rate, I'll let you women folk fight it out yourselves. I won't stand in your way."

It was quiet going back to the mansion as they thought over what they were about to do. Seeing Skulduggery again, especially for Tanith, knowing he upset Valkyrie before helping to blow her up, or possibly even doing it himself, was difficult for her, but she tried to keep herself focused. There was no point complaining about sore feet.

As soon as the car stopped in front of the house, Ghastly had opened the front door with a deep frown on his face. Tanith sighed, gave Nadia a smile in the mirror, and went to meet him.

**.*****.**

**_Nadia's POV_ **

Nadia watched quietly as Tanith got out the car and strolled up to Ghastly only for him to begin informing her she wasn't going to visit Skulduggery.

Nadia bit the inside of her cheek, feeling her ever-present bubbling anxiety in her stomach wish they could just leave without an argument, but she didn't think it would be so smooth. It was easy to tell Tanith what she wanted earlier because she knew Tanith well, knew she was pretty relaxed about most things, but someone like Ghastly was stubborn. Valkyrie had made jokes about how stubborn he was, and also that he'd upset Tanith a bit at the start of the pregnancy with shadowing her, so she definitely didn't envy Tanith's job.

She knew it wasn't any use sitting in the car, though, so she got out and snuck around Ghastly and Tanith, who was informing Ghastly he could fuck off, and into the house. Her bag was heavy, so she left it by the door and went through to the parlour where she could hear Valkyrie's brothers already. They had hard faces, stressed frowns and their muscular bodies were tense. If Nadia hadn't heard so much from Valkyrie about their childish antics and goofy dispositions, she'd be too scared to go any closer. She quietly came in and sat down on an empty sofa.

Then again, Skulduggery might have blown up Valkyrie. If he could do that, what could the rest of them do?

She took a stuttering breath and kept that thought away. It wasn't true. It couldn't be.

"Nadia," Dexter said suddenly, almost making her jump. He ran his hands through his hair and looked at her with a stern, almost irritated look. "Look, sis, this is not a place you want to visit."

For a moment, Nadia almost nodded automatically as he and Erskine stared her down and Saracen looked on before she made herself think of her poor Valkyrie lying in what could be her deathbed, strapped up to tubes and unnatural things, paler than she'd ever seen. She narrowed her eyes even as her heart clenched painfully. "I can handle it."

"This isn't a place you've been to before," he said, a little exasperation digging into his tone. Nadia narrowed her eyes. "It's a _Gaol,_ Nadia. An old one, a literal hole in the ground with dirt floors, frozen cold, practically no light. They dumped people in the war down there and I'm pretty sure they just froze there and got eaten by the other prisoners. It was never cleaned out."

Nadia's lip turned up at the disgusting images. "I want to go. I want to see him for myself."

"Why?" Erskine asked as Dexter sighed. She looked at him and saw his hard, angry eyes. "He played a part in this."

Nadia's heart picked up as irrational fear pricked at her brain. She took a breath and told him, "Because I want him to tell me why himself. And tell him what he's done to Valkyrie."

"You think he did it?" Dexter asked, his eyebrows slightly raised.

"I don't know," she said with a slight stutter, looking between the two men. "But he brought it in and prepared it, right? He helped. I just – I know what Valkyrie's like. She'll be really upset and get really mad, but if he's remorseful, she'll probably forgive him."

The two men sighed at the same time and looked at each other. Dexter sat down next to her on the sofa, a defeated groan leaving his lips. "What makes you think he'll tell you the truth?"

Nadia hesitated. "I don't know."

"You're not making a good case," Erskine muttered, but Nadia saw a small smile on his lips for just a moment before he started rubbing his eyes tiredly.

She bit her lip for a second before she tried again. "I just want to see for myself. Even if it's lies, I want to hear it."

Dexter nodded. "Fine. But I really recommend you don't mention this to anyone, especially not your parents. What magic do you have?"

"I know mainly Elemental, some healing, some Energy Throwing, and I've been doing a fair bit of Signal magic in my own time. I also know some defensive Shock magic," she listed.

"How much Shock magic?" Dexter asked.

"I only know how to Shock someone to fall over with a touch, they'll only stay down for a few moments. It's not very strong," she told him a little self-consciously.

Dexter nodded. "I've seen that. Pretty popular to teach kids when I was a kid until we got the idea of Shocking our siblings and fried their brains to nothing."

"It's only self-defence," she said quietly, not wanting a silence after that morbid tidbit.

He glanced at her, seemingly knowing he made her uncomfortable. "Sorry," he said, smiling a little. He had several days of stubble on his face. "I'll feel better when I know the truth."

Nadia wasn't sure if she trusted him on that given how close he was to both Valkyrie and Skulduggery, so she said nothing. It didn't really matter though, because Tanith came into the room in a fury, shouting at Ghastly who was stomping after her, both of them speaking at once and trying to convince the other by raising their voices louder and louder.

Nadia had always been told it was rude to fight in front of other people and looked away. Erskine was looking down, his elbows on his knees and seemed remarkably uncomfortable. She remembered Valkyrie had mentioned once, years ago, that Erskine had some type of PDSD, something that was worse with the Spider's coming back though she hadn't gone into detail. She wasn't an expert, but Erskine was stretching his fingers, fidgeting with them really, bending them back again as if he wished he could break them. Nadia didn't know how to deal with his pain either and she had to look down at the floor.

Whatever Tanith and Ghastly were shouting stopped suddenly and Nadia didn't dare move. She could see both their feet on either side of the coffee table, see that they had to be staring each other down.

Ghastly broke the silence. "I'm trying to keep you safe."

"I can keep myself safe, Ghastly," Tanith growled furiously from clenched teeth. "I've been keeping myself safe since I was a child, I can keep doing it in a Gaol."

"If you weren't pregnant I won't try to stop you," he tried explained, his voice a controlled calm.

"I'm not _stupid_. I _know_ how to keep myself safe. You need to keep out of it," Tanith growled.

"I'm allowed to be worried for my child," he said, his voice rising again.

"I know you are! But I can keep myself safe without you telling me how to do it."

"And what am I going to do if something happens to you there?" He asked loudly. "What if the Spider's attack again?"

"They could attack here when I'm alone, or asleep!" She shot back. "I could fall down the stairs, or in the shower or out of bed, I could fall straight on my stomach, but there's nothing you can do, okay?! Surely I'm safer with everyone than alone?"

"I can stay with you!" Ghastly tried, not reading the anger in Tanith's voice even nearly enough in Nadia's opinion. She wished she'd stayed in the car now. Or maybe the hospital. Valkyrie would never let this happen.

"And what will that bloody do?" She shouted. "I want to see Skulduggery myself, I'm allowed to do that! You can't just order me to stay here!"

"I know that–"

"No, you don't, because if you did we wouldn't be having this conversation again! How many times do we have to go over this? I can go where I want, when I want! I'm smart enough to know I can't drive, I've kept myself safe, I've been healthy, I've done everything anyone can expect, so why are you _still_ coming back to this? You have no trust!"

"Tanith–" Ghastly sighed, a warning in his voice that Tanith didn't like at all.

"Don't you dare," Tanith told him, her voice changing to match his warning tone. "Don't you dare deny it, or else you wouldn't have a problem with me deciding to do this. I _am_ going to see Skulduggery, because I need to be there for my sister, just like you and everyone else."

"I'm not trying–"

"I'll tell you something, Ghastly," she said, finality in her voice. "This is your last chance. This is your very, very last chance to stop acting like an absolute dickhead because if you dare try to tell me what I can and can't do, where I can and cannot go one more time, I'm _done_. I'm not going to take it ever again, so if you do, you can consider us, _whatever_ relationship we have, to be over. And I'm _only_ giving you so many chanced because of the kid, if it were just us, we'd have been over months ago. Do you understand _that_? I'm getting in the van."

Nadia looked up with wide eyes at Tanith's form storming out past Ghastly and slammed the front door shut. Her own heart was beating wildly, but she couldn't help but cheer Tanith on.

She glanced carefully at Ghastly and for a moment, just a small one, she felt bad for him. He looked crestfallen, defeated, almost as if he didn't dare say a single thing. But he was the one that was always clawing at Tanith, telling her what to do and how she should do things, Valkyrie had told her enough and been irritated on her sister's behalf enough. She had thought he'd gotten better, Valkyrie had mentioned that too, but she'd never mentioned them arguing like this before. Quietly, she looked at Dexter and saw his thin lips, and knew he too felt little sympathy for Ghastly.

It was Saracen that broke the silence, standing and going around the table to pat Ghastly on the shoulder before moving on and out the house. Dexter stood and got Erskine up when he tapped his arm gently, and Nadia took her social opportunity to jump up and followed them out the house with her head down.

Tanith was in the back, crying into Saracen's shoulder, holding her belly tightly and curling her legs up as much as she could. This day likely wouldn't get any better.


	112. Skulduggery

**Chapter 112**

The ride to the old war Gaol was tense to say the least. She wasn't exactly sure how the others dealt with the weird pressure that tried to suffocate her when socially awkward things came up lately, but it certainly wasn't digging their nails into their wrists like her.

It didn't help that she also felt a little hungry so her stomach would growl once in a while, making her more self-conscious, all while Tanith was blinking wearily at the van wall in her own world. She felt like an intruder in a very personal fight, and honestly, it was worse in the van than when they were shouting because Ghastly was driving and she could see him occasionally looking in the mirror at them.

When they stopped and the van was turned off, Nadia had never been so grateful to be somewhere, and Erskine obviously had the same idea because he was straight up and opened the back door. It was cold – it always felt cold after the summer heat of India – and they were on the other side of a line of trees that separated them from a main road, giving them a sound other than silence. She stretched her legs and back, feeling her spine crackle pleasantly.

"You okay?" Dexter whispered in her ear, almost making her jump.

She looked at him and nodded, seeing how he looked less okay than she probably felt. "Yeah. You look… bad."

He smirked. "I never look bad."

She couldn't help but giggle quietly at his joke but ducked her head while she did it. "How far is the Gaol?"

"It's underneath us," he said a little louder. "Not much of a walk."

She nodded again and gave Tanith a small smile when the pregnant woman joined her side. "How are you doing?" Nadia asked.

"I'm fine," Tanith nodded absently. "I will be, anyway. We'll do this, go home, have something to eat, report to Corrival and sleep."

"Sounds good to me," she replied quietly, watching as Ghastly spoke quietly with Saracen for a moment and then started walking off. Saracen turned and beckoned them to come, and they all walked after Ghastly. They were silent for a moment before Nadia whispered, without exactly meaning to, "Is he always like this?"

Tanith snored. "No. Just since _this_ happened," she said gesturing at her stomach like it was somehow in the wrong, before wrapping an arm around it. "Usually it's not so bad though."

"You mean arguing?"

"Yes," she said shortly, and Nadia thought she'd offended her for a moment before she spoke again. "At first it was this bad, but it was the start, and stressful, and I could understand better because I was constantly sick, but when I told him to shove it, he listened and it wasn't a problem once Corrival told him to back off too. But this thing with Skulduggery sparked it again."

"I'm sorry," she said, not knowing what she should say.

"It's not your fault," she said, giving her a smile and bumping their shoulders together. "Although this place is cold and nasty, I know it's safe. None of us needs to worry."

Nadia agreed with her, in her head, but didn't say anything because Ghastly had stopped and crouched down to lift a manhole with his bare hands. He didn't even look back at them, just lowered himself into it and dropped down to the bottom which didn't sound as if it were very far. Erskine went next, and then Tanith who was caught, Nadia assumed, by Erskine with his magic, then Nadia jumped it and landed heavily about six feet down.

She stood and got out the way quickly. Erskine and Ghastly had a flame in their hands, so Nadia clicked her fingers and held one too, illuminating the dingy, muddy passageway. The ground was wet and soggy but Nadia could feel there were cobblestones, or some type of slabs, beneath the layer of wet dirt.

When they were all in, Dexter shuffled passed Nadia and led the way down the slowly curving tunnel, becoming quickly steeper as they went. She didn't know much about defence, but she knew from history that a winding path going down into the ground wasn't that great for stopping an attack should something happen up top, but she didn't say anything. There was a reason it was abandoned after the war, and honestly, she didn't believe it would have been the enemy storming it to rescue captives, but rather their own side coming to kill the prisoners. There were rumours.

It didn't take long before the prison cells came into view and they were walking in echoing cell blocks, one after the other, going deep and deeper into the ground, a weird, stale smell occurring the further they went. Her stomach curled unpleasantly and she was glad she wasn't Tanith right then.

They were in there a silently, eerie thirty minutes before Dexter came to a stop outside an iron cell and looked in with a hard look on his face. Nadia and the others gathered around as Skulduggery stood up, his suit in tatters and the jacket, tie and hat missing. Was that still a suit? Nadia didn't know, and she didn't care, because all of a sudden she realised she hated this place and wanted to curl up in bed with Valkyrie and cry into her shoulder.

"I'm sorry," Skulduggery said and Nadia squealed when Dexter smashed his fist against the side of the metal cage.

"Don't you dare apologise," Dexter said in a gravelly, low voice. Nadia's heart beat wildly and she grasped at Tanith's hand. " _You_ armed that bomb. You brought it into the Sanctuary."

"I did," Skulduggery whispered almost silently. Although standing, he looked properly dead with his broken clothes and the way he stood so very still.

"Why?" Ghastly asked, his voice filled with angry emotion. "Do you know how many people you've killed? And now this?"

Skulduggery looked away. "I tried."

"Tried what?" Dexter asked scornfully. "All you did was try to kill your daughter."

Skulduggery looked up now. "I did not try to kill her. I had no idea she was even at the Sanctuary."

"Why _wouldn't_ she be?" Dexter snarled.

"I wasn't alone," he said after a moment. "Craven was sent to make sure I set it off."

"And you did," Ghastly said for him in a deadly calm voice.

"No!" Skulduggery said quickly. "I saw Valkyrie, and I couldn't do it. But I couldn't do anything to fight Craven when he took the switch, and he set it off before I could stop him."

They all went silent, a heavy consideration and suspicion thick in the air.

"Why did you agree in the first place?" Tanith asked after a moment, her voice surprisingly strong and much more level than Ghastly's or Dexter's.

"They were going to kill Solomon," he said, urgency in his voice as he tried convincing them. Nadia didn't even know what to think, but Dexter snored mockingly. "They tortured me for hours, and I refused, so they got Solomon and tortured him. He's already weak and sick, and I knew he couldn't stand much more, so I agreed, but even then Craven kept torturing him. They said if I didn't get them in and blow the Sanctuary up within that hour, they would kill him. But then I saw Valkyrie and – and I couldn't do it."

Nadia glanced at Tanith and saw she had thin lips as she considered his words.

"Where did they keep you?" Saracen asked after a moment.

"In their safehouse," Skulduggery said quickly. "It's down south, on the cliffs. Do you remember the battle we found Erskine in the field after he left the Spiders?"

Erskine took a sharp breath and nodded. Saracen nodded also. "You say Solomon's there?"

"And all the Spider's, The Torment, the mercenaries the Spider's had watch us, and a few others. They had the man that killed the Shunter, Creyfon Signate, and then kidnapped Solomon come with me and Craven into the Sanctuary. He had a separate mission to take something from the Receptacle."

"What?" Dexter asked harshly.

"I don't know," Skulduggery said darkly. "But the Spider's wanted it. You need to know, he has an enhanced Cloaking Sphere he made himself that can last hours, maybe days, that's how he got in and out the Sanctuary."

"What about his magic?"

"I don't know," he said again. "I think it has something to do with making copies or signals, but he’s an inventor. Maybe better than the Monster Hunters."

"Like the Cleaver's Valkyrie saw at the Receptacle doors," Saracen muttered, looking at Dexter. "What else do you know?"

"Not much," he admitted quietly. "Only that someone knew we were there before we did anything, and that Craven shadow walked away after he pressed the switch without me. He was meant to take me back, and I don't know why he didn't."

"Valkyrie knew something was wrong," Tanith said, her eyes still narrowed at him. "She went to look for others at the front of the building after she noticed the strange Cleavers but found you."

"She tried to activate the wards," Skulduggery said quietly.

"We know. The bomb broke the stairs and they fell on her head. She's in a coma, Skulduggery. We don't know if she'll even wake up," Tanith finished, making Nadia's own eyes tear up. She didn't let herself cry. She couldn't.

"This is my fault," Skulduggery muttered, covering his skull with his bony hands. "I didn't mean for this. I didn't think that would happen."

"Anton's in hospital too," Dexter spat. "He pulled Valkyrie from the wreckage while you stood there."

"I couldn't move," he said quietly behind his hands. "I couldn't make myself move."

"I don't believe you," Ghastly said after a moment, making them all look at him, Skulduggery included.

"Ghastly–"

"Don't bother, Skulduggery," he said. "You'd do anything to get out of a punishment, and we all know it. You could have stopped Craven. He's a miserable, weak man you could have fought easily, and then we could have all gotten Solomon back without anyone else getting hurt. But no. You enjoy hurting people too much."

"No, that's not true–"

"I know what you did," Ghastly snarled, going right up to the bars and pointing at Skulduggery. "We all know, but we forgave you. But this? This just proves it was all an act."

Skulduggery didn't say anything, and Ghastly was apparently done with his accusations. Without a word he pushed right through them all, making Nadia and Tanith stumble back. She had no idea if Ghastly realised, but he had pushed Tanith back by her stomach and now she silently curled over and almost fell, using Nadia to stay standing.

They all watched quietly as Ghastly turned the corner and left, and then Saracen realised Tanith's pain and helped Nadia lower her to the ground. They all quietly waited for Tanith's pain to pass, but Nadia's heart clenched for Tanith. She was so close to her due date, just two months in a very difficult pregnancy, and her close friend and sister were in the hospital, her other friend in a cell for putting them there, and her baby's daddy was turning into a control freak that just pushed her pregnant belly hard enough to make her cry. Tanith Low, crying from pain.

"I believe you," Tanith gasped out after some deep breaths, and Nadia almost jumped when she looked at Skulduggery to see he was kneeling at the edge of his cell and holding the bars to be close to Tanith. "You're a dick, and you're the reason they're in hospital, but you didn't set it off. And I can see how you’d be brought to desperation after what the Spider’s did to you and Solomon. Even if I think it was the wrong choice."

Nadia nodded also. "I think Tanith's right."

Erskine, Saracen and Dexter looked at each other from their places standing or on the floor with Tanith.

"I just don't know," Erskine said, and Nadia could hear he was getting overwhelmed. Dexter stood and linked his hand in his brothers. "I want to see Anton."

"I need to hear Valkyrie's side of the story before I believe you," Saracen said, his eyes glaring at Skulduggery. "But I am leaning more towards you not setting it off. The thing is, Skulduggery, if you hadn't seen Valkyrie, would you have done it?"

Skulduggery didn't say anything for a long moment and then nodded once, barely. "I probably wouldn't have seen a way out of it."

"Then you're still guilty," Saracen said quietly and helped Tanith stand. Nadia stood also, though she wasn't of any help to Tanith. "Dexter?"

Dexter was silent. He shook his head and began walking away, Erskine in tow. Saracen followed, helping Tanith to leave also, leaving just Nadia and Skulduggery. They looked at each other and Nadia felt her heart rate lower.

"You really thought you had no choice?" She asked quietly.

"We always have a choice," he told her quietly. "I could have said no. I've been thinking about it for the last few days. But I also realised, as will Dexter, Saracen, Erskine and the others, that if I hadn't, Solomon would have been killed and Craven and the assassin probably would have been able to do it by themselves with that Cloaking Sphere. Not just that, but The Torment would have had a second switch made. They only wanted me to be there to drive us apart and make the Sanctuary look weak. Perhaps it would have been more difficult without me, but there's always another way. They're mostly mad that I was involved, and because Valkyrie and Anton are hurt. I'm wrong to do it, and I know that, and I won't forgive myself for being a part of destroying the Sanctuary, but my involvement probably wouldn't have changed anything."

Nadia nodded, barely comprehending his words but listening anyway. "We're going there to see them now, I think."

"Can you tell Valkyrie I'm sorry?" He asked quietly. "And that I love her. Please."

Nadia looked down at her feet and felt all her emotions, the way Valkyrie's poor body was broken on a hospital bed and said this: "You know, she loves you like a father. She would love it if you would treat her more like your daughter than a friend or colleague. She just wants you to love her and hug her and spend more time with her. You've never really done that. Like a father."

Skulduggery didn't say anything and tears were about to fall from Nadia's eyes, so she walked away quickly, hugging herself and following the single, winding path up to the top.


	113. Smells like Valkyrie to me

**Chapter 113**

By the time Nadia got to the top of the old war Gaol, she had shed a few tears but had pulled herself together, knowing someone had to be strong. She had expected to hear voices or perhaps shouting, but it was quiet above ground when Nadia used the air to pull herself out the manhole.

Dexter, Tanith, Saracen and Erskine were up there, and so was the van further down the field, but Tanith was incredibly pale and hunched over with Dexter and Saracen helping to keep her up, and Erskine pushing some hair gently behind the woman's ear. Nadia, slightly in awe and feeling a deep longing for the sort of bonds Valkyrie's family had, came over quickly.

"What's wrong?"

"The walk was difficult for Tanith," Dexter told her, not taking his attention from his friend. Perhaps sister was more accurate. He seemed to love her a lot.

"But where's Ghastly?"

Now all their faces soured. Tanith answered her. "Gone. I'm gonna be sick."

Nadia carefully rubbed Tanith's back while Dexter sprinted for the van and drove it over. They were all quiet on the way to Kenspeckle's, all tense from the visit and Ghastly.

At the Hibernian Cinema, Kenspeckle and one of his assistants practically pounced on Tanith at the door. Nadia ended up quietly leaning against the wall, trying to blend in, as Dexter and Erskine got angry explaining what Ghastly had inadvertently caused and Tanith began crying again and cursing her hormones.

They moved her off to a room to give her a check over, and without a real reason to stay with Tanith considering she was with the men, Nadia rubbed at her wrists awkwardly and went to see Valkyrie.

It was quiet in the ward at the back with the other few patients. There were a few beeps, and it really made Nadia feel strange to be in a magic hospital and there be beeping, but she was grateful to be away from the stress of the other room.

Valkyrie in herself gave her anxiety. She always did nowadays, though in a very different way to most people, the type she was very willing to ignore and get through because she _trusted_ Valkyrie a whole lot more than most people. It was nothing Valkyrie had done, it was what other people had done, her own fears she wasn't good enough for someone like Valkyrie.

"Hey Val," she whispered, sitting back on the bed carefully. She moved Valkyrie's limp arm, which was surprisingly heavy, and wrapped it over her legs as if Valkyrie was holding her. Nadia smiled. "I hope you don't mind. I really miss you. We just went to see Skulduggery like I said to you earlier. It was – God it was bad Val." She began to tear up and lent over Valkyrie, holding herself up by leaning her arm next to Valkyrie's head and gently smoothed her hair with the other. "I guess I'll say about Skulduggery first. He said that he didn't do it. He helped them, but it was because they were torturing Solomon. I believed him, and so does Tanith, and I think Erskine does too, but Saracen and Dexter are still on the fence. We're still really mad though because, I don't know, he helped them. But I kind of understand too? If you were being tortured, I'd agree to blow something up if I thought they'd stop too. But then, you're meant to be his daughter, kind of, and it's just so sick to think about."

Nadia took a deep breath and carefully calmed herself before she began to talk again. "Something else happened. After we, that being me, Tanith and Saracen, got to your house, Tanith and Ghastly had a fight. And a bad one too. They screamed at each other with me and the others right there, and Tanith said if he told her what to do again, she would break up with him. It was really bad on the drive over, and then at the Gaol where Skulduggery was, Ghastly got mad and said he didn't want to forgive Skulduggery even if he didn't do it because he thinks he likes causing pain and something about something he did before. I don't know what, but he said he didn't believe his story and stormed out and he pushed through us all and I think he accidentally hit Tanith when he pushed passed. She's really bad. She was crying and she's thrown up and was in loads of pain. I really wish you were here. You would have called him back and punched him and made him see what he did. But he just disappeared and Tanith's sick and your brothers are mad, and I don't know what to do Val." A tear fell from her eye and splashed onto Valkyrie's pale, pretty skin. "I promised not to cry. God, I want a hug so bad. I want you to wake up and make it better."

Valkyrie didn't move except to breath.

**.*****.**

The next trip was to the temporary Sanctuary – a little building in the middle of nowhere for meetings – which Nadia opted out of and stayed in the car alone, listening to the radio on low and wallowing in her worry and fear. She'd worked herself up in the hospital and had a bit of a sobbing fit, but all she could think about when she was crying about not having a hug was that Anton had severe burn wounds all over his body and almost all the bones in his chest were broken in at least two places, Tanith was in extreme pain, Valkyrie's brothers had no idea what to do, Solomon was probably being tortured, and Valkyrie might die. She hadn't known what to do except feel so damn awful she had left Valkyrie's side, making her feel worse, and hid in the bathroom for an hour.

She'd scratched at her arms and sobbed, feeling more alone and guilty than ever, scratching until she had to pick skin from under her nails and her arm bled.

She didn't know how to hide the scratches, but had washed them and patted them dry. They were thin but there were a few, so it would take a while to heal. In the safety of the car, she rolled up her sleeve to reassess how they were now she wasn't panicking about someone coming into the bathroom or getting blood on her clothes. They had clotted and she wasn't bleeding, which was a relief, but everywhere her nails had dug in, even where there wasn't a cut, were lines of pink swelling that was incredibly sensitive.

She had promised herself to stop after she got back together with Valkyrie, but this was the fifth time she'd broken that promise, although this time was the worst. The only reason she'd been able to hide it was because she had an abundance of healing stones she used once scratches or cuts healed enough one could be used. That's why in India she had done it to her thighs and waist where the other girls wouldn't see, wouldn't worry, wouldn't get upset.

But the urge, seeing how bad everything suddenly was in Valkyrie's amazing life, had been too much and she hasn't been able to control herself. Now the urge was gone and not only was there the pressure, guilt, social awkwardness and stress, but she was also in pain. And she had a familiar hollow feeling in her stomach. She probably wouldn't throw up anything but water, but she might do it anyway if she kept feeling so bad. Her ability to deal with stress was incredibly awful and too much stress often lead to her feeling so nauseous she threw up. Her parents demanding she somehow "stop having" her "eating disorder" didn't exactly help the situation. She didn't want to do this, she didn't like not fitting her clothes. It wasn't her fault.

She pulled a face at her horrid thoughts and tried to think of something else while she waited.

She ended up playing a stupid game on her phone for almost a full hour, almost until her phone ran out of battery and it was way past seven in the evening, for the others to come back. She put it away in her purse quickly and watched as they tiredly came in and sat down, Dexter in the front and turning on the van without a sound. Erskine closed the back and sat down, rubbing a hand over his face. Tanith was pale and grim but she gave Nadia an unconvincing smile that Nadia smiled back to. Saracen didn't even look at her. They set off.

She tried to stay quiet, didn't even really want to know, but decided she needed to. She knew the rest. Why not? "What happened?"

"They're releasing Skulduggery," Erskine said in a low voice, almost defeated.

"Really?" She asked after a moment of shock.

"Meritorious' orders," Saracen told her, closing his eyes.

"Is it not a good thing?" Saracen, Erskine and Tanith looked at her and she felt herself blush. "I, er, I mean, he's a detective. I know he's done a bad thing, but can't he help find that Craven guy and fight the Spiders?"

Dexter snorted from the front of the car. "He'd try and do it alone and get himself captured again. I say let him go. He'll just end up in another cage."

Nadia bit her lip and sunk down a little into the thin pillow on the floor she was sat on. She'd also learnt in the last few months that she didn't like angry people. She could deal with them if she had to but they generally made her scared, awkward and wish she were anywhere else. Like falling through a hole in the ground, far, far away.

"And then we'll have to rescue him," Erskine pointed out. Dexter made a grumbling sound. "He'll be at the house in the morning."

"We just need some sleep," Tanith said wearily. "Then we'll all talk and deal with this. No matter what, we need a plan to get Solomon back."

"Tomorrow," Saracen said loudly before anyone could make a remark. Valkyrie had never said Saracen was much of a peacekeeper. She'd said he liked stirring things up. A little softer, he continued. "We'll talk tomorrow."

They all fell silent, and Nadia was grateful for it. She avoided looking at anyone on the way back, and in the house, she breathed in the smell of _Valkyrie_. There was a bit of a man smell from all of them that lived there, but mostly it smelt like Valkyrie. It comforted Nadia on one level, but also reminded her immediately of her lack of presence. She always took up so much room, so tall with intense, pretty eyes and black clothes that the recently white painted front entry hall looked cold without her. She followed the others into the parlour.

Tanith already had the phone in her hand and waved her over.

"Hi, can I make an order for, er, four large pizza's, a garlic bread pizza and three sides of wings? Thanks, I want one cheese, one meat feast, one pepperoni, and Nadia, what do you what?"

Nadia made a face and quickly answered, "Vegetarian."

"And a vegetarian." Tanith finished the order by telling them the address and then hung up before pulled Nadia onto the couch with her and dialling another number.

"Who are you calling?" Nadia asked.

"My maternity hospital. The pizza place is literally down the street so you're going to answer the door. There's money in the drawer right there. Then we're going to talk."

Nadia didn't like the sound of that, but she did wait, and twenty minutes later the pizza man came and she answered it and gave the man his money and a five euro tip, making the young man smile happily, and took the food through to the living room. The men had congregated there from wherever in the house they had disappeared to for those last twenty minutes and helped her set the boxes up on the coffee table before ravaging it.

Nadia carefully emptied one of the wing boxes and put a bit of everything in there and put it on the sofa for Tanith, knowing she must be hungry since she was pregnant and all, and then took a slice of pizza for herself. She hadn't liked vegetarian pizza until the girls she shared a room with basically told her that eating anything else was disgusting and didn't allow her to order anything else when they got takeaway. She was lucky in that she had ended up enjoying it, but when she remembered how she found out that like, it saddened her too. Still, she ate a few slices, plus some garlic bread, until she was way passed stuffed.

Tanith put a hand on Nadia's shoulder and Nadia didn't fight the inevitable, though she did start worrying again. Tanith smiled, but it didn't really do anything. Nadia grabbed her bag on the way up.

She was taken, not to her own room, but to Valkyrie's. She frowned at Tanith when the woman sat on the bed heavily. "I thought you'd appreciate a familiar room. This place is kind of big, and since I wasn't sure how long you wanted to stay, I figured you'd rather be in here."

"That's okay," Nadia said.

"I can show you a different one if you like?" Tanith said, watching her closely.

"No, really, it's fine. I – I like this room," she said stupidly and lowered her head. She put her bag down quietly.

"Come sit with me, Nadia," Tanith said quietly, and Nadia went and sat on the bed with her. "Look at me. You need to stop stressing. Okay? Not just about Valkyrie. Not just about Skulduggery. Everything else? Out of your control. Nothing to worry about. Nothing to even think about."

"It's just hard," she found herself saying, her eyes welling up for the trillionth time that day. It had been a really long day.

"I know, honey," Tanith said sympathetically. "But it's how it goes. I want to worry about everything, but that's why we have family. Right now, I have my brothers helping me with pain. I have you helping me with Valkyrie. And even if he is a cowardly dick, I have Ghastly with the baby." _But will he even be there?_ Nadia thought horribly and then shook that disgusting thought far away. _It was a mistake_ , she thought firmly. "This is a tough time, for me and you, and all of us, but we'll cope. Even Valkyrie. I know she'll be okay. Maybe not tomorrow or a week from now, but she will be. And that guilty look in your eye? Don't even bother. You need to forget all ideas of guilt. You've done nothing wrong at all."

"I just feel bad," Nadia said, unconsciously touching her hurt arm. She let it go quickly. "I feel like, if Valkyrie was here, nothing would be wrong. Or at least, it would be ten times simpler to handle."

"Valkyrie's pretty good at solving problems," Tanith said, smiling slightly. Her eyes betrayed how tired she was. "Look, I want to stay and tell you how good it'll be, but I don't know how this is going to turn out, and I really need to pee, and I'm incredibly tired."

Nadia plastered on her smile. "Don't worry. Go sleep and stuff, I'll see you tomorrow."

Tanith didn't look fooled but followed her own advice in not worrying as she hugged Nadia goodnight and left for her room across at the back of the house. Nadia had seen it almost two months ago when she and Valkyrie got back together, but she did wonder what it was like now.

She tried to focus on those cute thoughts of babies as she got in the shower next to Valkyrie's room, but the water stung her arm really bad and she just ended up crying in pain and trying to wash her hair one-handed. She was nearly eighteen, for Christ's sake! And she was there wishing Valkyrie was there to wash her hair, kiss her scratches and wrap her up in a warm towel. If she'd been dating her for the last seven months instead of pushing her out like an idiot, they'd have already done things like that, Nadia bet. Those thoughts led to more, and she ended up standing there for ages, feeling bad about her actions.

She picked herself up, metaphorically, after some ten minutes, and sniffed through the shampoos until she found Valkyrie's and washed her hair with it. She wasn't sure on the body wash but found a nice one anyways and very carefully washed with that, using her hand since using the poof seemed a little too personal. There was a clean stack of towels she could dry with, which she did, and then she hesitated, opened the bathroom door slightly, looked around, and legged it to Valkyrie's room.

In there with the door locked, she forced herself to relax. She found Valkyrie's pyjamas under her duvet where she'd roughly made the bed and smelt them deeply like some weirdo. The comfort Valkyrie's smell gave her when she was alone was overwhelming, almost as much as it had been in India with her old Bespoke work jacket, and the other random clothes left behind. When the smell had worn out she'd been gutted.

She pulled the garments over her naked body, not even bothering to dry her hair even with magic, and curled up in the bed. The pillows smelt just like Valkyrie's hair. She loved that smell.

With a guilty, gut-wrenching feeling in her stomach, she squeezed her eyes shut and wished for sleep.


	114. Skulduggery continues his decent

**For reference ~**

**Tanith is exactly: six months, two weeks, five days**

**Valkyrie is four days in a coma**

* * *

**Chapter 114**

Sleep was difficult to find, but once she was unconscious, she stayed like that until ten the next morning. She had a few blissful moments between sleep and wakefulness where she felt almost nothing at all and stretched through a smile. Then she sagged back into a fatal position as anxiety and some other funny feeling she didn't like filled her belly.

Unfortunately for Nadia, she couldn't stay there wallowing because there was a whole family waiting to do things and she might be holding them up, especially if they wanted to visit Valkyrie and Anton, so she pulled herself out of the gigantic bed and shuffled through her bag for her toiletries.

Once she had cleaned her face, toned it, moisturised and given herself a strict talking to, she dressed and went down to see what was happening, hoping some breakfast might still be around even though it was now about to be eleven.

As soon as she was downstairs, though, she saw she had no reasonable chance of eating even if there was food because Skulduggery Pleasant was already sitting in an armchair by the window and Tanith, Erskine, Dexter and Saracen were sitting around also. They were talking in soft voices but went quiet when she came into the room.

"Nadia," Tanith said, giving her a smile and encouraging her to come closer. She did and sat next to Tanith. "We were talking about how to rescue Solomon."

Nadia's eyes widened a little in shock, but then she nodded quickly and sat back to let that conversation continue.

"We can't take on all the Spider's how we are," Erskine said in a low, but reasonable, voice. He didn't look happy but didn't look as panicky as he had been when the Spider's location had been brought up the day before. "And I can't go there. I know we're down two people, maybe Ghastly too, but I can't go there again."

"That's fine," Dexter said in a strong voice of finality. "We wouldn't expect you to. This needs to be an in and out mission, quiet and quick without anyone noticing we were ever there. And it needs to be quick. They might move on. They might have _already_ moved on."

"They'll know I would have told you where they were," Skulduggery warned. "Anyone going near there will cause the whole place to get ready to kill you, and they always _have_ wanted us all dead. I wouldn't be surprised if they killed Craven for leaving me behind. The only reason they would have remained behind and stayed there is if they are waiting for us."

"Seems about right," Dexter agreed, sitting back in his chair. "No matter what, we are all we have. Tanith and Erskine aren't going, so it's me and Saracen. An easy in and out."

"I can go," Skulduggery said immediately, his head tilting at Dexter. Nadia was suddenly stuck with how much Valkyrie copied her friends.

"You're too involved," Saracen said, glaring at Skulduggery. Nadia couldn't help but agree. "You're not going."

Skulduggery made a move like he was going to argue, but then he sat back a little. She could never tell what he was thinking or felt. "Okay."

"Good," Dexter said, glancing at Saracen who glared down Skulduggery for a few more moments before letting it go.

"Well, I need to get going," Tanith said, pulling herself off the sofa at a strange angle that was apparently most comfortable. "Erskine, are you okay to drive?"

"Sure," he said, and the two of them left the room for whatever they were going to. Nadia was pretty sure it was an appointment with Tanith's midwife from the bits of conversation she'd eavesdropped the day before.

"We should go see Pa and talk about a plan," Dexter said, standing up. Saracen stood after him and they stood close, closer than Nadia had seen them do before, and it was actually nice to see at least one couple seemed strong even though they had difficult things going on in life.

"I can help," Skulduggery said, standing and picking up his hat. "I know the layout."

Dexter and Saracen nodded and they left out the front too, utterly forgetting about Nadia sitting right there on the sofa, watching them leave.

The front door shut.

She watched the Bentley drive away.

Nadia kind of sat there for a moment, thinking about what to do, and then stood up and looked around as if there were some other babysitter around and realised they really had forgotten they were meant to do something with her. Then she remembered she was going to be eighteen in just a few months, and as an almost adult, she was capable of moving around a house she was invited to and willingly – or accidently? – left at alone.

She remembered where the kitchen was from her other infrequent visits but found it had been redesigned in the last few years. There was two sides to the kitchen and it was relatively thin but that was because the counters were extra deep to give more room, and without an island or the old table, there was a lot of movement space. There was a double oven in the middle opposite the window the massive double basin sink looked out of, but there were another two ovens stacked on the wall by the archway that led to the laundry room. The largest fridge freezer Nadia had ever seen in person was opposite those ovens, and when Nadia opened the two double doors, she fully recognised she and Valkyrie could sit in there comfortably and still have a ton of food with them.

The top shelf of the fridge had a bunch of plastic containers, and Nadia pulled two of the boxes down to see it was leftovers. One of the boxes on the very right side she stretched to reach was a fruit salad that was a little brown but when she opened it, it smelt fresh so she kept it for her own. She then picked out a smaller tub that had a boring looking tomato pasta. She heated that up in the massive industrial microwave and went to the living room to eat her breakfast cross lunch in front of the television.

She was incredibly full by the end of the meal, but once her half hour show was over, she felt peckish already, and since she was alone, she wandered over into the kitchen for a little more.

"Hi, Nadia," Fletcher said.

Nadia screeched and dropped the tubs and her fork on the floor where it clattered.

"Oh. Sorry," he said, and teleported closer and picked it up for her. His girlfriend, Myra, who Valkyrie said she didn't particularly like, was by the ovens mixing something together and gave her a smile. "Where are the others?"

"Um, Tanith is at her maternity place because she's not well, Erskine is driving her and the others went to the temporary Sanctuary I think." She took the tubs from him and started putting them in the dishwasher. "I don't know where Ghastly is. He was with us yesterday and then he disappeared."

"I picked him up yesterday and took him to his shop," Fletcher said, frowning. "What happened? He was really mad."

"Him and Tanith had a fight because Ghastly was telling her what to do and she's sick of it, and then we went to see Skulduggery in an old Gaol and he got mad and told him he wouldn't forgive Skulduggery no matter what, and he pushed through us to leave, because he was so mad, and pushed into Tanith," she explained, leaving out some of the gory details since Nadia didn't know how much the others, particularly Tanith, wanted other people to know. "To be honest, I don't think he realised at all that he pushed her, but she got really ill and threw up and was in a lot of pain."

"Damn," Fletcher said. "I haven't really been up to date since the Sanctuary blew up. I've just been moving stuff and waiting for a new Sanctuary to, you know, move more stuff."

"Neither, until yesterday," Nadia admitted, closing the dishwasher and turning to face him. Myra was balling up her mixture with her hands and putting the chocolate chip biscuit dough on a sheet. "Tanith asked me to live here so I could easier see Valkyrie in hospital. I don't know if you know, but she's in a coma. Tanith thinks that me talking to her might help her come back."

"Oh god," Fletcher whispered with wide eyes. He obviously hadn't been told anything. "What does the doctor say?"

"Doctor Kenspeckle? I haven't spoken to him, but Tanith said that _he_ said that she should wake up, but he can't say when. Even if I don't help, me and Tanith agree that some people can hear when they're in coma's so it helps for me to be there. I'm meant to be basically talking to her non-stop."

"But, why didn't they take you there before they went out?" Fletcher asked.

Nadia smiled a little bitterly. "Well, yesterday, after talking to Skulduggery, they spoke to Elder Deuce and the Grand Mage and they decided to let Skulduggery go on the grounds that he was forced to bring the bomb in after being tortured, so it kind of wasn't his fault, and they believe that someone else was with him that blew the Sanctuary up. I'm on their side about that, but they let him go, and I don't think anyone's really comfortable about it until Valkyrie's awake and says what she saw. After all that, he turned up this morning and they were talking about rescuing Solomon. Tanith and Erskine left, and then the other three did, and I think they forgot I was there."

"Yeah, I know how _that_ feels," Fletcher said, leaning back on the counter. "Hey, do you want me to take you to see Valkyrie? You can give me a call and I can bring you back if you want."

Nadia considered it and then nodded. "That would be really nice."

"That's okay," he grinned and without even seeing him move, she felt his hand on her shoulder and she was suddenly in the Hibernian Cinema.

Nadia swayed and with a turn of her stomach, she threw up all over the floor.

"Ah, sorry," Fletcher said from the other side of the room. "I forget that happens sometimes."

She choked up the last of the throw-up and spat it out before standing back up. "It's fine," she said, already regretting not eating more and not bringing something with her, and then the assistant Civet came in.

"Oh no," he said lightly, giving her a smile. "First time teleporting? Everyone has the same reaction. Are you two here to see Valkyrie?"

"Yeah," Nadia said, wishing she had some water, and despite it not being her first time. It was just the first time she hadn’t prepared herself. Civet sent the two of them to the back to go and see Valkyrie, who was in the exact same position as she was yesterday when Nadia left her, pale and breathing on the bed. Civet gave them a smile and went off, presumably to clean her throw up, which she could already feel herself getting guilty over, damn it, but tried to ignore that part of her so she could focus on Valkyrie.

After taking her moment to take in the girl, she came forward and stroked her hair back, feeling how silky it still was after four days of being unconscious. "It's weird," she said absently. "Her hair is still soft."

Fletcher stood on Valkyrie's other side and looked at her face sadly. "It is," he said, not touching it or really making a move at all. "She apologised a few months ago, and I asked to have Myra live with me, and didn't bother to see her after. I didn't even go to the Ball, even when she made them put me and Myra on the list. I asked Ghastly about it once, a month ago or so, and he said she had argued for me and had been disappointed I didn't come but was thrilled you were dating her again. I don't think Valkyrie really wanted to cut me out, but the others don't really like me."

"You said you spoke to Ghastly?" Nadia said.

He shrugged. "I ask something, he answers. Not much, is it?"

"They have a close-knit family," Nadia commented. "It's hard to fit in when they're so tight. They can hold hands or kiss, or hug, or even sleep in each-others bed and it's not weird because they just have so much trust and love. It's not something most people can get in on."

"You've managed it," he said.

"Not really," she said quietly, pulling on a lock of Valkyrie's hair and beginning to braid it. "I'm close with Valkyrie, but no more than she is with Dexter, or Erskine, or Tanith. I mean, they're family, they should be. But I'm not really that close with the others. I know more about Anton than the other Dead Men, and that's only because _everyone's_ met Anton through the Midnight Hotel. I slept there when I was a kid once when we went to India. I even spoke to him, but I was really young."

"Is… is that Anton over there?" Fletcher asked, looking at the end of the ward.

Nadia nodded. "I think he should wake up soon. He did already once, but he's still ill so he was put back to sleep so he could heal. I think Doctor Kenspeckle's mad because he was already hurt before he pulled Valkyrie out of the fires."

"I didn't know he did that."

Nadia just nodded and found herself wishing Valkyrie could wrap her up in her strong arms and cuddle her until she fell asleep.

"I heard things weren't so great at your house," Fletcher said.

Nadia shrugged. "It's okay," she said shortly.

Fletcher rocked on his feet for a moment and stuck his hands in his pockets. "You know, I had a pretty bad home life a few years ago too. It was a bit different, and I know we don't know each other much, but I wouldn't mind talking to you if you want. I know how it can get overwhelming sometimes, even when you love your folks and they love you and all. Like you wish you could be somewhere else and recreate those good times you used to have with someone else, without the bad memories hanging on. I mean, how else could I suddenly get the ability to Teleport other than wishing really hard? Just, I'm here if you want it."

Nadia swallowed back a ball of emotion in her throat. "Thank you. I appreciate it."

**.*****.**

Nadia stayed at the hospital for an hour with Fletcher, just talking about things that had happened recently, particularly the Spiders and what they thought and knew between them, before heading back to the mansion for food. Although she loved being with Valkyrie, she felt nauseous with hunger, so it was good to finally get something in her after throwing her breakfast up.

Myra was in the kitchen just taking out a tray of biscuits when they teleported in. The second time wasn't so bad on her stomach, but Nadia still swayed while the couple hugged. Luckily, that was the extent of the damage that time.

"Did you have lunch?" Fletcher asked Myra. Nadia went to the fridge and got out an apple and a yoghurt.

"No, I thought we could get sushi," she answered. "Don't touch my cookies. They're for dessert."

"Fine. We can do that. Hey, Nadia," Fletcher said. Nadia turned from chopping her apple into chunks. "If you want to see Valkyrie again later, just give me a call. I don't mind taking you."

She smiled. "Thank you."

He smiled back and a moment later he and Myra were gone, the tray of fresh, warm biscuits left on the side to cool. Nadia's mouth watered just looking at them, but she wasn't sure how her tummy would be after stuffing herself and then throwing up, so she mixed her yoghurt into the apples and stuck with that. She could make her own later if she wanted.

Nadia looked around the living room and felt her heart sink just a little. It was even lonelier now.

She decided it was best to go lay on Valkyrie's bed and relax with her snack, but didn't even get to the stairs before she heard a car rolling down the gravel and ran back into the living room like a kid to see who it was. It was the Bentley. But only Skulduggery was in it.

She still wasn't completely comfortable with his presence but tried to look casual on the couch. He shut the front door quietly and she watched as he came straight into the living room and sat opposite her.

"Nadia," he said quietly. "I have something I need to ask of you."

Nadia cleared her throat and put her bowl down on the coffee table. "Umm, what do you need?"

"I need to know if you would help me get Solomon back?"

She felt her heart skip a beat from shock and abhorrence to being anywhere near any place Solomon was being kept captive. The Children of the Spider's where there! " _What_?"

"The others think the best way to get Solomon back is to go in quietly, get Solomon, and leave. I think they're underestimating the Spiders," he explained, fiddling with the rim of his hat and staring at her intently with his gaping holes for eyes. " I think one person, small enough to fit in the vents, is the way to go. They have ventilation tubing throughout the safehouse, and I don't believe they allow smaller, real spiders in there because they use fans in the forging area, so it'll be safe to crawl through and get to Solomon."

"That's a bad idea," she squeaked. "You – I can't fit in a vent."

"You can, because Valkyrie can," he said as if that was all she needed. "I'll draw out a map, and all you'll need to do is follow it to Solomon. You won't go near any mage whatsoever."

"But – but what about getting him out the cell?" Nadia asked. "Solomon must be locked up, right? I can't get him out."

"You will be able to," he said and reached into his jacket pocket for something. He held it out to Nadia and she took it. It was a golden coloured string. "That's a String Blade. It's an old idea, but this one's brand new. Just wrap it around the bars of Solomon's cell and rub it back and forth, and it'll break."

"Dexter and Saracen won't like that," she whispered, staring at the string.

"No, they won't," Skulduggery said, and Nadia looked up at him. She could hear the remorse in his voice. "I'm going to tell them you went to your house while you're rescuing Solomon. I'll be there to collect you and him, and if anything happens, I'll be able to come in and help you. I'll have your back."

"I – I don't really want to be involved in this," she said, her heart beating wildly. "They'll be really mad."

"Not with you," he said, dropping the hat on the table. "But the Spider's will realise Dexter and Saracen are in the safehouse in minutes. They'll kill Solomon and take those two hostage and use them to get to Erskine. _Their_ plan won't work, but this will, and if we do it now, there's no chance of Dexter and Saracen going and getting caught."

" _I'll_ get caught. I'm meant to be here for Valkyrie," she said, standing up suddenly. She didn't know what to do. "Why can't you fit through the vents?"

"I'm too big," he explained. "You're small enough to get around the bends in the vents and light enough to be quiet. You have to trust me, Nadia. You're our only chance. You're Solomon's only chance."

"I– I–" she tried, and rushed around him. "I'm going to the loo."

She ran there, sprinted down the hall, and locked the door firmly behind her. She sat on the loo and thought about Skulduggery's words, thought about if what he was saying was right or wrong or worth it or anything at all. All she could think was that she knew nothing about attacking or breaking into a place, and she had no idea how Skulduggery thought she'd get into a vent in the first place let alone crawl all the way to Solomon.

She splashed her face with water and took some deep breaths until her hands were shaking a little less and went back to see Skulduggery. He was sitting in the same place waiting for her.

"How do you think I'd get into the vent?" She asked him, sitting down on the edge of the sofa.

"There's a maintenance shed outside that will let you into the vent shaft. It used to be a full house, but now it is just a small shed, they don't bother guarding it. You'll be fine getting into it, the safehouse is concealed by trees," he told her. “It’s already been scoped out.”

Nadia nodded, clenching and unclenching her hands. "And then I'd follow the map you'll make me to find Solomon, use the String to break him out. Right?"

"That's exactly right. Will you do it?"

Nadia took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and thought about Valkyrie. She would want her to. She would probably she proud she did something so good, but she was also scared, so, so very scared of the Spiders. Still, she felt herself nod. Saracen and Dexter were going to run headfirst into the Spiders if she didn't. They could be letting their hate of Skulduggery get in the way of a good plan. She just wished they'd agreed so she didn't have to do it. "Yes."

"Excellent. We need to leave now."


	115. Saving Solomon

**Chapter 115**

The drive was intense as Skulduggery told her things she should and shouldn't do or look out for while Nadia tried her hardest to remember it all but was so worried about the mission, as Skulduggery called it, that she wasn't retaining any of what he said.

They travelled for hours, Skulduggery only stopping once so she could go to the loo and get something to eat so she wouldn't, as he said, "pass out during the mission." She'd ignored his words but had used the loo and bought a sandwich which she put on the floor by her feet. She was far too stressed to eat.

The last hour of the ride, she thought over her plan and tried to memorise some of the map he'd drawn out and by the time they came to a jarring stop, she knew the map by heart which helped solidify some of the points she needed to remember.

"And you promise we can go to Kenspeckle's after?" She asked him, taking one last deep breath.

"I swear," he told her solemnly, holding out a hand. "Thank you, Nadia. You're the best shot we've got."

She took his hand lightly, barely even touching his fingers, and gave him the smallest handshake that hopefully let him know she didn't like any of what she was doing but understood she had to do it.

The first part of her mission was to travel to the town which was the other side of a large cluster of trees, too small to be a woods, but somewhat large. That took her half an hour. Then she was in a small town, which she had to go around, and that took the best part of forty-five minutes. By then, she had her personal plans down on what to do if bad things happened. Then was going across a farm filled with cabbages and corn which was the worst part because it had rained that night and she got covered in mud over the twenty minutes that took her, bringing it to the early evening. She could see the maintenance shed in the distance as Skulduggery had described it.

She could also see the seemingly abandoned and ruined castle that was essentially the top of a giant anthill. She could see between two hills the end of the sea where it met the sky in the far away distance.

Feeling her heart thud painfully, she walked carefully over to the maintenance shed, hunched behind a row of bushes, and looked around carefully before breaking the lock with a force of air in the mechanism and went straight in.

She held her breath at first, fearing she'd be immediately jumped on by Spiders, but when she clicked her fingers, she found the shed was blissfully empty. Just as Skulduggery told her, there was a bunch of rusted and old tools, and an extractor fan, a massive one with dust covering it. She didn't have much time until it was the evening, but she predicted another hour before the Spider's would be working since they lived nocturnally according to Skulduggery. Using the air, she blasted a hole in the dirt that acted as a floor and used her hands to dig out a hole around the tubing that would lead under the castle. Nadia shook her head, trying to imagine how Skulduggery could have possibly known where the vents and extractors where, before using some precision magic to make a large hole in the bend of the vent.

Some rats ran the opposite way.

Shivering and wishing she was at home, or Valkyrie's home anyway, she kicked off her mud-caked shoes, crawled into the hole and began army crawling in the narrow metal vent before she could talk herself out of this stupid plan. She'd do it for Valkyrie and her brothers. She'd prove she was strong enough to handle the pressure and save Solomon. So long as she didn't pass out with fear first.

The directions she had to take were very simple, so long as she kept to them and no one turned on any furnaces before she was done. She knew when she had reached the castle tunnels because the vent began to look rusty and she could see mesh and run off tunnels going to other parts of the building. As silently as she could, she shuffled along and passed the mesh hole in the vent, seeing nothing except a gentle flame on a desk.

Remaining just as silent, Nadia continued down the vent, seeing more and more mesh and grate holes light up and she knew she was cutting it close on time. There was a certain corner she needed to pass, and she was sure she should have been now by then but couldn't know in the dark. The little lights did nothing more than make her wary of the Spiders and other mages around her.

She found the corner she wanted quite suddenly, by banging her head against the corner of the vent pipe she was in.

It had a thudding noise and although she was in enough pain to cry, she bit her lip and listening carefully. No sounds were made. She hoped that meant no one heard her and, trying not to think of them coming to get her, she gently lowered herself, front first, down the curve.

Even with magic slowing her, the going down part was quick and she only stopped herself going squish by an inch.

Gently, she pulled herself so she was flat in the vent rather than curving with the pipe, and heard as motors began whirring as the extractor fans began being used for the forgers and other workers in the bowels of the tunnels. She had hoped to have passed them by then, but at least it wasn't hot yet. That would take several minutes. Her heart thudding like a drum, she crept quietly through the vent, warm air, dust and tiny metal flakes hitting her face as the extractor fans did their job. She didn't want to risk anyone noticing her magic, so she squinted her eyes and held her breath as she made her way through the big rooms. As she got to the end of the hallway, she heard voices, the first ones since she had begun, and carefully slowed down to avoid any noise whatsoever.

She didn't know who any of the people were, but she listened closely as she silently crawled above them.

"It's better to cut them off from their alliances," one mage was saying. "Without an alliance, the Sanctuary won't be able to call for help."

"Without the threat of help, other countries will move in," another, more rough voice, said. "We can't compete with the whole of the world."

"We can make them all hate Ireland though," a sly voice said. "We always have the problem of either alliances coming to help or having enemies try to take Ireland. But if we make Ireland look weak and incapable, we will be causing problems for the Sanctuary, and the alliances won't believe Ireland is worth helping because it makes them look back, but allows the Sanctuary to spend all their time keeping the enemies out rather than us."

"They may work together," the second voice warned.

"They will not," the first declared. "They hate each other too much. Mages have no loyalty whatsoever, even to their own people."

Nadia knew she should keep better concentration on what those Spider's wanted to do in order to take over Ireland, seeing as she had the opportunity, but she was more concerned with getting to Solomon and luckily, she was through the room those Spider's where in and could move into what Skulduggery had told her where the cells.

It was sooner than she thought but she had been in the pipes for at least forty minutes by then. She could feel her body sweating badly and her shoulders were shaking from the strain.

The holes in the vents where sparser and had thick metal bars covering them to keep them from being used in the way Nadia was, but there was meant to be one that had a grate over it that Skulduggery thought she could loosen. If not, she had to blast that too, but she was comfortable with her options despite the threat of death. Due to the many cells, the vent went in a loop, and Nadia chose to go to the left to try and find it, as Skulduggery had not been able to tell her the exact location.

There was no light in the direction she chose, and she didn't know what that meant, and without any air being used through the vent in these parts, she could taste the stagnant dust and something horrid that probably included rotting human waste and something infected. She could hear the rats though. Rats on the floor, scuttering around, others in the vents ahead of her. They were probably the only reason she hadn't been found out. She had to stop just to let a shiver run through her.

On the second curve of the square loop she made, she saw a dim light, so tiny she wouldn't have noticed it if it wasn't so pitch black, but she knew that wasn't necessarily good. She crawled closer and heard whimpering as she did. She swallowed back bile.

Through a sealed, metal hole in the vent, she could see a single candle and not far from that, two men. One was dressed in black and she could see he was a Necromancer, and she had a mini heart attack before realising that the Necromancer was not Solomon. No, the naked man on the floor with red skin was Solomon. Pale, broken bones and bleeding on the dirt and stone floor, the shadows of rats scurrying around the men. The standing Necromancer must have been Craven, a man Valkyrie had told her about. He was torturing Solomon.

And if he found out she was there, he'd do the same to her.

She was so frightened Craven might notice her she didn't dare make a noise despite her awkward position. Craven moved beneath her, out of sight, and there was some scraping of metal on metal. His whispering voice cut the air. "I'm glad you're still alive," he said. Nadia could hear the grin in Craven's voice. "I've wanted you dead for a long time. It's only right I get to do the honours."

 _Oh no_ , Nadia thought. _I can't fight a Necromancer!_

"You've made a disgrace of Irish Necromancer's for centuries, and now you think partnering with Skulduggery Pleasant is acceptable? The Skeleton is our enemy. You were the one that told us to work against the Dead Men in the war. But now you have changed your mind in the most _despicable_ way possible." Craven came back into view, his shadows swirling around his feet. "You're going to die here, Wreath. It's been four days. They're not letting Pleasant go. They're not even asking him where to find you. You're just as forgotten and pathetic as you were when he left you the first time."

Nadia flinched as Craven's hand suddenly shot out and the blade had sheathed itself in Solomon's stomach.

"It's not the way I would have wanted it. Not as public," Craven said as Wreath writhed on the floor, moaning and gurgling. "But it'll do. When your body is dumped on the doorstep of the Dead Men's house and it's reported to Pleasant – they'll know you're only a warning. The girl is next."

"Ng – ng –" Solomon gurgled, staring at Craven in the dim light. "Ng Val-gry."

"'Not Valkyrie'? Are you asking me to spare the girl her life?" Craven chuckled into the night. "Wreath, the rumours I told you of what happened to her in Grievers Down is only the beginning of what I'll do to her."

Getting progressively louder, Craven laughed and walked away as Solomon writhed on the floor and reached out to Craven, trying to use the last of his strength to get to the man. It was all for nothing, as Craven's footsteps faded and eventually his laughing did too.

With goosebumps on her arms, Nadia swallowed carefully and got her String out of her pocket and carefully wrapped it around one of the bars.

She rubbed it back and forth and it practically melted through the metal, giving her a boost of confidence even though she was shaking all over. She did all the top parts of the bars, and then carefully did the bottom, grabbing the bars before they fell and putting them off to the side. When she had a hole, she poked her head out, saw no one but Solomon with his eyes closed and breathing gaspingly, and shoved her arms out, then pushed herself headfirst from the vent. It was difficult and it pulled her trousers down a bit, but she got herself out and used the air to stop herself mid-air and land on her feet. She yanked the trousers back up and went to Solomon's side.

"Mr Wreath?" Nadia said very quietly. She put a hand on his cheek and felt how frozen it was. Solomon opened his eyes at her and she could see the recognition when his eyebrows went up. "Mr Wreath, I'm here to help you. I – I don't know how, but – but we need to leave, okay? Um, I –" she felt herself tear up. "Skulduggery sent me to get you, but I don't know what to do now I've found you. You can't stand. Can you?"

He drew in a gurgling breath. "Ca-gne"

"C – Cane? You mean your Necromancy item?" Nadia looked around them. "Um, it's not here. Mr Wreath, if I leave you I might not find you, or you might die. I can't find it. Oh god, this was a bad idea."

Shakily, he raised his arm and pointed at a cell door. She stood and looked through, and sure enough, half a stick was in there, black and barely visible in the light. She used her control of the air again and slid it from its resting place to where Solomon was on the floor.

He grasped it in his hand and she could immediately see shadows wrapping around him. She quickly rushed to his side, deathly afraid of being left there behind, and grabbed his upper arm, seeing as the rest of it was mangled and she didn't want to know what that felt like. With an ease Nadia hadn't expected, Solomon shadow walked them. So easy to leave, but with his cane locked away... Nadia knew that must have been a torture in itself.

Nadia looked around quickly when they had finished and saw they were outside, but still in the castle, the top, abandoned part. It had started to spit with rain and the sky was a dark orange as the sun set on the sea behind them. She laughed in relief, wondering if that was how Valkyrie felt after her missions, and then looked back at Solomon.

He looked a lot worse in the sun.

She almost panicked, not knowing what to do with a brutally tortured, bleeding, naked man with a knife in his stomach, but her head pulled her back to the time she had had her basic medical training at school, so she stood and used the air to pick Solomon up, although it was getting difficult to use her magic now she was so exhausted from everything else. Taking a deep breath, she directed Solomon's floating body in front of her, and started to jog across the field.

She got as far as the maintenance shed at the end of the field before she had to stop, breathing heavily and knowing she was done for if she couldn't keep going. Surely the Spider's knew something was up? How couldn't they? She just couldn't be sure because she knew nothing about tactics or keeping watch or anything like that. But in her head, she knew they had to have been someone around. So she surely only have a small amount of time left. And it took another twenty minute walk at a fast pace to get to the town.

She felt like crying, but kept moving, walking on shaky legs and hoping she could find something or someone that could help her. She should have known it was no use. Behind her, she heard a shout and saw a group of Spiders, maybe six of them, advancing steadily. They were already almost on her. Her heart skipped a beat and she nearly dropped Solomon.

One of the Spider's began transforming.

She screamed and tried to run, keeping Solomon in mid-air but wobbling up and down dangerously, running for their lives even though she was so exhausted she wasn't going at more than a jog and she could feel her sobbing tears falling from her eyes and making her stumble over the uneven ground. She just wanted to curl up in a ball and have her dad hold her until she was safe, or have Valkyrie jump in and save her as she had before.

She could hear as the Spider, in gigantic Spider form, caught up to her, jumped on its hind legs and –

She fell to her knees, screaming and crying for help, covering her face. But no pain came.

"It's okay," Fletcher said, putting a hand on her back. "You're safe now."


	116. Worthless

**Chapter 116**

To say it was bad was a lie.

Not a little, insignificant thing, or a mediocre event you'd feel guilty about but one day be able to mention with a smile and maybe get a few teasing remarks about.

This was so bad that she'd run to the bathroom in fear of the consequences and hadn't even been able to pull her trousers down before she wet herself. She hadn't wet herself since she was three. She'd felt as if she might when she was stupid and didn't go before a car trip as a little girl, and she felt like it when she was being tickled, or perhaps trampolining. But out of fear? Never. She'd been mortified. Luckily, Fletcher had collected her bag from Valkyrie's room so she could change out of the mud and dust and other muck so she wouldn't look so beaten up before she'd had to admit to it, so no one knew, but it was in her head.

Not as much as how awful she felt.

Before Tanith, Dexter, Saracen and Erskine arrived at Kenspeckle's where Fletcher had taken her, Solomon had been whisked away to be treated, at which point Nadia had been crying into Fletcher, and then when she had stopped he had kindly told her the others were on their way and she had realised that they would know what she did without permission and that they might just be mad that she risked her life and Solomon's in getting him back. She had already known that, had worked that out before she'd gotten out of Skulduggery's car – but she'd been focused and hadn't thought of the _real_ consequences. In a way, she'd done well because that focus was what Valkyrie spoke about feeling, and she was a rescuing expert to Nadia.

But she wasn't Valkyrie, and she'd been so scared she had run to the loo and peed herself. Then was the joint panic of peeing herself and everyone on their way, then she'd changed, then she double checked the locks on the bathroom door and sat on the floor after using the wet room shower to clean herself and the floor as well as she could without any cleaners available.

She knew exactly when they arrived because she could hear the loud voices and the front door slamming loudly against the wall.

With the two assistants and Kenspeckle busy with Solomon, she had thought they'd find her immediately. Her ribcage shook violently from shivering with fear and she ground her teeth so no one would hear her crying, but she was saved once more by Fletcher when she heard him shout for the angry voices, she couldn't quite discern what each person said, to stop. They had, but only for a moment. She listened through her crying.

"Renn, did you find them?" A man snapped. She had heard that voice once before at the Requiem Ball. That was Elder Deuce. "Out with it!"

"Yeah, I found them," Fletcher snapped back irritably. "Kenspeckle and the others took Solomon to the back for surgery, he's already in there. He looked like hell, but it was him."

"Are you sure?" Elder Deuce asked immediately, and she could hear someone was pacing. The bathroom door was in the waiting area, where they were, so she could hear them well now. Her sobs lessened to silent tears. She was so exhausted.

"Yes," Fletcher replied, a wariness in his voice. "Nadia was with him. She had him in mid-air, carrying him out. A giant freak of a spider was about to jump on her, but I was able to get to her first."

There was a moment of silence. "Good lad, then," Elder Deuce said, and she could hear him pat Fletcher. "But we have to know. Where's the girl?"

Nadia felt her heart begin to race. _'Where's the girl?'_ That – that sounded like a threat, something sad and distressing like bad, bad news. Unable to help it, her nails began cutting into her arms over the unhealed, already sore scratches she'd been hiding these last few days.

"Nadia's fine," Fletcher said instead. "She's just really upset. I think she was scared of the spider thing."

"Yes, but where is she now?" Tanith asked in a hard voice. Nadia didn't like that either. She put her head in her arms and balled herself up tight with her legs pressing into her chest. They would find her. Only a matter of time. She took a mouthful of arm flesh in her mouth and clenched on it. Her sobs felt quieter.

"She needs space," Fletcher said in her defence. "Shouldn't you be getting Skulduggery or something? He's the one that did the wrong thing, not Nadia."

"The girls old enough to know not to invade on a Sanctuary operation," Elder Deuce said in his gruff voice. She'd heard he was a fair man, but he was also meant to be mean if people didn't do what he wanted. She was fucked. "The moment she agreed to do anything Skulduggery Pleasant told her, she defied the Sanctuary. She put lives at risk, she put the _country_ at risk! We can't have the Spider's keep a child hostage! We'd have to give them everything to save her, and she went in there alone with no type of protection. What did she _think_ would happen? That Pleasant would just steal in after her and - and fetch her if things went badly!?"

Nadia bit down harder, trying to muffle her crying screams. She was such an idiot! She had thought stupid things like that, it wasn't even worth telling herself she had panicked or had been too busy trying to _live_ to think of those things, she was just a stupid, worthless idiot that had wanted to impress Valkyrie with being strong and capable so much she'd almost ruined _everything_.

"Skulduggery manipulated her!" Fletcher shouted. There was a long silence where Nadia had to hold her breath. "Do you think she'd do that without thinking? I barely know Nadia but I know she's not stupid enough to think of something like this herself. She isn't in a good place, is she? Her parents are fighting, her girlfriend's in a coma, and just this morning you all left her without saying a word, so I doubt she thought she had much choice when Skulduggery came around telling her she had to save Solomon or something awful would happen."

There were low growls and footsteps moving around, probably considering his words. Nadia let go of her bloody grip on her arm and shoved the palms of her hands into her eyes hard enough to create white splodges on the inside. She wished she just _die_. She didn't even deserve Valkyrie. She'd done nothing for her. What was the _point_? She did _not_ want to do this.

"You can't just grab her and expect her to smile and think everything's fine," Fletcher continued, this time in a much quieter voice, almost like he was grumbling at the floor, maybe with his hand in his pockets. "She knows she fucked up, but when she got here, she was just happy to be alive and away from the spider-thing. She was really upset. I bet she already knows how bad things are so you don't need to make it worse. And anyway, Valkyrie wouldn't want you to be mad at her."

"He's right," Dexter said after a moments silence, his tone defeated. "Neither would Solomon."

Nadia hugged her legs tightly and held her breath as long as she could, trying to stop the tears and maybe pass out forever while she was at it.

"We can't let her get away with what she's done," Elder Deuce said in a way Nadia couldn't describe. It made her breath out slowly and then back in. "Solomon is back, and we need an explanation. Pleasant already told multiple people that he sent her in."

There was a long silence before Fletcher once more spoke up. "Tell them I did it." There was another short pause. "What? It makes sense, right? Tell people I went through the vent like Skulduggery was saying, and that when I got to Solomon, I just teleported us out. More believable than whatever Nadia actually did to get out, and I don't even know what that was yet."

"It's not bad," Saracen said in consideration. "The Spider's still know she did it though. She's in danger."

"We'll deal with that later," Tanith told them. "We still need to see Nadia. She's probably shaken."

"You can say that again," Nadia heard Fletcher mutter from behind the door. She felt her chest start shaking in fear again. She wasn't ready! She pulled her sleeves down over her freshly bloody arms and wiped her face of blood. There was a knock on the door and Nadia felt the hysterics rising up again. "Nadia?"

She didn't say anything. Maybe they'd go away. She shuffled back so she was huddled under the floating sink and then, smartly, pushed her legs out so no one could open the door since it swung inwards. She was too short to reach it, but it felt better. She clenched her fists tensely.

There was some movement behind the door and it was knocked gently a second time, this time by Tanith. "Nadia? Are you okay?"

She said nothing.

"I'm sorry we left without saying anything this morning. We were all stressed, but we still should have at least said something to you. Is it okay if I come in?"

In Nadia's mind, being incredibly pessimistic about life at that moment, she heard Tanith's words as a fake apology uttered only to lure her into opening the door. She said nothing and hugged herself.

"We need to come in Nadia. I promise you're not in trouble," Tanith tried again. "I just want to make sure you’re okay. You really scared me." Doubt filled her when she heard the emotion in Tanith's voice. Doubt in her decision not to believe Tanith, and doubt as to whether Tanith said the truth. "I'm sorry, Nadia, but if you don't open the door I'm going to open it for you." The raw fear came back. "One last chance." A few seconds went by and Nadia brought her legs up to hug. There was no point anyway.

The lock clicked and the door was opened a moment later by Tanith, the others standing just a little way behind her. She clenched her jaw to stop her teeth from chattering.

Honestly, the only comforting sight was Fletcher in that moment.

"Come on, get off the bathroom floor," Tanith commanded softly. Although she was afraid she might burst out crying again, she could see the men frowning seriously at each other at the back of the waiting room so she got herself onto her shaking legs and left the bathroom, hugging herself still and probably blotchy faced. She wanted to thank Fletcher, and did in her head, but couldn't bring herself to speak. Tanith led her into the back ward where Valkyrie and Anton were.

There was a long moment of silence after they sat on the empty bed next to Valkyrie's. She'd been there earlier that morning with Fletcher and it felt like days ago rather than hours. Valkyrie was still breathing, a peaceful look on her face that hid anything that might be going on in her unconscious mind. Nadia was at least glad she wouldn't see her like this.

"One of the monitors is gone," Tanith remarked, looking at Valkyrie.

Nadia stared and after a moment her tired brain caught up to the same realisation. She didn't know which one, but that was an amazing thing because obviously something in Valkyrie had changed since midday, and that change was more than likely a good one. Despite all the bad things going on, Nadia managed a smile for a few seconds. Then she looked down at her lap in shame for not noticing before. "I'm sorry," she said, talking to Valkyrie and Tanith.

Tanith sighed, leaning back so her large belly had room. "I thought you were dead." Nadia didn't say anything. What could she say? "Skulduggery left a message with the Administrator four hours ago saying he'd taken you to the Spider’s den and left you there. It took half an hour for someone to hear the message, and then longer for them to tell Corrival because he was in a private meeting in a secret location. It was only an hour ago we all had all the details, and now Skulduggery isn't answering his phone. You're lucky Fletcher had visited the area before."

"I know," she whispered pathetically.

"Nadia, what made you think going for Solomon alone was a good idea?"

Nadia tried to think of a reason, but her guilt and sadness combined with tiredness made her mind blank, as if there was even a good answer to that question. She just shrugged.

Tanith sighed and rubbed her belly in discomfort. Nadia felt bad for making the woman stress. "What did Skulduggery tell you?"

"He told me that Dexter and Saracen were going to go in together and get Solomon, but that they'd be spotted going in and the Spiders would probably kill Solomon and take them prisoner to get to Erskine and the rest of your family, and the only good way for someone to get Solomon was for them to sneak through the vents, and that I'm the only one big enough. I was really scared, but he said that if I didn't, Solomon, Dexter and Saracen would die."

"He lied," Tanith told her softly, and Nadia felt her tears well up. "Nadia, they all knew Saracen and Dexter were too obvious, Corrival told them so, while Skulduggery was still there. They were organising for a friend of Dexter's to come that specialised in rescuing hostages, and they were going to send her in. They were never in any danger."

"Really?" Nadia asked, and then immediately began to blubber. Tanith sat up and wrapped an arm around her but Nadia felt so awful she leaned away and curled up in a ball on the bed, the betrayal and – and whatever feeling being manipulated into risking being tortured to death brought. Tanith didn't leave, but started to rub her back soothingly until, some minutes later, she had run herself dry. Her head felt dizzy.

"Can you tell me what happened? I'll tell Corrival for you," Tanith offered.

Nadia opened her eyes and stared and the bars on the end of the hospital bed blankly. "I went through the maintenance shed into the vents and followed a map Skulduggery gave me to the cells. A Necromancer, I think he was Craven, was hurting Solomon. He was saying that he was glad he could kill him and that he was going to kill Valkyrie. Solomon tried to tell him not to, and Craven laughed and said something like 'I'll do worse to her than the rumours about what happened in – in' – I forgot what the name was. Grieves something. Then he left and I used this String thing Skulduggery gave me to get out of the vent and I got Solomon's cane and he shadow walked us out."

"And then you tried to leave and the Spider's chased you before Fletcher teleported you out," Tanith finished. "Alright, I'll tell him. Get some rest now."

Nadia nodded lamely, seeing Tanith waddle out of the room between the bars, and then stared uselessly until she fell asleep.


	117. She's awake!

**Chapter 117**

Nadia woke up still curled up in the hospital bed some hours later and looked around the ward, seeing one of the other patients were gone. For a moment, she made herself feel happy for the person since they were able to go home before she thought back over the previous day and clenched her eyes shut.

Someone had put her bag by her feet, and Nadia reached in and grabbed a pain leaf she had put in there from Valkyrie's room to help her scratched arm and sore, aching muscles, before grabbing her phone.

Her mother had sent her texts. They were all the same, as her letters were, asking where she was, what she was doing, when she would be home. Nadia deleted the one-sided conversation entirely so she wouldn’t have to see it and put it away.

To ease her heart, she went over to Valkyrie's bed and took her hand in her own. She couldn't bring herself to tell her what had happened. She just said that Fletcher saved Solomon, and then she felt numb guilt once more and carefully laid down in the bed with Valkyrie, shuffling down so she wouldn't pull any of the things attached to Valkyrie, and put her head on Valkyrie's stomach.

She fell back to sleep.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's seventh day in a coma_ **

Anton had woken back up. It wasn't new news, but it had happened.

Nadia was living out of her bag at the hospital to stay with Valkyrie and Doctor Kenspeckle hadn't said anything except to tell her how Valkyrie was doing whenever he came to check on her or when he'd come in to take Anton off of medication which would allow him to wake up. She'd been the one to text Tanith.

That had happened two days previously, and now Anton was asking to go home, or more likely, get in on the task of hunting down Skulduggery which no one had spoken to her about but she had overheard. She didn't deserve to be in on missions or tasks after what she had done, but it still stung a little.

To distract herself from the Dead Men and her own guilt, she focused on Valkyrie. Civet, one of the assistants, was incredibly nice and was teaching her some things in his spare time so she might be able to help Valkyrie during her recovery.

She hadn't known they expected a recovery period until he'd brought it up. It had been gut-wrenching and eye-opening to imagine that Valkyrie might not be herself the moment she opened her eyes. Civet had said they were all hoping for the very best but had also explained to her some important things about brain injuries that were frightening to Nadia. After helping her calm down, he'd gone through some of the things Doctor Kenspeckle was concerned might be a problem once Valkyrie woke up based on where she'd been struck on the head by the stairs, and then hit her head on the floor. It was a long list, but the majority of the really bad things had been ranked as very unlikely, so Nadia was able to breathe and move past them, and then Civet had helped her with learning all those good things she might need if any one of those bad things happened.

It was very nice to have something useful to do, other than talk to Valkyrie of course. She spent most of her time just stroking Valkyrie hair, or rubbing her thumb over her hand as she read the medical books.

But truly, a girl in a coma made for awful conversation. She tried when she could, but she had no news, no good thoughts. So she sat with her and gave her touch instead, hoping that one day she might respond to that, something Civet had indicated was a good thing anyway. Regardless of if it was, Nadia had run out of things to say. She felt sort of bad, but if she said anything else it would have to be made up because she couldn't think of a single other thing and didn't want to frighten Valkyrie with the medical stuff just in case she could hear her.

Overall, her experiences were lonely and boring.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's eighth day in a coma_ **

The very next day, four days after she'd gotten Solomon out of the Spider's den, the Dead Men came to the hospital to help Anton go back home. Nadia had smiled, seeing how relieved his family was behind the tense muscles and strained smiles, watching as they came in and left again.

They hadn't spoken to her.

She'd come to the conclusion she was invisible to them. That or they really did hate her.

Tanith only spoke to her over text, never relaying messages from the men, as if they would have anything to say to her. The only man other than the doctors she had seen was Fletcher, who'd come every other day to bring her takeaway and get her dirty clothes and replaced them with clean ones. Thanks to him, and probably Myra, she was fit to stay in the hospital. He'd been kind to her from the start and always asked how she was and what she'd heard about Valkyrie. A lot more than Valkyrie's family had done.

She shook that thought away. They asked Kenspeckle personally to get all the details. Not an idiot that doesn't know right from really fucking stupid like her.

She planned on making it back to Fletcher when she could.

**.*****.**

Just hours after Anton left with his family, Nadia had another surprise.

Skulduggery had shown up.

She'd been in the bathroom using baby wipes to clean herself since the actual patients needed the shower and had opened the door to leave just as Skulduggery had gone into the ward. Her heart had almost jumped out her mouth with some emotion she still couldn't handle, and she'd nearly locked herself back in the bathroom before kicking herself, literally, and making herself leave.

He hadn't noticed her carefully looking around the corner of the doorframe at him because he'd been focused on the bed Solomon rested in. Somehow, he was the one that had come out of surgery and not had a long period of unconsciousness. He'd been awake, and eerily silent. He did sleep a lot, but Nadia was pretty sure he pretended when the Dead Men had been around. She knew he was in there. But he hadn't spoken a word, and she had tried speaking to him as much as she did Valkyrie, repeated almost everything to him. It hadn't done anything.

Now, Skulduggery was leaning over him and holding one hand, speaking so softly Nadia couldn't hear what he said. It was almost impossible to see, but Solomon's lips moved. She had no idea what they said, but it was disturbing to her. Watching a man that was so horrible, so despicable. He's been awful to Valkyrie and herself. But she could see a spark in Solomon's eyes now, something angry, something that gave him the strength to not only speak but also point weakly in Valkyrie's direction.

She decided to leave them to it. She smiled to herself, hoping Solomon also had the strength to say some of the choice words she didn't have the guts for. It wasn't her business after all.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's ninth day in a coma_ **

It only took one more day before Valkyrie was pronounced healthy. The tubing was removed and so was all the monitoring equipment. As of that day, Valkyrie had been in a coma for nine days. She was still in a coma, technically, but Doctor Kenspeckle had smiled victoriously that morning and told her, very happily, "She'll be waking up within a day," before going about removing all the stuff.

Nadia had been overjoyed, obviously, and had run to the bathroom to clean up so when Valkyrie saw her she'd look just a little better. It was a silly thing to do, but Nadia liked the idea. She took a full half hour in the bathroom before almost running back to the ward and sitting back down.

Valkyrie hadn't moved.

Nadia sagged, realising that day was going to be the longest one of her life.

She picked up her phone, knowing she really needed to tell Valkyrie's family the news. She swallowed nervously. Perhaps it was petty, but Nadia wanted to be the first one Valkyrie saw. She'd been sitting there for days, and Valkyrie's family had barely come up at all. Sure, they might be busy searching for Skulduggery – she hadn't told them he'd visited, it felt personal to Solomon who'd turned over and refused to talk to her – but this was their sister!

She pulled up Tanith's number to text her, before deciding that was too impersonal and hitting the call button before she could back out. She sat on Valkyrie's bed and pulled off her girlfriend's socks.

"Nadia?" Tanith said through the phone. Her voice was groggy. What time was it? "What's going on? Is Valkyrie okay?"

"Yeah, she's fine," Nadia replied, throwing the socks on the floor and lining up her weapons of mass destruction. Valkyrie was getting a pedicure. "Kenspeckle just told me that Valkyrie's better. She's going to be awake within a day."

"That's great!" Tanith said excitedly. "I'm coming up."

"Okay–"

Tanith hung up.

Nadia sighed and thought for a moment before texting Fletcher that Valkyrie was going to wake up within a day, because she didn't know if he was asleep given his world hopping, and settled in to give Valkyrie her pedicure.

Then a manicure.

Then she plucked her eyebrows for her.

She didn't have anything to do after that. Sighing for what had to be the thousandth time in the hour and a half it had been, she put Valkyrie's socks back on and used her face cleanser to clean Valkyrie's face as she had done every day she'd been there. She was almost out of cotton pads but hadn't wanted to ask Fletcher for more when he’d already done so much.

Sitting carefully by Valkyrie's feet, she was just wondering if Tanith was ever turning up when the door opened and Tanith, Dexter, Saracen, Erskine and Anton came through the door. They all looked incredibly tired but gave her a smile. She tried to smile back and then decided she was too upset with them ignoring her to bother and turned to look at Valkyrie instead.

"Doctor Kenspeckle didn't say when she'd wake exactly," she told them as they began sitting on the beds next to Valkyrie's. "Just that it was within a day."

"It'll be good to see her awake again," Tanith commented. Nadia looked over and only then realised how utterly pale Tanith was. She was breathing shallowly with her eyes closed and was leaning back with her legs open to give some space for the baby within her. She must have been seven months at that point, although Nadia wasn’t entirely sure. Nadia decided that Valkyrie could do all the birthing in their relationship since she had more room in there, being the taller one and all. Not that that was even a close thing, but it was something she made a note of in her head. She took Valkyrie's hand in her own.

"Civet and Doctor Kenspeckle showed me some things that might help Valkyrie when she wakes up," Nadia told them. "They're worried it might take a few hours or even days for her memory to be fully functional again, but Kenspeckle says it should be all there. Civet said reminding her of herself is really important to start."

"We'll deal with that when we get there," Saracen said, and when Nadia looked at him she saw that he was comforting Dexter, who looked ready to cry or jump on Valkyrie. He looked as bad as Tanith did, and she felt bad for being so harsh on them in her opinions. They were struggling as much as she was.

They sat there for a long time, Nadia deliberating in her head what to say, before deciding she might as well try. "Have you heard anything about Skulduggery?"

"He's in the country," Erskine said, rubbing Tanith's knee absently. "We haven’t found him yet. He hasn't tried to contact us."

Nadia nodded. She didn't want to say about his visit still. "Solomon still hasn't spoken to me," she said instead. "Or the doctors. But I gave him my book and he was reading it yesterday."

"That's good," Erskine said after an awkward moment of silence.

Nadia wasn't really sure how to handle their unresponsiveness to Solomon's health, so she kept staring at Valkyrie.

They were quiet, except to get food every few hours and to be sensitive to Tanith's nausea. Kenspeckle was able to give Tanith some soothing medicine which helped her for a while but it wore off after an hour, leaving Kenspeckle to mutter and go back to his lab room. They didn't really do anything. Nadia asked Anton how he was doing, and he answered her quietly and in short sentences, but that was the only normal response to anything she had had from any of the Dead Men in days. She couldn't recall Anton ever having a long conversation with her, and she felt grateful she at least hadn't made him hate her. Or make him hate her enough to show it, anyway.

The others were dozing around the room when Nadia saw Valkyrie's eyes moving behind her eyelids. She was immediately at her side, stroking her hair, holding her breath. With jiggered movements, Valkyrie raised her arm and rubbed her eyes, yawned and turned to face Nadia. Excitedly, Nadia whispered, "Val? Baby? Can you open your eyes? I've really missed you."

Slowly, Valkyrie opened her eyes and blinked blearily around, looking at Nadia's face blankly. Her eyes moved quickly too, tiny back and forth motions, and Nadia could recognise from her training with Civet that Valkyrie couldn't see her properly, if at all. She grinned, hoping she could at least make out a happy face and kept talking.

"Hey, Valkyrie. I've missed you. You've been asleep for a little bit, but I stayed with you. Your family is here too, they've been worried. Do you want to see Doctor Kenspeckle?"

Valkyrie made no response but did train her shaky eyes on Nadia when she moved, and that did make Nadia happy that she understood that Nadia was a person, perhaps meaning she wanted to look at her and maybe even knew who she was. Before she could get any more ahead of herself, she pressed the button on the wall and only a moment later, Doctor Kenspeckle and Civet came into the room.

Kenspeckle didn't waste time with Nadia, he just moved straight onto Valkyrie, talking in a low, soft voice and taking her temperature, her pulse, and then carefully assessing her eyesight without any equipment.

"Her heart rate is increasing," he noted seriously, taking a quick note and then putting the clipboard down. "Valkyrie, are you looking at me? If you can, please blink twice if you are in any pain, and I will help you. Please could you do that for me."

They waited, Kenspeckle by her head, the rest of the family sitting on the beds and looking on, Nadia and Civet at the end of the bed watching. Valkyrie did blink, but only once, and made no other indication of anything. She was staring at Kenspeckle strangely, and Nadia had a horrible idea.

"Doctor?" She said timidly. He grunted, giving up on Valkyrie responding and getting out his tools to test her motor skills. "Doctor, I think she's scared."

He frowned and looked at her. "Scared? What does she have to be afraid of?"

Nadia didn't feel comfortable with the idea, but thankfully, Civet had also caught on. "Doctor Grouse, Valkyrie may be scared of you. Perhaps the memory of you being possessed…?"

Kenspeckle went immediately pale and put the motor skill instrument back on the metal trolley. "Right," he said somewhat faintly. "Well, to be sure, Civet, you should be the one to treat young Valkyrie." Looking fragile, Kenspeckle rushed from the room and straight into his lab. He left the door a crack open.

Biting her lip, she glanced at Civet before each of them took a side on the bed. She held Valkyrie's hand in her own while Civet began to assess the damage.


	118. The sparks of love, all over again

**Note: I know nothing about brains and brain injuries. This is fanfiction and I made it up based on what I figured would sound about right in a magic world**

* * *

**Chapter 118**

**_One day awake_ **

The first day was the hardest. Valkyrie's family stayed at the hospital, sleeping there uncomfortably, at least in Tanith's case, and waiting for Valkyrie brain to essentially 're-wire' itself. 'Re-wiring' was the best way Nadia knew to describe it, but Civet used big, medical words when he spoke to the Dead Men or his husband or Doctor Kenspeckle.

'Re-wiring' was easier. Valkyrie relearnt within an hour how to control her facial expressions and had a quick memory jog when she poked herself in the eye and remembered that it hurt and not to do it.

Kenspeckle had made up and had given to Civet, who gave it to Valkyrie, a lumpy, disgusting mixture that was standard to use on coma or memory loss patients. It was slow acting, they said, and had been used for centuries. Throughout the day and that night, Valkyrie took gulps of it to speed up her recovery.

Her first fit of anger had been the worst. Nadia had been taking a break on her bed, her own rather than snuggled up with her girlfriend, staring at the ceiling and unable to sleep, and Dexter had been reading to Valkyrie. She'd been captivated at first, staring with her mouth open and drooling, seemingly happy to listen, but when Dexter closed the book at the end of the chapter, she had begun screaming and hitting.

Nadia had hated it and ran to the waiting room while Valkyrie's brothers restrained her. Civet had run it and helped, telling them to keep calm and giving Valkyrie a mild sedative that made her sleepy and passive. It had shaken Nadia massively to see the anger on Valkyrie's pretty face, but she had known there was a chance of it happening. Valkyrie was like a small child at that point, and just like a child, she demonstrated her emotions more so than her voice. It just had scared her.

The second day was far, far better, though much, much harder. Valkyrie, during her sleep, had worked out how to eat with her hands, albeit messily, and how to grin, and how to point and demand basic things. In a toddler, it would be cute, but in an almost full-grown woman with the physique of a six-foot-plus lightweight bodybuilder, it was incredibly difficult. And that was before the cringing when Valkyrie had a temper tantrum and screamed her lungs out that she couldn't have a syringe or dirty bowl or be hugged all day.

The hugging part _was_ cute. Her brothers spent the whole day sitting on the floor with an arm around her, cushions all over the floor to make sure Valkyrie was safe. Unfortunately, she hadn't worked out her own strength yet and Nadia couldn't hug Valkyrie because of it. She'd had her hair pulled and it hurt too much to try again. She couldn't blame Valkyrie – she reminded herself of that when she'd cried – because Valkyrie was currently not herself. But she wished more every hour for the moment Valkyrie would be whole again.

**.*****.**

**_Three days awake_ **

Nadia was in the waiting room taking a breather when she heard footsteps coming up the stairwell. She put on a smile because that was polite, but it fell away when she saw who it was.

"Nadia," Ghastly said, taking his hat off. He looked miserable and had black bags under his eyes.

"Have you been in a fight?" She asked instead of a greeting. She was not a friend of his right now.

He coughed uncomfortably. "Nothing major," he said lowly. "I was going to see how Valkyrie's doing."

"Valkyrie needs a positive environment to aid her recovery," Nadia told him, crossing her arms. "I don't think it will be very good for her for you to bring back tempers."

"Bring back – what do you mean?" He frowned. "I haven't done anything unless you mean to be angry with Skulduggery. Is Skulduggery in there?"

"No, he hasn't even tried coming here," she told him, conceding that Ghastly had put the effort in. "But your own temper proves my point."

"I haven't done anything Nadia," he said irritably, but obviously trying to remain as calm as he could. "I want to see my sister, I don't see why that would be a problem."

Nadia had suspected, along with the other, that he might not realise his mistake but Nadia hadn't wanted to be the only to break it to him. "Can I at least get Tanith so you can speak to her before coming in?"

He sighed but after a moment where Nadia thought he was going to push past her, he nodded. "Alright."

Nadia nodded and went back into the ward and looked around. Tanith was sitting on a cushion holding Valkyrie's hand while Saracen read her a book. It was one of Gordon's, a gory one that Valkyrie had hidden in her room and read as a child so they were using that to jog her up to an older age or perhaps a few more memories. She wasn't entirely sure those things were helping Valkyrie, but it made her family happy so Nadia didn't say anything and neither did Civet. Quietly, she tapped on Tanith's shoulder.

Tanith extracted herself from Valkyrie, who was getting better with the independence compared to yesterday and followed her into the waiting room.

"Ghastly's in the lobby," Nadia whispered.

Tanith immediately soured and didn't even answer her back before storming into the lobby. She knew she shouldn't, but Nadia couldn't help but stay and listen.

"What the hell do you think you're playing at?" Tanith whispered angrily at Ghastly. She couldn't see them but took glee in imagining how frightened Ghastly must look. "Do you think I'm an idiot? Or a toy?"

"Tanith–"

"Don't you even bother," she spat at him. "Where have you been?"

"At the shop, working," he told her, an irritated bite in his voice.

"So you could have called then? You could have sent a message, asked about Valkyrie, asked about me? Hum?"

Ghastly was quiet.

"Oh, no, I _understand_ , you must have so much pressure going through the same things the rest of us are, except you're ignoring us, not helping to find Skulduggery, not even bothering to ask about Valkyrie. And that's before _this_. You pushed into me on the way out Ghastly. I had to go to the maternity hospital, and they want to induce me early if the baby keeps getting distressed. You're not _helping_!"

Ghastly groaned, probably into his hands, and Nadia felt as if her curiosity was satisfied but couldn't quite pull herself away from the wall. "I had no idea–"

"Yeah, I know you didn't, you didn't bloody well call me!" Tanith said angrily.

"If I had known–"

"Then what? ' _If I'd known'_ you'd what? You can't go back Ghastly, I want to know what you're doing now!" Tanith asked him exasperatedly.

"I don't know," he said back quietly, his voice strained. "I didn't want – I didn't think it was like this."

"Like what?" She snapped back dangerously.

"Like this! I didn't think you were this upset with me, I didn't know I'd hurt you! I'm sorry Tanith. I – If I'd known I'd have been here to apologise. But I didn't know. I was trying to work things out."

"I'm not interested in that," she said back. Nadia could hear a growl in the woman's voice. "I want to know what you were expecting this to be."

He spluttered for a moment. "What do you mean?"

"You said you didn't think it was like this. Well, what did you think it would be like after you didn't call your girlfriend who is in the third trimester of a difficult pregnancy for, what, thirteen days?" Ghastly didn't say anything Nadia could hear. "No answer? Tell me Ghastly, I want to know. Be honest, now."

Even Nadia was hoping he wouldn't answer that. He didn't seem to understand the dangers. "I thought you'd be glad to see me!" He snapped. "I thought we were working."

"Glad to see you?" She repeated. Nadia cringed. "It's been thirteen days, what do you think I was doing? Counting the hours? And as for us working, you need to get a grip. You killed us before we had a real chance."

"I – I killed us?" Ghastly asked, some anger, some sorrow in his voice. He needed to begin begging, that much was obvious, but he didn't have a grip on his anger. "I've tried from the start, but every time I try you think I'm taking your independence."

"Telling me what to do all the time is the exact reason this got so bad!" Tanith said, her voice rising. "You have no concept of how much space I need!" There was a moment of very quiet muttering in which Nadia thought Tanith was trying to calm herself. She began again in a quieter voice. "Look, Ghastly, you need to go."

"I still need to see–"

"Don't. See Valkyrie when she's better, it'll only take a few more days. You need to leave," Tanith said. Her tone was final.

It seemed to dawn on Ghastly that he might not be able to save his relationship. "What about us?" He asked, his voice quiet.

"We're done, Ghastly. I'll be in touch," Tanith quietly told him, and she heard her footsteps as she waddled down the hall and straight back into the ward.

Nadia had to stay quiet so she wasn't caught now the two weren't fighting and actually felt bad when she heard Ghastly begin to cry. She didn't feel so good about being able to tell Valkyrie now. Just one more fuck up to add to the list, she supposed, and made her way back to the ward too.

**.*****.**

**_Four days awake_ **

Overnight, Valkyrie's brain did miraculous things and pulled itself from its childhood stupor. She was still incapable of what she had before, but Nadia had been there to help wake her up and as soon as she'd opened her eyes, she'd blushed upon seeing Nadia.

It had made her heart jump for joy, and all of Valkyrie's family had gotten a laugh out of it. Then she'd seen her family and laughed back, grinning and calling out their names perfectly as if nothing was wrong at all. Nadia had cried a bit as all her brothers and Tanith had hugged her and told Valkyrie they loved her. They knew not everything was okay yet, but it was a lot better than the day before. As her luck went, Nadia was not on the list of people she remembered yet, but Civet had said it came in stages, so she didn't give up hope.

When Tanith had hugged her, Valkyrie had let go and pointed at Tanith's belly and declared she was fat. Tanith had a thick skin, luckily, and have laughed and told her about the baby and Valkyrie had been fascinated and asked to hold it. Tanith had been patient and acted like Valkyrie was a child as she spoke and told her how to look after the baby because although a massive chunk had returned to Valkyrie, she was still acting a little like a kid. There was no meltdown of tears or anger that day, thank goodness, and she had an amazing perception of where things were around her, and when Civet asked her to read off a sheet, she had stumbled and been slow but had read every line with patience and accuracy. Civet had grinned like a loon.

"How about we give you something to eat then, Valkyrie?" Civet had said, and left for a moment, leaving Valkyrie literally bouncing on her bed in excitement which Nadia wished she was allowed to record and came back with a massive bowl of strawberries. "Do you like strawberries, Valkyrie?"

"Yes," Valkyrie grinned sitting still at the end of the bed like a dog.

"And you remember that you have to take off the green bits, yes?"

"Yep," she said, popping the _p_ at the end of the word. Nadia remembered her talking like that when they went on their first date or two, but she'd not done it since. It was cute.

"I was thinking everyone could share them," Civet told her, bringing the strawberries to a large table that had been brought into the room. "I need you to have a bit of that medicine first, and then would you like to eat and talk?"

Valkyrie didn't answer, just glugged down some of the foul looking medicine that was helping her get better rapidly, and went to sit at the table.

Nadia got a seat opposite Valkyrie and smiled at her. Her heart fluttered when she saw Valkyrie blush again. Obviously, there was no romantic attachment so long as Valkyrie was sick with a brain and memory problem, but Nadia loved the girl and seeing her blush was both cute and, to be honest, a little alluring. It made her feel as if Valkyrie remember her love, or at least 'fancied' her with her underdeveloped feelings, and that made her feel wanted. It was very welcome after so long waiting for someone to even smile at her. She was still barely spoken to some days.

"Alright, Valkyrie. I want you to hand out the strawberries to everyone who tells you a good story, and if you remember it, or like it, or think it's funny, you tell the group and can have a strawberry too. Understand?"

"Yes," she said and grabbed a strawberry. "I like your game, so I get one."

Civet laughed, probably overjoyed to see her cheekiness like the rest of them and left them to the game.

"I'll go first," Dexter grinned, bringing Valkyrie attention to him. "I have a story about a time me, Skulduggery and Ghastly visited your Uncle Gordon." Valkyrie nodded, recognising all those names. "We were in his study and there was a noise outside of the room and Gordon went to look, thinking it was you as a little girl. He went searching, and when he was gone, you came into his office where I was and told us that you loved us."

"Aww," Valkyrie said, grinning and grabbing another strawberry. "Then what?"

"Gordon came back and you got in trouble, but I grabbed you and ran away and we lived happily ever after."

"That didn't happen!" She laughed and gave him the strawberry. She didn't say if she knew what did happen, just moved on to look at Saracen. "What's your story?"

"Well, I think my story is about… how much you liked to swim as a little girl. Gordon had loads of pictures of you playing in the sea, sometimes with your friends. Do you remember?"

She got a concentrated look on her face as if she were trying to remember a word or name she'd forgotten. "I remember J.J Pearl. He shattered his knee when we were jumping in the sea. There was a lot of blood."

Saracen hummed, probably wishing he hadn't triggered that memory. The bad ones seemed easier to come back to the surface, but Nadia had heard that humans latched onto bad memories and feelings the easiest. Maybe it was connected? "Just a few years ago you won a swimming competition."

Nadia watched Valkyrie's face, remembering herself the bloody mess that Valkyrie had been in. She doubted it was the worst shape she'd been left in but to do it for being in a relationship with another female had been horrible. It had given Valkyrie nightmares for weeks, it had given her nightmares and fears. As for Valkyrie, her face looked a little sadder and she didn't say anything about Saracen's story, so she probably remembered more of the bad things. Saracen was awful at this game.

"Tanith, what's yours?" Valkyrie asked instead.

"How about the time you met Nadia?" Tanith asked with a tease in her voice. Valkyrie blushed again and glanced at Nadia. "We all went to a party on your thirteenth birthday. You'd been taken away from us by the host and left to be babysat by his son, but he was so boring you'd gone outside. All day your brothers had been saying not to go near boys, but you came back in, hand in hand with Nadia."

"Really?" Valkyrie grinned and giggled cheekily like a kid.

"Yes," Tanith grinned, taking the offered strawberry. "You danced the whole night and then went outside and spoke with each other for hours. Saracen had to drag you inside."

Nadia nodded, thinking back on it fondly herself. "You kept tripping up on the gravel."

Valkyrie just giggled again. No memory quite yet… but she was still adorable.


	119. Going home

**Chapter 119**

**_Five days awake_ **

"I think a home environment will help Valkyrie significantly," Civet said, looking over his notes with Kenspeckle over his shoulder and nodding. Nadia and Tanith were the only ones there.

"I'm worried we can't give her the time," Tanith said again, exasperation in her voice. "Even if it's slower, she's better off with around the clock monitoring. You said that yourself."

"I said that when she was in a coma," Doctor Kenspeckle interjected. He'd given Tanith a new medicine this morning for her morning sickness and it was working very well. Well enough he might be regretting his discovery because Tanith had woken up kicking back that morning. Or afternoon. Nadia had been inside for nearly three weeks and it was not healthy. "Her recovery at the hospital is slowing down."

"I think it's also possible we need to prepare for a more permanent brain injury," Civet warned. "There's no indication that Valkyrie can't recover, but that doesn't mean she will. Regular visits here, the correct medication and lots of positive interactions at home is the best bet she has for a full and quick recovery."

"And I'm telling you, we don't have time to give her those things," Tanith repeated once more. "We can't be there all the time to help her. The others are working with the Sanctuary, there are mages pouring in trying to take over the Sanctuary from other countries. I'm seven months pregnant! There's no one at home to help Valkyrie like there is here."

"With all due respect, this hospital isn't exactly designed for this type of healing," Civet said sadly. "Our resources are designed for surgeries and short term, highly difficult healing, not long term recovery. And at any rate, over the last three days, Valkyrie was expected to have made much more of a recovery but hasn't met any of the milestones we were expecting in the time parameters. There's no reason she shouldn't except for lack of stimulation."

"I can look after her," Nadia interjected quietly when Tanith was about to repeat herself again. They all looked at her. "I mean, you've already explained everything that she needs. And she's worked out the things she needs for me to be able to look after her so… it makes sense, right? And Tanith will be home too, and the others at night, if there’s a real emergency. I'll just be doing the majority and keeping her from killing herself. We’ll literally watch telly, talk and play games all day."

Doctor Kenspeckle was sceptical, Tanith looked like she'd rather not, but Civet nodded encouragingly. "Nadia knows everything she needs to."

"Miss Robin is a child," Doctor Kenspeckle argued.

"Lots of children look after their family," Nadia said strictly. "And if being at home will help, Valkyrie won't need me around all the time for long. That's what you said."

"It is," Civet agreed, and she could see Tanith begin to be convinced. "If it doesn't work out, we can review. But for now, even regular home visits are better than being stuck in here."

Doctor Kenspeckle and Tanith didn't look entirely happy but both grudgingly agreed and once Doctor Kenspeckle was hidden – Valkyrie had seen him again and been scared, so he was still off limits – Nadia packed up the last of their things while Tanith woke Valkyrie and told her the plans.

Tanith got Valkyrie dressed and ready for the move and before long, they were outside and waiting on their taxi. Nadia gave Valkyrie a little wave.

"Hi," Valkyrie smiled.

"Hey," Nadia replied.

Valkyrie held her hand out and after a moment, Nadia took it. Grinning, Valkyrie looked away and seemed very smug, leaving Nadia to shake her head fondly.

**.*****.**

"We're here!" Valkyrie announced when the taxi stopped by the gated driveway. Tanith paid the man and Nadia helped Valkyrie out of the car. They got the bags out of the trunk and Nadia was pleasantly surprised when Valkyrie grabbed a couple for her because there was no way she could have carried them all.

In the house, Valkyrie was quick to throw her shoes and the bags to the floor and run up the stairs on her hands and feet like a child and go off giggling to, Nadia presumed, her bedroom.

"At least she's happy," Tanith commented, sitting on the stool in the front entrance and leaning carefully to take her shoes off. "Thank you for doing this, by the way. It _is_ nice to have her home again."

"It's okay," Nadia smiled. "Erm, is there anything you want for dinner? I thought I might make something."

"If you want," Tanith shrugged. "I don't really mind what food, but I really want garlic bread."

"I'll make that then."

There was a crash from upstairs and both of them looked up. "I'm okay!" Valkyrie shouted.

"I need a nap," Tanith said, and went off to the snug.

A little nervously, Nadia went up the stairs and saw that Valkyrie was in her bedroom. In there, she was sitting on the floor and had pulled out a blanket from the ottoman at the end of the bed, turned on her old computer, and had knocked the printer on the floor leaving it smashed.

"I think it's broken," Valkyrie said, nodding innocently.

"That's fine," Nadia told her. It was Valkyrie printer anyway. "Um, I'm going to put it outside the door."

"Okay," Valkyrie replied and watched Nadia move the printer with magic. When it was down, Nadia came back into the room and looked at Valkyrie. "I'm going to play Sims."

"I've not played that before," Nadia admitted. "My friends had it when we were little."

"It's the best," Valkyrie gushed. "I have the pets expansion. I can make you a cat."

"Cats are my favourite animal," Nadia smiled, taking a seat on the bed.

"I know," Valkyrie said shyly, smiling over her shoulder at Nadia. "My favourite animal is a dog, though."

"Well, cats and dogs can get along."

"Yeeeah," Valkyrie said, obviously unconvinced. Still, the game had just loaded up on the boxy PC and Valkyrie seemed pretty thrilled. "I'm going to make all of us."

Nadia nodded and went to Valkyrie's bookshelf for a peruse. Last time she'd been in the room with Valkyrie had been on their first date after getting back together and she'd been nervous. It had just been so much pressure, standing in the room, and Valkyrie being so pretty and _there_.

She had felt as if she needed to do something and that hadn't made her feel comfortable even though Valkyrie didn't do anything in particular to make her feel that way but – Emily had done. Emily had pushed her until she was not comfortable anymore and when she'd first stepped foot in this room, those feelings had come back no matter how hard she'd pushed. Luckily, Valkyrie was always gentle with her and had taken her to see Tanith's baby's room which _had_ been cute. She needed to see if she could do anything to help Tanith, maybe get more into her good side since she wasn't sure still how much Tanith hated her. They spoke, but what did that mean? Nadia didn't know. She'd been taught by her Daadii and all her further relations that a good meal always made people like you more, so she'd make a good dinner. That wasn't so hard, and she liked cooking anyway. Maybe it was just her family, but food would work on her for sure.

"Nadia?" Valkyrie asked.

"Hmm?" She turned and saw Valkyrie with a concerned look on her face. "What is it?"

"You were spacy," Valkyrie claimed.

"Just thinking," Nadia smiled. "I was wondering what to make for dinner."

"You're making dinner? Can I help?"

"Sure," she agreed easily. "We have a few hours yet."

"Good. I'm making you in game. You can watch." Valkyrie turned back to her game and Nadia wasn't sure, but her commanding attitude seemed to be a little change even from what she'd been earlier. Or perhaps that was because she was finally away from the adults. Civet had told them repeatedly that all expressions of emotion and personality, even if it differed from how Valkyrie 'normally' was like, was a good thing. So, Nadia brought a chair up and watched Valkyrie play her game.

**.*****.**

"That was amazing," Dexter complimented, putting his knife and fork down.

"That's okay," Valkyrie said absently, trying very carefully to eat without getting messy. She'd spilt some of the lasagne down herself but other than the edges of her mouth and a few bits on her lap, she'd eaten with cutlery and almost cleanly. Progress.

"What did you do today?" Nadia asked politely. Perhaps hopefully.

"We're working to contact Skulduggery," Erskine said, eating the last of his garlic bread. "We thought he'd respond if we pretended to be Solomon but we've heard nothing."

"I'm sure he'll want to see Valkyrie," Nadia said, though she didn't feel any truth in her words. "At least, Valkyrie will want to see him."

"That's what we're betting on," Dexter admitted, relaxing back and putting an arm over Saracen's shoulders. "Valkyrie and Skulduggery are the best detectives in the world. As soon as Valkyrie's fit, I know she'll drag him out of whatever hole he's in. Then we can deal with all this crap."

"But what plan do you have?" Nadia asked. Dexter gave her a strange look. "Like, he was let free, wasn't he? So why are you looking for him?"

"He was let free of being forced to bomb somewhere, not free to disappear off the edge of the world after sending _Fletcher_ into the Spider's den. Anyway, the Elders know the truth, so he'll still get punished in some way. With the way things are going, that's the best any of us are getting out of this."

"It'll be okay," Valkyrie smiled, not understanding the gravity of what they were saying.

Still, Dexter grinned back. "It will be with dinner like this every day. You and Nadia did a good job."

"Thanks," she smiled again.

"You're blushing," he teased.

Valkyrie went red. "No, I'm not."

"You are! Look Saracen, she's blushing!"

"She's got a crush on Nadia," he joined in.

"I do not!" Valkyrie shouted back and ran from her chair out of the dining room.

"I think she has a crush on you," Erskine smiled quietly before they all flinched.

"Don't tease her like that!" Tanith snapped at them. She hadn't woken up in a good mood. "Isn't she going through enough without you messing with her?"

"Hey, it was just some fun," Saracen tried, smiling sweetly. Tanith glared harder. "Okay, okay. How about we go apologise?"

Tanith humped and sat back to eat the other half of her dinner, which was a garlic baguette with a side of lasagne. She'd requested it. "You better."

"We'll go now," he said, and him, Dexter and Erskine ran off from the table like three naughty schoolboys. All they needed to do was start giggling.

"Children," Anton seconded quietly, eating almost delicately.

"They need a hobby," Tanith muttered.


	120. Snap back to reality

**Chapter 120**

**_Six days awake_ **

Nadia was halfway through helping Valkyrie get changed into her pyjamas when she saw from Valkyrie's bedroom window her parent's car coming up the drive. The anxiety kicked in quickly like it always did, but for Valkyrie's sake, she didn't let it on.

The first night had been easy because Valkyrie had just let her put the clothes on her, lifting the first leg, then the other, and so on. Maybe somewhat awkward for herself to be around her naked girlfriend in that way, but Valkyrie hadn't cared, and it wasn't something she felt she should feel awkward about, so she'd just done it. It felt a bit weird though. She was with Valkyrie in a way that was moving towards a sexual relationship. Looking after her when she was like a child just made it weird no matter what. Even though she wasn’t viewing her in that way… it didn’t make sense and Nadia knew that, it just made her uncomfortable.

Tonight, Valkyrie insisted she could do it herself. It had been half an hour, but finally, blessedly, she had pulled her bloody trousers on.

"Alright, into bed," Nadia said softly, pulling the thick covers back. With agility that told nothing of the countless things Valkyrie had knocked over that day, she jumped into the bed and swung the covers over herself. "Good night Valkyrie."

"Night night Nadia," Valkyrie murmured. "Have fun with your parents."

Nadia nearly gave away that she was shocked Valkyrie recognised the car, but then smiled and nodded, closed all the curtains and shut the bedroom door behind her. She took a deep breath and then went into Tanith old bedroom, her new one since Valkyrie was in her own and she could hardly sleep next to her as the situation was, and quickly changed her top to one that hadn't been food splattered from baking with Valkyrie, brushed her hair out, and went down the stairs.

Anton had let her mum and dad into the house. Neither looked happy, but they didn't look mad, which make her irrationally hopeful. She hadn't spoken to them at all since she'd left the house two weeks ago.

"Nadia," her mum exclaimed when she caught sight of her, before rushing forward and wrapping her into a tight hug. Nadia hugged her back. She'd really missed them. "I was getting worried about you."

"It's fine Mum," she said, giving her an automatic smile. "Really, I've just been busy."

"Doing so much you can't even text me?" She asked disappointedly before waving her hand as if she was trying to make Nadia forget she'd even asked that question. "How is Valkyrie?"

"She's doing well," Nadia reported, leading her mum to the sofa. Mr Vinay followed behind and they all sat down. Anton left the room. "She was in the hospital unconscious for nine days and then she was awake but she's not quite all there, I suppose. It’s been really hard, but she's getting better every day. This was only her second day home but she should be recovered within two or three more days we hope. Maybe even sooner."

"That's wonderful," Mrs Keena said, and Nadia could see the worry and genuineness in her eyes. "How have you been?"

"I've been fine," she lied. "Worried, tired, maybe a little scared sometimes. But it's all working out now. Valkyrie actually recognised your car coming up the drive and knew who you were."

"Does she remember you?" Mr Vinay asked.

"Not yet," Nadia said, trying not to sound sad. She felt as if her whole life was trying not to sound sad or anxious or anything she really was nowadays. As soon as Valkyrie was properly recovered, she was going to use her as an emotional dumping ground, and then let Valkyrie do the same to her. "But it's only a matter of time. We know that she remembers the majority of her feelings towards the people she knows a lot better than any memory, but she usually refuses or doesn't have the attention span to explain her memories so we don't know exactly how well she is connecting to her long term memory at the moment. It's getting better, and so are her motor skills and stuff, but she still needs time. We can tell she, well, has feelings for me, but she doesn't remember that we are dating."

"I'm sure it'll work out," her mum said. "We were hearing stories about Mr Pleasant and Mr Wreath over the last week and with you not calling, we thought coming to talk would be a good idea."

"That's okay," Nadia nodded.

"Nadia, sweetheart, we really need to discuss your schooling," Mrs Keena said tentatively. Nadia's stomach dropped. They got to the point quickly. "With all that's going on, you do understand why we're worried, don't you? We want you safe, and they're saying the Sanctuary’s in trouble international. We don't want you getting involved in something like that, and with you being so close to Valkyrie and the Dead Men, we think it'd be safer for you to come back to India."

"I'm not going back to India," Nadia told them firmly. "I need to be here for Valkyrie. Even when her memory comes back and she's acting like normal, it's going to be a difficult adjustment. And with the Dead Men busy and working, I've been helping around the house to make it easier for them. I'm needed here. I'm not getting involved like you think, I'm just helping."

"You're needed at _home_ ," her mum argued. "You're meant to be studying, playing games, having sleepovers and spending time with your family, not cooking and cleaning for your girlfriend and her host family."

"They’re not my hosts," she said, her own anger welling her. She hadn't been able to really let her emotions out in a while and knew it was going to get dangerous quickly but was already too angry to care. "I'm here to help, I'm not bossed around. I want to do this."

"It's not your job."

"So? Am I not allowed to help?"

"Yes, you are, but not like this," her mum snapped. "You need to come home soon. We're leaving the country. All of us."

"What?" Nadia said after a moment.

"We're moving to India," Mr Vinay told her, putting a hand on Mrs Keena’s knee. They looked at each other and Nadia couldn't see any conflict in their gaze. At least that part was getting fixed. "We all need a new start. If we all move then you can commute to school like the other girls that live nearby and spend time with us at home like you used to. I know that means leaving Valkyrie for a time, but we think it's worth it to be away from the problems here."

"I’m not leaving Valkyrie," Nadia pressed. "And I'm not moving anywhere."

"But you've always wanted to go to India," Mum claimed.

"I haven't wanted to live here since I was _eleven_ ," she half-shouted. "I'm _not_ leaving Ireland!"

Her dad sighed heavily, and Nadia's anger shot up. "You don't have a choice. We've let you run riot since you've come back from school, but when it's time, you’re coming with us to India even if we have to drag you. We won't go until Valkyrie has her memory back, so you will have time to explain everything to her, but after that, we will be leaving."

"I'm not going with you," she said firmly, gripping the sofa. "I'm staying with Valkyrie."

"This isn't up for debate," her dad warned just like he would when she was a little kid. "You said three days for Valkyrie to be better, so we will be back in four. Make sure you're ready."

Mr Vinay seemed to think that was the end of that and stood up. Feeling the anger bubbling, Nadia stood too, clenching her fists angrily. "I'm not coming with you. You can't make me."

"We can and we will," he denied, holding a hand out for his wife. They stood side by side and gave her the same look they always did when she didn't do what they wanted. She'd always caved before, but this time was different. She wasn't going anywhere. Not after the pain of last time. Even if she didn't deserve it.

"I'm not leaving," she said, voice rising.

"Don't shout at me," her mum snapped quickly. "We can argue about school and other things later, but there is no way we're letting our only child stay in Ireland when there’s so much unsettlement going on here. So long as you're with the Dead Men you're a target, surely you understand that? You'll be coming with us in four days or you can just pack up and come with us now. Your choice."

"I'm almost eighteen!" She half-shouted. "You can't force me to move! What are you going to do, call the Cleaver's to come get me?"

"If you shout at me one more time–"

"You'll do what, Dad? You'll hit me? Why not, I'm tired of you always saying the same things," she shouted, following him out into the entry hall. "I don't want to live with you anyway!"

"Calm down, Na–"

"No I fucking won't!" She screamed, swearing at her parents for the first time in her life.

If she had thought her father would be the one to snap, she had been wrong. Without ever seeing it coming, her Mum slapped her thin shoulder so hand she stumbled away.

" _Don't you ever swear at us_!" Her mother screamed. "What did we do to deserve your disrespect? We've raised you with every luxury and advantage a child could have, and this last year had just been one argument after another. I'm sick of it!"

"Only because–"

"Don't even start!" She threatened, getting into her face, her red hair practically frizzing the angrier she got. "If you think I'm going to put up with this anymore, you can think again. We were happy to let you stay here for another four days without any supervision, without any safety precautions. Do you know how many people have gone missing recently? How many people, how many of our friends, your childhood friends, have gone missing? They're all dead, Nadia, and we don't want you on that list too."

" _You still can't make me leave_!" She shouted and shoved her mother back.

All the tensions they'd had over that year broke in that moment, and her mother slapped her so hard around the face Nadia fell to the floor. There was a moment of silence as they all became very shocked at what her mother had done before Nadia resolutely stood herself back up and glared at her mum.

"Pack your bags," Mum told her quietly.

"No," Nadia whispered again.

"Fine."

Her mum grabbed her wrist and pulled, trying to yank her from the house as her father opened the front door. She screamed and yelled for help, and heard footsteps around the house coming for her, but they sounded so far away.

Trying to be smart, Nadia used her magic to push Mrs Keena away, which worked, and turned on her dad to give him a Shock, but he was quick enough to jump out of her way, wrap an arm around her and pick her straight up. Unwilling to really hurt her parents, Nadia began crying, asking for help, but they were still too far away.

Out of the house, Nadia had never felt more alone or vulnerable in her life. Crying, she shouted for Valkyrie, wishing her girlfriend would swoop in, but knowing she wouldn't, couldn't. She wriggled and struggled in her father's grip but she just didn't have the strength to fight him, and he shoved her into the back of the car, hitting her head on the top in the process.

Being quicker than she thought she could be, Nadia crawled to the other side of the car and jumped out, hearing her dad shout her name, but she rushed around her teary mother and jumped up the step into the house, almost running into –

"Valkyrie!" Nadia exclaimed.

"What's – I don't–" Valkyrie tried, her eyes wild and dazed. Her father came through the door, and Valkyrie face morphed immediately into anger and without seeing her fist, Valkyrie punched him in the face, pushed him back and slammed the door in his face.

Nadia expected her dad to just try and open it, but it seemed her parents had given up, both a happy and incredibly gut wrenching moment for Nadia. Valkyrie stood there, unmoving, and Valkyrie family filled the entryway at last, even Tanith. Unsure of what had even happened, Nadia gently put a hand on Valkyrie's arm.

"Valkyrie? Are you okay?" She asked tentatively.

Slowly, Valkyrie turned to face them. Something in her eye had changed. Confusion was there, of course, but the mature, intelligent, hard look was back.

"Valkyrie?" She asked again, her heart skipping. "Talk to me."

"I– I'm so confused," she muttered with perfect accuracy. "Oh, god, my head hurts so bad. I remember– I was so scared and I was at Kenspeckle's. How did I get here?"

With a sob, Nadia jumped on Valkyrie, holding her muscular body tightly and feeling all the pain and so much excitement and joy well up all at once. "You're back," she kept saying and felt Valkyrie kiss her hair and stroke her back.

Before long, Tanith and Valkyrie's brothers were in on the reunion, hugging Valkyrie, kissing her, and not a single eye was clear of tears.

"I love you so much," Nadia cried into Valkyrie's shoulder.

"I love you too baby," Valkyrie whispered, pushing the group into the parlour while keeping a strong grip on Nadia. "Don't worry, everything will be okay."


	121. I'll make it better again

**Skulduggery – Crow**

**Anton – Bear**

**Ghastly – Panda**

**Dexter – Wolf**

**Saracen – Weasel**

**Erskine – Snake**

**Solomon – Raven**

**Corrival – Pa**

* * *

**Chapter 121**

They split apart in the parlour just to sit. Nadia was kept tight to Valkyrie's side and got a seat next to her, Tanith on Valkyrie's other side and Dexter next to Tanith on the largest sofa. The others pulled the other big one closer and they sat there, pressed into each other's side. Nadia tried hard to stop her tears, but she was so shocked by Valkyrie's sudden return it was practically impossible. It was only Valkyrie holding on to her so protectively that got her smiling up to her instead of acting like an idiot.

"We've really missed you," a teary Tanith said.

"I don't know where I've been," Valkyrie said back, exasperation and confusion in her voice. "I only have these, like, flashes of memory. What happened?"

"Do you remember the Sanctuary? The people that came in, and you sent everyone to the safe room?" Dexter asked.

"Yeah, I – I went off to go out the front to see… and there were two people outside," she said slowly, her face screwed up in thought. "I – I remember Skulduggery and Craven were there and they looked at me. I hit the alarm signal and I think it electrocuted me."

"There was someone else in the building according to Skulduggery," Anton revealed to her.

"He broke the wards," Erskine said excitedly. "Kenspeckle said you'd had some type of shock."

"The building was blown up," Nadia continued quietly. Valkyrie looked down at her. "A part of the staircase hit your head. Anton was the one to run through the fire and pull you to safety."

She smiled at Anton. "Thank you."

Anton waved it away. "They put Skulduggery in a Gaol. Everyone believed he did it."

"We visited him after three days," Dexter said. "It didn't go well."

"What do you mean?" Valkyrie asked.

Dexter just shook his head. "It doesn't matter. We told Meritorious and Pa – oh. Val, Elder Crow was killed in the blast."

"What? She's dead?" Valkyrie asked, dismayed. Nadia squeezed her hand.

"Unfortunately. She was a good Elder," Dexter said, and there was a moment of silence for her before they had to continue. "We told Meritorious and Corrival, and they released Skulduggery, believing he was forced and couldn't be blamed."

Valkyrie looked over Tanith's and her brother's faces and after a moment, nodded. "Okay. Then what?"

"Skulduggery came to us to get Solomon back," Saracen said incredibly seriously.

"Did you?"

"Yes," Dexter said shortly. "But Skulduggery convinced Fletcher to do it, putting him at risk. No one has seen Skulduggery since then."

"How long ago?" Valkyrie asked as Nadia looked at Saracen across the room. He avoided her eyes and she was left with a sick, empty feeling. She had to keep her pain a secret from Valkyrie now? How could she even begin doing that?

"Eleven days ago. Solomon will be released from the hospital soon," Erskine said. "Do you really remember nothing?"

"No, I have flashes," she said. "I remember Nadia's voice, but I can't remember what she said."

Nadia smiled up at her and Valkyrie kissed her forehead, making her feel like the most important thing in Valkyrie's life. It was an incredible feeling.

"I kind of remember a few other things. I remember that medicine and I remember getting kind of annoyed at all the constant questions, and, I guess, strawberries? I don't know. Where's Ghastly?"

There was another silence. "We broke up," Tanith told her. "He disappeared for thirteen days and then he turned up and told me I should be glad to see him. So I told him we were over and that was that."

"Oh no," Valkyrie whispered and released Nadia to hug her sister tightly before settling her arm back around Nadia. "I'm so sorry."

"It's fine Val," Tanith smiled. "I'm a big girl. Anyway, I have a wonderful family here."

"Exactly," Valkyrie grinned. "How long is it now?"

"Seven months and a week, so seven weeks to go. They said I might birth a little early from all the stress that's happened."

"How early?"

"Only a week or so, nothing too dangerous, just a little concerning in terms of blood pressure. They're not sure though. I told them to stop telling me, it'll happen when it does, I guess, and I'm taking all the medication they tell me to," Tanith told her. "Nothing we can do but wait."

"I'm even more excited now," Valkyrie smiled, before looking back over the room and letting it slip. "So what's happening everywhere else?"

"We're trying to find a new Sanctuary," Dexter said. "A new Elder is needed too, and Meritorious made an announcement that the Spider's want war with the Magic community but that the Sanctuary won't give them anything they want. Sanctuaries all over the world are bickering and trying to push their way into the country to 'help' but they've been kept back so far."

"What about general crime?"

"Hey, you're not getting back involved in that for at least another week, miss," Dexter grinned. "You've had a brain injury up until twenty minutes ago and you're already trying to jump back into it."

"I'm just asking," Valkyrie smirked.

"There's been a rise," Anton helped. "A lot of mages are trying to leave the country via the hotel, but an equal amount are coming in. The Sanctuary has asked me to stop the hotel coming to Ireland so frequently to help stem the number of criminals coming in."

"Did you?" Valkyrie asked curiously.

"I have removed one visit a month, but I will not stop the free flow of people travelling," Anton stated. "No Sanctuary can control the Midnight Hotel. But the Spider's are asking for war."

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "So let me recite. I've been in a coma cross memory loss state for two and a half weeks? Craven and someone else forced Skulduggery to blow up the Sanctuary, Skul was found innocent, and then he immediately got Fletcher to go straight into Spider territory, and since then he's been AWOL. Tanith and Panda broke up, the baby isn't far from coming, and just now Nadia's parents came to get her. What's going on with that?"

"Nadia said she'd stay with you to help you recover," Tanith supplied, stopping Nadia from talking. "She's been with you since we got her on day three of you being in a coma."

"You stayed with me?" Valkyrie asked her.

Nadia nodded, smiling.

"Thank you," she said, and Nadia could see so much love and gratitude in her eyes that she had to look away. "So what's the plan?"

"Well, right now, it's to sleep," Tanith said, pulling herself up. "This has been a hard day."

"You can say that again," Dexter said and everyone else stood. After a flurry of hugs going to Valkyrie, they all split off to different parts of the house and left Valkyrie with Nadia. They looked at each other, alone in the room, and it didn't take a moment for Valkyrie's lips to connect with her own.

**.*****.**

_**Valkyrie's POV** _

Valkyrie's foggy head cleared when Nadia wrapped her hands in her hair, drawing her closer. Barely a moment went by before she had her tongue in Nadia's mouth, dancing and playing with her girlfriend until they had to pull away for breath.

"I love you," Valkyrie whispered.

"I love you too," Nadia repeated, her big, brown eyes filled with conflict, love and something desperate. It was almost amusing, in a mean way, that Nadia thought she could hide how bad she felt from Valkyrie. It was clear as day that her girlfriend had so much to say, and she'd caught the look Weasel had given Nadia. Or rather, seen Weasel look away from Nadia when Fletcher had been mentioned. Whatever that meant, Valkyrie didn't know, except that her family was hiding details from her about her girlfriend and Fletcher. Knowing she'd just woken up from essentially a wakeful coma was scary, Valkyrie could admit that, but she also felt refreshed and healthy. She didn't really feel so much of the stress, of the tension, as before. There was worry, concern. But not stress. She hadn't felt like that in years!

"Talk to me," Valkyrie asked her, stroking Nadia's cheek gently. Nadia looked incredibly stressed. Had she been difficult to look after? She felt bad that Nadia had had to do that because her own family was divided. "You're unhappy."

Nadia smiled up at her. "I'm fine, now I have you back."

Valkyrie had to smile back. "But you're also unhappy. Tell me about your parents first."

"Oh," Nadia said as if that little visit had already left her mind. "They're moving to India. They want me to move with them."

"Oh," Valkyrie repeated, her heart falling. "Are you thinking of going?"

She gave her a strange look. "Baby, I just screamed for you to save me from being taken away, doesn't that answer the question for you?"

"Ahh yeah," Valkyrie remembered. She was just… in a weird headspace. "I didn't forget about it. I remembered your mum slapping you."

"Yeah, she did," Nadia said quietly, leaning into Valkyrie. "I swore at her and she got really mad."

"She shouldn't hit you."

"You hit people all the time," Nadia pointed out.

"I don't hit you," Valkyrie said, placing a kiss on Nadia's lips. "I love you too much."

Nadia smiled against her lips. "I love you too."

"Does this mean that you're going to stay with me?" Valkyrie asked hopefully.

Nadia rolled her eyes. "Yes, Val. I'm not leaving. Not after how close I've been to losing you."

Valkyrie grinned and picked Nadia up. Laughing, Nadia wrapped her legs around Valkyrie's waist and giggled all the way up the stairs. Valkyrie didn't know where Nadia had been sleeping, but for the moment, she took her girlfriend to her bedroom and shut the door firmly behind her, hopping onto the bed and falling forward so she'd lay over Nadia. "Will you tell me something else?" Valkyrie asked, softly kissing Nadia's neck.

"Mmm," she moaned.

"What really happened when Raven was rescued?"

Nadia immediately went physically tense and pushed Valkyrie back. There was nearly no strength to her demand, but Valkyrie sat up anyway. "I – I don't know what you mean," she said pathetically.

"Nadia," Valkyrie started, "you know I' not that stupid. Come on. It's upsetting you."

For a moment, they sat across from each other on the bed, Nadia wringing her hands, and then the waterworks started. Surprised, because Nadia rarely cried in front of Valkyrie, she held the girl and rocked her soothingly even as her own insides practically boiled with rage.

Nadia told her all about how her time with Valkyrie's own family, about how kind Tanith had been at the start, Panda being mad at Tanith, going to see Skulduggery, the strange things Panda said that worried Valkyrie on a different level, Tanith being sick, her whole family ignoring Nadia. Then came the parts about Fletcher and his kindness, Skulduggery telling her lies, how terrified she'd been in the Spider's den, the pride of how well she'd managed even though she was scared, Fletcher rescuing her, being so scared of her families reaction, only for her family to come to the hospital and Fletcher take the blame so she wouldn't be held responsible for being used when it was so obvious that Nadia wasn't to blame for being manipulated. Then was her own recovery, and how she'd been lonely and her family had barely come to speak to her, and the times they acted like she wasn't there when she was and how she had sunk into herself so it wouldn't hurt so much.

The whole thing took almost an hour to tell, and by the end, Nadia was lying sleepily on Valkyrie's breast while silent tears fell into Valkyrie's hair as she lay on her pillow and cried that her family and girlfriend had struggled without her. She was barely able to think about blame. She just felt utterly awful, so much that she couldn't even begin to think of how horrid it must have been for Nadia.

"It's okay now," she whispered, holding Nadia tightly. "I'll sort out everything. I promise."

"No," Nadia whispered back sleepily. "I just want to love you."

"You already love me."

"I know," she smiled, closing her eyes.

"I love you too. Promise," Valkyrie said quietly, stroking Nadia's hair.


	122. The start of beginning a 'New Start'

**Chapter 122**

Valkyrie's first thoughts when she woke up was that she was far too hot and was also very thirsty. The second's ones were just a barrage of last night and all the crazy things she'd been told. Carefully, she extracted herself from under Nadia and took a drink from the plastic cup from the side – had she not been allowed glass? – kicked the covers off of them and lay back down to think.

She'd just been told so much. It was scary to think that so many big things had happened while she was… away? Gone? Sick? She wasn't sure about the words, but it was hard to believe so much had changed. Tanith and Ghastly, Solomon being rescued, Nadia saving him all alone, her family cutting Nadia off so rudely. Nadia had been able to tell her a lot of truth, but Valkyrie was a detective, and even if he was on her Shit List of people she wanted to scream at right about now, Skulduggery had taught her that there were two sides to every story.

Tanith must have been tired and certainly ill so there was a little bit of an alibi to leaving Nadia alone, and it did seem as if she put in some effort when Nadia was right in front of her, but her brothers didn't have that defence. She supposed they had been looking for Skulduggery but again, it was not a full-time thing that stopped them from checking in on Nadia. Single texts here and there would have sufficed.

 _Perhaps I'm prematurely overreacting_ , she thought to herself. She needed the full story, but she was also being protective of Nadia because she could see how badly this had affected her. And even with all that jumbling around in her head, she knew Nadia hadn't told her everything and she needed to get those details still.

She needed time. Time to think and plan and act. She had to prioritise. When she and Nadia had first broken up, she'd spent a lot of time with Corrival while she was getting over immediate emotions and they had mostly spoken about military tactics and the sort of priorities she had to hold during battle and even just in the Sanctuary doing paperwork.

Well, she knew she needed information. The first thing that came to mind, admittedly, was Skulduggery. She had to speak with him about a massive number of things, but with him being quiet, and her being so angry, she didn't particularly want to get involved with that at the moment. As well as that, there were the Spiders, and she bet he knew a bunch about that if she could put that anger to one side. So Skulduggery was a big one for a few things, but there were other things she could do the emotions were too raw to actually do it.

She needed to talk to Tanith. Honestly, she wasn't mad with Tanith. Her sister was in a really bad situation, even if she was being strong about it. She was having a baby, the father was being an idiot, and all the other things like Valkyrie being sick, Skulduggery and all of that couldn't be helping. Plus, she was already getting sick from the pregnancy, so Valkyrie doubted that was much better with stress added on top. The only thing she needed to do with Tanith was kindly ask what was happening and try to help her. Sure, she wanted to be mad that Tanith hadn't been there for Nadia, but even Nadia had said how worried Tanith had been, how much she had risked in her pregnancy and health to be at the hospital for Valkyrie. There was no point in making it worse.

As for Ghastly, he was also on the Shit List, but in a way that made her side firmly with Tanith and make her want to ignore him. She'd get around to the shouting later.

Now, her brothers? That was something else. They truly had ignored Nadia, even when they were at the hospital together when she'd been 'awake'. They hadn't been busy searching, they had unified in their want to help Valkyrie. _And_ in their refusal to talk to Nadia. That was not okay and she would find out what was going on there.

Obviously, Nadia was on the list of priorities too, because there was a lot to talk about and help her with but getting everything around them calm would probably help the most. She also had to thank Fletcher, and probably Myra, for helping Nadia. In fact, she wouldn't mind thinking of something to thank Nadia with too, since she'd helped her so much.

She smiled to herself, stroking Nadia's hair as she thought. It was a lot to do, but she could handle it. First, she'd deal with her brothers, then talk to Tanith, then thank Fletcher and Myra if they were at home, spend the night talking with Nadia, then it was getting in touch with Meritorious and Corrival to take over the Skulduggery hunt investigation. She had said yesterday she'd continue to recover but now she was awake she'd rather be involved. She could start that off with going to visit China, who she hadn't seen since they'd killed Bliss and China saved her life.

With any luck, she'd have the time to actually do all that!

Nadia moaned. Grinning, Valkyrie kissed her neck softly, and when Nadia smiled, Valkyrie trained her fingers over Nadia's soft midriff where her top had risen and begin to lightly tickle her. It took a moment, but soon she was awake and giggling.

"Stop it," Nadia groaned, pretending she didn't like it.

"You're cute," Valkyrie whispered, kissing her again. "It's really early."

"We went to bed at nine or something," Nadia yawned. "Does this make us really responsible?"

"Sounds like it. Come on, let's get something to eat," Valkyrie grinned, pulled Nadia up.

"I'm not hungry yet," Nadia complained. "Anyway, I need a shower."

Valkyrie let her go and stood up. "Alright, well, you do that. I need to talk with my brothers."

Nadia looked concerned and a bit guilty again. "They'll know I told."

"So? I saw Saracen give you that look last night. I'm going to ask him to tell me the truth, and if he does, I might not outright kill him," Valkyrie joked, knowing full well she badly wanted to hit him anyway. Nadia smiled. "Don't worry. I'll make sure everything is better soon, but if they think they can hide from me, they can think again. Alright?"

"I know," Nadia sighed, getting out of bed. She was still in jeans and shirt. She crossed her arms. "You're thinking of going to find Skulduggery, aren't you?"

"You could be a detective," Valkyrie smiled softly, and kissed her forehead. "Don't worry about me anymore, okay? I'm not doing anything immediately."

Nadia just nodded to that but did have her a kiss on the lips before leaving the bedroom. Valkyrie watched her go, knowing she needed to reassure Nadia later on, but for now, she got herself dressed. She just chose some tight jeans and a green vest top she'd had for a long time but had never gotten too small because it was stretchy and her chest had never really grown. She may have tiny little breasts, but she had legs. Well, maybe they weren't tiny, necessarily, because Valkyrie had seen women with flatter chests. But Valkyrie would have chosen something else if she had gotten the choice. Then she grinned, because she _had_ chosen bigger when she started dating Nadia. She was still giggling when she went down the stairs and had to take a moment to remind herself of what she had to talk about before she could continue.

Dexter, Saracen, Anton, Erskine and Tanith were sitting in the parlour cross living room already, all holding cups of tea or coffee and looking incredibly tired. She wasn't sure they had slept at all last night.

"Good morning," Valkyrie said chirpily, taking her usual seat. The others smiled tightly. "What's happened?"

"Nothing to worry about," Dexter said after a moment of hesitation. He sat up and acted casual. "So, you and Nadia shared a room last night."

"Yes," Valkyrie said easily. "You can't deflect my question, Dexter. What happened?"

He sighed. "Cub, I know you like being involved, but we just got you back. Can we leave the explanation for a few days?"

"No, we can't," Valkyrie said immediately, knowing she needed to get in control of her family before things got even worse. "Nadia told me some interesting things last night."

Dexter tried a smirk, but seeing Valkyrie serious face, it didn't look convincing. "Do I want to know?"

She looked over at Saracen, who was looking at her almost pleadingly. "Last night. You were talking about how Skulduggery convinced Fletcher to go into the Spiders den but refused to look at Nadia when you said it. Why?"

He tried to speak but just a croak came out. He cleared his throat. "It was nothing Val," he tried, and his smile faded when he saw the look she was giving him. "Really. Nothing's happened."

"I didn't say it did."

"I know, but you think it did."

"I _know_ it did Saracen," Valkyrie snapped, watching his face fall when she used his real name. They could always tell she was genuinely upset with them when she used their real names in private. Her family all lowered their faces and Valkyrie was almost glad for it. "Come on, guys. Did you really think that I was stupid enough not to see you hiding things? Nadia was practically in hysterics. She's not _used_ to this type of stuff. She's a normal, average schoolgirl, she doesn't do anything big or stressful like this. She needed support and a friend, and you all just buggered off and left her at the hospital. You buggered off _before_ that, for god's sake. What were you thinking?"

"We were thinking of the Sanctuary and the Spiders," Dexter snapped. His exterior of calm was slipping. "She almost ruined everything."

"No, Skulduggery ruined everything," she told him outright. " _He's_ the one that did all this. He went off alone, he thought he didn't need family. _He_ agreed to help blow up the Sanctuary. _He_ manipulated Nadia into thinking her only option was to go to the Spiders because she thought _you_ would be killed, and you ignored her and made her feel like she was worthless for it. She isn't like us. This is still eating her up inside because, since the start, you've all just cut her off. Do you have any idea what this is doing to her? And, I'd like to point out, she actually fucking managed it! She deserves some sort of medal for that shit. I don't think I could have gotten in and out of there like she did!"

"Val, there's been a lot going on," Tanith said quietly. The sun was shining through the window and making her bed hair look like a glowing golden halo.

"I know there has, but there was enough time to call her or send a text, or, I don't know, talk to her when you were actually _in_ the hospital," Valkyrie glared, letting them all feel her anger. "Nadia is already suffering mentally from being abandoned at that school and by her parents, and all this hasn't helped in the slightest. And the worst part is that she was trying to defend you when she said what happened and was scared when I said I was going to talk to you about it. How could you do that?"

Saracen, Dexter and Erskine, the ones she was most angry with, didn't look up from the floor and didn't answer her.

"Nothing? No excuse? Really? You're my brothers. You should have spoken to her and made this easier for her, not – not this," Valkyrie choked, her emotions getting too strong. "I've honestly never been so angry. You've all just let this family fall apart, and that's before Skulduggery and Ghastly fucked up. The way you've dealt with all this is disgusting. And you know what, when's the last time you spoke to Fletcher? When he took the blame for Nadia? He was being the only fucking friend she had, and I doubt you looked at him twice. You didn't give a shit, did you? Huh? Say something!"

"There isn't anything to say," Erskine said quietly.

"Really?" Valkyrie said sarcastically. "Is that what you think?"

He looked up at her with tears in his eyes. "He's been our friend for centuries, Valkyrie, and he tried to kill us all just to save some man he hasn't had one nice thought about in three hundred years. It's killing us, Cub."

Valkyrie could see pain in Snake's eyes, pain and guilt. A tear fell from Dexter's downcast face, and Saracen put an arm around him, but they didn't let her see their faces.

She sighed and felt her anger leave her, letting the sadness and her own pain and confusion fill her back up. "How close are you to finding Skulduggery?"

"He's disappeared," Anton said in his deep voice.

Valkyrie nodded. "I want you to all take some time off. Three days at least. More would be better," Valkyrie told them, standing up. They all looked up at her. "I'm taking over this case. You're all too close."

"Cub–"

"Don't," she told Dexter, and strode out of the parlour, spotting Nadia peeking her head around the corner. Out of view of her family, she gave her girlfriend a soft, sad smile and waited for her to quietly jump over the bannister and float down to stand next to Valkyrie. With a hand on Nadia's back, they went to the kitchen and Valkyrie carefully took a breath and let the emotions go, like she'd been trained. She would get through this, and even if it was different later, she'd fix her family. With the little smile Nadia was looking up at her with, she knew it was the right thing to do.

She fixed them up a breakfast of fruits and oatmeal, Nadia staring at the wall with vacant eyes. "You okay?" Valkyrie asked, setting a bowl in front of her at the breakfast bar her family had never really used.

Nadia nodded and smiled at her gratefully. "Yeah. I was just thinking."

"What about?"

"Just everything," she said quietly, taking a spoonful of the fruit porridge. "I think I'm still just shocked you're back to yourself."

"It's weird for me too," Valkyrie admitted, smothering her breakfast in syrup. "So much changed. But I'll fix what I can, alright? I'm going to fix all this."

Nadia smiled, and they ate in compatible silence, both thinking of their troubles. Nadia offered to do the dishes, and while she did that, Valkyrie stepped out the backdoor and called Corrival on her mobile.

It took a few moments, but then he picked up. "Valkyrie?"

"Hi, Pa," Valkyrie said, somehow relieved to hear his voice. "So, what's the news?"

"The news?" He spluttered for a moment, before laughing a little and warmly saying, "Goodness, already back to normal. Welcome back, Valkyrie."

"Thank you," Valkyrie said. "Everything's kind of falling apart isn't it?"

He grunted. "You don't need to worry–"

"Yeah, I've just left my brothers crying in the other room because of how they've handled all this, so I kind of don't care if you think I shouldn't be involved," Valkyrie said firmly before he could even finish. He didn't say anything back. "I want to take over the case. The others are too involved. They haven't acted like themselves."

"Honey," he said quietly. "The Dead Men know what they're doing. You should be recovering."

"They're too involved to find Skulduggery and get the answers we need and you know it. They wouldn't be able to cope even if they did, and we both know they don't have the detective skills to get anywhere close to him," Valkyrie reasoned. "I can track him down. Give me a month to sort all this shit out. I want full powers over the search, and I'll be able to find him and finish this case. I can get answers for what happened at the Spiders den, and what he made Nadia do."

"Valkyrie–"

"Yes or no, Elder Deuce," she said harshly. "Full control or I'll go alone off the books."

He sighed and after perhaps a full minute in which Valkyrie knew he was stewing over what he wanted to do, he answered. "Alright, Detective Cain. Do what you need to do."

Valkyrie thanked him and hung up the phone, glad to have that off her mental checklist. She was in control of the investigation, had beaten her brothers around the head enough for them to understand how they had fucked up. Now came actually getting them to back off the search since she didn't think her telling them off would make them stay back for too long. Knowing she had some time now she was in control and not wanting to make the mistake of acting with her emotions rolling – she'd learnt something important from her family's mistakes at the least – she went back into the house.

Sitting at the breakfast bar was Tanith and Nadia.

"Hi," Valkyrie said, giving Tanith a small smile. She'd said what she wanted, Valkyrie told herself firmly. Now was the forgiving part. That would bring them closer as a family. "How are you feeling?"

"Oh, fine, fine," Tanith said, wrapping her hand around the mug of steaming hot blackcurrant in front of her. "Was that Corrival?"

"Yeah, he gave me full power over the search. I'll have Skulduggery back within the month, or that's what I told him anyway."

"You're not calling anyone by their nicknames," Tanith observed.

"I think I'm growing out of it," Valkyrie said lightly, pulling one of the barstools around so she could face Tanith.

"You're only sixteen," Tanith said quietly, her eyes sad. "You don't need to force out your childhood yet."

"They were only meant to be code names at the beginning," Valkyrie said, looking into her own mug of coffee Nadia had made her. "I think I might start using them like that."

"Your brothers would be upset if you did that."

"Maybe it's for the best," Valkyrie said, smiling to herself. "A change. A new beginning. We need to spend time together, rebuild our bonds. Even without Skulduggery and Ghastly, it's important for us to stand together. We're still family."

Tanith smiled and held her hand out. Valkyrie didn't hesitate to take it in her own. "You're a good person, Valkyrie," Tanith said softly. "I'm glad I've been here to watch you grow up."

Valkyrie smiled and the two of them looked at Nadia when she started crying.

"Nadia?" Valkyrie asked, a little panicked.

"I'm fine!" She said quickly, covering her face. "It's just nice to see you two happy!"

Valkyrie laughed and Tanith pulled Nadia into her arms and the three girls grinned at each other. There was a lot more to go… but this was a start. A happy start.


	123. Short China visit and thanking Fletcher

**Chapter 123**

After informing her brothers, who were still sitting silently in the parlour, that she had full control of the search, Valkyrie took Tanith's motorbike and set off to China's library.

She was glad to get on the road and have some alone time to clear her head, so much so she was walking with a skip in her step when she got to China's. She still had to thank the woman for saving her at Bliss' house when she stupidly thought China wasn't expecting her brother to save her. He had done, after Valkyrie put her own life in danger, meaning China had to pull her out and use up her magic on healing _her_ instead of herself. Something Valkyrie hadn't expected but did appreciate.

China was actually in the hallway when Valkyrie got up the stairs and had a smile waiting for her.

"Valkyrie, my dear," China softly smiled. "You've recovered."

"Yeah, as of yesterday."

"And your family let you out without an escort? That is a surprise," China commented, opening the apartment door to let them in.

"Yeah, well, they had to take some time off for themselves," Valkyrie started.

"Oh? Tell me more," China smiled, sitting on a beautiful new velvet chair and pouring some tea.

"They haven't been acting like themselves. They essentially left Nadia by herself to deal with everything to do with me and haven't spoken to her once. I know they don't have to talk to her in normal circumstances, but they got her from her house, threw her in the hospital, and didn't say a thing," Valkyrie explained carefully.

"And of course there are the rumours she was the one that rescued Mr Wreath," China suggested.

Valkyrie smiled tightly. "You know, then. Yes, Skulduggery manipulated her into going by saying she was the only one able to fit in some ventilation system and that if anyone else went they'd surely die. She's already going through a lot mentally so I don't think she could think of a way out of it and being so stressed at the time... it's insane she actually managed to do it."

"It is an impressive feat," China put in, stirring a sugar cube around her cup.

"I know, I was honestly in shock. But when it came to telling me yesterday, my brothers tried to trick me into thinking Fletcher did it all like they told the public, and Nadia's struggling a lot with everything and I got her to tell me the truth. It turns out the Dead Men can't cope very well with breaks within their own, just like the Spiders were counting on. So I told them to take a few days, got full control of the search, and came to speak with you."

"And how are you feeling?" China asked, sipping her tea. The light was shining beautifully on her hair, giving her a dark halo.

Valkyrie shrugged. "A little shocked. Maybe a little hurt that they did all those things, but I guess I understand. I'm more mad with Skulduggery than I am with anyone else. To be fair, Tanith is dealing with too much to be held responsible, Anton was in hospital for a long time and didn't seem to speak to her any more or less than usual. It was just Dexter, Saracen and Erskine. And Ghastly, but he's decided not to talk to anyone so that's a whole other thing. I thought they'd be the ones to understand, given how close we are. So yeah, definitely hurt. But now I just want to fix all this so the rest of us can be happy."

For a moment, China watched her with a small smiled, and then put her tea down. "Well, I know some things that you don't."

"I was counting on it."

"I've been going through my dear, deceased brother's home and I've found some correspondences I believe he left specifically for me in the event he died. Seeing as I have no interest in the nature of the information he was giving me, I passed them on a few days ago," China explained and Valkyrie felt a pit in her stomach. "I found out later that the day Skulduggery came to get that information, he had already taken young Nadia to the Spiders and left her there for dead."

"What does he know?" Valkyrie asked after a moment.

China stood and got a thin file out from her desk drawer. "Skulduggery believes he has the only copy because he is under the impression he blackmailed me out of it. It's all to do with the Spiders, the Wild Brothers, and a man called Stolen, as well as a bit on Craven."

"Is Stolen a thief?" Valkyrie asked mockingly.

"Yes, and it is a ridiculous name, however, I believe he is the man that killed the Shunter, Signate, and also the one that broke the wards when the Sanctuary was attacked," China said mildly. Valkyrie had practically forgotten all about Signate. "At the least, it'll tell you a bit more about them, but I couldn't see any code about plans or else I would have made moves to get away from them."

"Understandable," Valkyrie said, and put the file down next to her untouched tea. "Did Skulduggery mention what his plan was?"

"Oh, no, Skulduggery won't tell anyone that," China smiled. "At best, he'll come back for Mr Wreath."

Valkyrie thought about that for a moment and then nodded. "I'm assuming that means no rumours?"

"Nothing of authority. Mere hearsay from someone's brother's friend's cousin. Other than going to his usual haunts, I wouldn't expect anyone to find him."

"I'll find him," Valkyrie promised, and downed her tea in a few gulps. "Thank you for talking to me China. And thank you for saving me when I was an idiot trying to fight Bliss. I'd be dead without you."

"Oh, I know," China smirked. "You must visit me again to speak about young Nadia. I haven't heard enough going on in your social life recently. It does me good to be in on the drama, you know."

Valkyrie grinned. "Soon," she promised.

China watched her leave with the file and promise, and Valkyrie tucked the file into her top before taking off for Dublin on unrelated business.

She didn't want to be there for too long, so Valkyrie stopped off by a shopping centre and went in to find a small gift for Fletcher and Myra, as well as something for Nadia.

Unfortunately, after half an hour, Valkyrie could only think of food-based things for the couple and had to stick with that. She settled for two chocolates in the shapes of England and Australia, since that was where they were from, and then wandered through the other shops trying to find something for Nadia. That proved harder because she didn't want to throw little trinket's at her girlfriend as she had in the past, no matter how appreciated and well thought out they'd been. Sure, she didn't remember being sick, but it felt like she was starting a new, more mature part of her life. Perhaps it was the family problems.

She found a very beautiful bracelet for Nadia and drove home quickly.

The house was still very quiet when she returned. Valkyrie kicked her shoes off at the door and went through to the kitchen, but it was empty. Shrugging, she decided to see if Fletcher was home and jogged up the stairs, around to the back of the house, and knocked on his door.

She stood still for a moment, almost gave up, and then heard the creak of someone getting out of bed. She took the chocolates out of the bag. The door opened.

"Hey, Valkyrie," Fletcher said in surprise. "It's good to see you."

Valkyrie smiled, actually happy to see his annoying, handsome face. "Hey. I wanted to say thank you for saving Nadia's life and taking the fall on the saving Solomon. You did a really good thing."

He nodded and kicked his feet. "Yeah, it's alright. She looked like she needed some help, you know?"

"I do. So, thank you. Here, I got you this," she said and held out the chocolate. He took it and smiled when he saw what it was.

"Ha, thanks Val," Fletcher smiled, and a moment later, reached out and they hugged. "I really am glad you're better. Everything's gone to hell since you got ill."

"Tell me about it," Valkyrie muttered. They pulled apart a moment later. "I've been given full control of the investigation to find Skulduggery, so the men of the house have to chill and think about how badly they've reacted to all this."

Fletcher's eyebrows raised. "Time out?"

"Like children. To be entirely honest, I'm dreading finding Skulduggery," she admitted. "I don't mind looking, or telling off the guys, or helping Tanith, or being there for Nadia, but actually confronting Skulduggery about what he's done? It's kind of terrifying."

"Hey, hey, you'll be fine!" Fletcher said quickly, running a hand over his hair. "I mean, you're Valkyrie Cain. You're invincible, one of the Dead Men. If you can put the Dead Men – including Anton, especially– in time out and it worked, I'm sure you can kick Skulduggery's bony ass!"

Valkyrie grinned at Fletcher's enthusiasm despite the fact he had no idea of the actual arguments and truths that she was afraid of, not any physical fight Skulduggery might pose, and hugged him again. "Thanks, Fletch. Will you thank Myra for me?"

"Sure thing," he said, and waved her off down the corridor.

That seemed like a success! Now to check up on her girlfriend.


	124. Change can be positive

**Chapter 124**

"Hey Val," Nadia smiled when Valkyrie finally found her just coming in from the back door.

"Hey," Valkyrie replied quietly, taking the stack of perfectly folded, cold but dry laundry from Nadia's arms. "How was your day?"

"Fine, I mean, you've only been gone for four hours," Nadia shrugged, going through the kitchen without looking over at the breakfast bar where Saracen and Erskine were sitting despondently. Valkyrie didn't acknowledge them either – it had only been a few hours of punishment for them so far, so it was acceptable. "I got the rest of your washing done, and my own. I hope you don't mind, I put our clothes in the machine together. I don't know, I thought it might be weird to put our clothes together but we didn't have enough separately for a wash. I hope that's okay."

"It's fine baby," Valkyrie said, sneaking a kiss onto her cheek without dropping anything. "Anything exciting happen?"

Nadia shook her head. "No. Should it have?"

"No," Valkyrie nodded. "It feels really strange in the house now you know. I mean, it's lovely that you're here and I wanted that for ages to be fair, even if it was just visits or temporary or whatever. But there's just all this tension in the air."

Nadia hummed. "It's been empty for the most part. Before you woke up, I mean."

Valkyrie shook her head. "Whack."

" _Whack_?" Nadia smirked

Valkyrie grinned. "I'm amazing." That was received with an eyeroll, and then they were in the bedroom and Valkyrie placed the clean clothes on the end of the bed. After watching Nadia split the clothes into their own piles, Valkyrie had a sudden thought and sat on the bed. "Wait."

"Hmm?" Nadia wondered.

"Where are your clothes?"

"They're right here."

"I mean where's all your stuff? Are you living out a suitcase?" Valkyrie asked, looking around stupidly. She couldn't see one in her room.

"I moved it into Tanith's old room across the hall when you could come home from Kenspeckle's a few days ago. Tanith called him and told him you're back to normal by the way. You have to go in for a check-up but he said to tell you it'd only be half an hour at most so you have to do it."

Valkyrie grimaced, not feeling like going to the doctors but also not wanting to search for Skulduggery more and recognising that a doctor's visit extended her time not searching. "I'll go later. But I was just thinking – well, if you're okay with it, you could just move all your clothes into my wardrobe and we could, like, share."

Valkyrie knew she was putting on puppy eyes, but Nadia looked conflicted and wasn't quite looking at Valkyrie's incredibly convincing face which was unfortunate for Nadia because Valkyrie knew it was adorable. After giving her a few minutes to think about it, Valkyrie reached out and gently took Nadia's hand. Smiling, Nadia sat onto the bed and squeezed Valkyrie's hand.

"I don't know if there's room," Nadia said uncertainly.

"I don't mind moving some stuff. I did a massive clear out with Erskine a while ago, but I could do with another. I don't wear over half of what I have you know," Valkyrie said quietly with a little joking in her voice to make it a little sincere so that it wouldn't seem as if she was pushing Nadia into it, but not so much that Nadia didn't think Valkyrie was serious. Nadia bit her lip in thought. "I guess it must be a bit quick for you. I mean, yesterday I needed help doing normal things and you were helping me put my clothes on, but I have no clue what happened these last couple of weeks. It just feels like one moment I was at the Sanctuary, then there were a few little flashes like I was going in and out of consciousness, and then I woke up in the front door. To me, this is kind of what I had been hoping for for a little while."

Nadia squeezed her hand again. "It's okay. Actually, it's not that I don't want to, it feels kind of… exciting to think of our stuff all together," Nadia admitted quietly and Valkyrie felt the timid tone to her voice. "I think it's just that putting our stuff together is a very adult thing, very permanent. And I like that. But it's also a bit frightening."

Valkyrie shuffled closed on the bed and wrapped an arm around her girlfriend's shoulders. "You don't need to be frightened. I mean, we have each other don't we? I know things have been crazy, especially for you, but we will make all this work. If we share a bed, or even just the wardrobe, we'd still be exactly what we are. You can still do everything you want. And if you don't do any of those things, that's okay too. I mean, we're sixteen and seventeen right now. And god, it's so close to us being seventeen and eighteen. But aside from that, we have such long lives and I really love you Nadia. Like, a lot. We don't have to do anything until we're ready. Just like with other… _things_."

Nadia smirked slyly. "You mean _sex_?"

"Err, actually," Valkyrie said in a mock-stuck up voice, "what we did was only _fingering_. Get it right. But yes, I do mean sex."

Nadia snorted a laugh and Valkyrie grinned and kissed Nadia's neck. "I guess I can move my stuff in. Honestly, I don't even mind if all my stuff is in here because it just feels so weird being in the other room. This whole house feels disjointed. At least you're here in your room."

"What do you mean? Don't you like the house?" Valkyrie asked, standing up with a little jump to help move Nadia's suitcase.

"It's not that," Nadia said slowly.

"Tell me."

Naida sighed. "Don't take this the wrong way, but your house is old. Parts of it are lived in and happy, but most of it feels like it's been here too long and just needs a bit of help. A stilt or something."

"Have you been reading poetry?" Valkyrie teased, picking up the suitcase with the lip open and letting Nadia put her dozen or so products into the bag. "I've never really seen it that way."

"Yeah, but you've lived here since you were a little kid. You wouldn't see it like I do," Nadia pointed out.

"So does it need a paint job?"

Nadia just shrugged. "I don't know. I was just saying how I felt, not that it needed anything done to it. Anyway, I thought your dream was to build your own house?"

"I have a perfectly good foundation for that right here," Valkyrie pointed out. "If I ever wanted to redo the place, I'd make the front really pretty with stone and whitewash and all that crap I don't know about, knock everything down internally and redo the lot. Maybe I'd make the house smaller, or I could add another wing if I was feeling fancy. But this plot of land is pretty cool. I like the outside of American houses, do you know what I mean? With the rock and the siding?"

"Isn't there a deadly maze under this house?"

"That's been filled up with cement and most of the creatures and weird plants were killed. It's not safe, but it's inaccessible. And anyway, I thought you liked scary animals."

"I like kittens, not beasts," Nadia told her, opening one of Valkyrie drawers now they were back in the room. "And in my dream house, I want watercolour wallpaper. Purple, gold, pink, lilac, all pastel-y colours all mixed about and printed on wallpaper. I'd want white wainscoting and in the squares, I want the wallpaper. All the rest of the room would be white. And I wouldn't want carpet anywhere in the house, other than rugs of course. Your house is really weird because some of the rooms are carpet, some are tile, some are wood, and that's just the bedrooms on this floor."

"How do you know what flooring my brothers have, hmm?" Valkyrie teased, listening to Nadia's vision.

"Shush. I'd want chandeliers and crystals and sparkly things, but nothing tacky or over the top. One of my, I think, eighth cousins, has rhinestones and chandeliers and candles and glass and mirrors absolutely everywhere and it doesn't look good because it's just so much. I want a subtle, modern type of look."

"I'd rather chic over modern," Valkyrie put in.

"Yeah, a modern, chic house. I guess watercolour wallpaper doesn't fit in that?"

"I think the wainscoting isn't modern is it? Isn't modern all sleek lines and nothing else? I think that's like fancy farmhouse or something along those lines."

"I don't know. It's my vision, I can be hypocritical if I want," Nadia sniffed, standing back to let Valkyrie begin taking the drawers out of her built in so she could throw all the clothes in a pile on the floor by the second built in. After emptying the entire chest of drawers, she smiled at Nadia.

"This one's yours."

"Thanks," Nadia smiled and kissed Valkyrie's cheek. "You know what else I really want?"

"A dog?"

"No, not a dog! I want a round dining room table. And a room with a wallpapered ceiling that looks like a galaxy."

"Okay, that sounds pretty cool," Valkyrie conceded as they both began to sort out their own chests of drawers. It would take Valkyrie a lot longer since she had to eventually get rid of half of her folded clothes, but that was the pains of loving someone she supposed. "So, we want wainscoting on the walls, a watercolour bedroom, modern cross chic cross whatever the fuck else we decide, redo the front to look pretty. Anything else?"

"A kitten. A grey, ragdoll one," Nadia nodded to herself. "I'd call it Pearl after my imaginary cat friend from when I was a kid."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and began arguing with Nadia, in good nature of course, that dogs were far superior to cats for over an hour before she'd finally finished her clothes purge and had successfully merged her two drawers into one. She had more to go through in the wardrobe, but since Nadia's stomach had rumbled and it was five o'clock and so late enough to think about dinner, Valkyrie stood and dusted herself off.

"You know, I bought you something while I was out," Valkyrie smiled, going to the bag in the corner.

"Oh? What for?" Nadia asked, already smiling.

"For being with me when I wasn't myself," Valkyrie said quietly, standing close to the shorter girl and holding the palm-sized box between them. Nadia bit her lip. "It's not much, but I thought you'd like it."

With barely concealed excitement, Nadia took the box and opened it, putting a hand over her mouth when she saw the thin, beautiful bracelet within. It was the thinnest, golden metal, incredibly delicate looking and the perfect complimentary colour to Nadia's skin. "Oh, baby, it's amazing," Nadia whispered, putting the chain out. "It's so gorgeous."

"It's not as beautiful as you," Valkyrie smiled, happy to see Nadia grin and roll her eyes. "Here, I'll put it on you."

In just a moment, Valkyrie had the bracelet on Nadia's wrist. "Thank you, Val. I love it." Nadia leaned in and kissed Valkyrie before hugging her. "Thank you so so much!"

"It's alright. I mean, you did look after me for weeks, you kind of deserve it!" Valkyrie laughed, spinning Nadia around. "I'm glad you like it anyway. Do you want to get dinner now?"

Nadia nodded and, hand in hand, they went down the stairs like little sweethearts, smiling shyly and almost giddy with their relationship. For a moment, Valkyrie felt it sink in quite how lucky she was to have someone that loved her and cared for her and wanted to be with her. For some reason, it really struck her how incredible it was that such an intelligent, gorgeous, generous, wonderful young woman could want to be with _her_. It filled her heart up and Valkyrie felt as if nothing could make that go away.

Except for when they got in the kitchen and her brothers were there and Nadia's smile mysteriously vanished.

Like a whip, Valkyrie snapped her head up to glare at them, knowing it was their fault for Nadia becoming upset. If they hadn't been dick wads these last few weeks, this wouldn't be a problem but ohhh no!

After a moment, she forced that expression to disappear and smiled at Nadia's ducked head, pulling her into the room. One day they'd redo this kitchen and it would be big and beautiful and open and far better than the narrow space it currently was that made her have to stand so close to her brothers. It had literally just been renovated but that wasn't the point.

Fortunately for Valkyrie, Nadia perked up when the suggestion of chicken nuggets was brought up, so Valkyrie got out the rarely used fryer for some chips while Nadia heated the oven. It didn't take many silent looks before they had decided on the full meal and had it on. Since Anton, their grocery shopper, knew they wouldn't all cook, they always had frozen vegetables in the freezer, so some of that was in a bowl waiting to be nuked in the microwave, nuggets were in the oven, and the oil was heating in the deep fryer.

"There," Valkyrie nodded, hands on hips. "Do we have any sauces?"

"Err," Nadia murmured, looking in their oversized fridge. "Yes. Actually, I think you have every sauce."

"Good, that's grand," Valkyrie nodded.

With nothing else to do, she leaned against the counter and looked at Nadia rather than the opposite direction where Erskine, Saracen and now also Dexter was sitting quietly like naughty children that didn't often get told off and had finally been punished by their parents.

Nadia didn't look particularly comfortable. Probably because she could see Valkyrie's brothers over Valkyrie's shoulder. After a moment of thinking she'd wait it out, Valkyrie heart sank. She had to talk to them.

"So," Valkyrie started immediately realising how awkward she sounded. "What's been done today?"

Her brothers looked up at her from their seats and Valkyrie felt Nadia stand on her other side. They all shrugged and looked despondent.

"Come on guys, I didn't get mad at you for you to just act like that. Talk to me," Valkyrie tried. A moment of silence and then Valkyrie realised Dexter had started to cry and her heart tripped. She felt her own tears come to her eyes and all the anger that had surfaced while she was out dissipated, and she felt bad. Saracen leaned into his brother-boyfriend, as if that wasn't strange to think, and kept his own head down and Erskine just looked as if all the life had been sucked out of him.

God, this just wasn't right to Valkyrie. These were her favourite people, her family.

Nadia gave Valkyrie a small push and that was all it took for Valkyrie to run over and pull Dexter into her arms. He immediately wrapped his arms around Valkyrie and held on tightly, only standing when he almost fell out his chair trying to hold onto her. Together, they cried and felt really awful, and one by one, Saracen joined them, then Erskine, and when Erskine and Dexter held and arm open each, Nadia jumped into the middle of the crying fest and sobbed with the family. All around, Valkyrie heard the sniffing and the boys saying how sorry they were to Nadia and Nadia's sniffles of forgiveness.

"I love you," Erskine wept at one point, gripping onto Valkyrie's shirt tightly. "I love you so much. Please don't hate me."

Valkyrie wasn't sure which one of her, Nadia or the other men grabbed him and held him the tightest, but they all hugged him tightly and he got a turn in the middle. After a long time, they pulled away to see each other's tear-stained faces.

"I love you guys," Valkyrie whispered, wiping her tears away with her sleeve.

"We love you too," Dexter sniffed, kissing her forehead and then wrapping Nadia in a hug. "I'm so sorry Nadia. I didn't realise what I was doing and I just messed up so badly. I wanted to blame anyone and I just took out my anger on you. You didn't deserve that."

Nadia could only nod because it looked as if Dexter was blocking her airways, but the point was put across. Saracen was on the other side of the kitchen finishing cooking the girl's dinner to hide away from further emotions and as an apology, but Valkyrie could see how badly this was affecting him. Erskine was holding Valkyrie's hand and when Dexter let her go, he switched out for Nadia, hugging her tightly before holding her hand instead. He was obviously having one of his childish episodes where he needed to hold onto others, but Nadia didn't look as if she minded and that just filled Valkyrie's heart even more. Not only would Nadia look after Valkyrie, but she was willing to forgive the people that made her life so hard these last few weeks and even comfort one of the people that made her cry herself to sleep for days at a time.

Valkyrie made a vow to herself to learn to be as forgiving and smart as Nadia. If she could be as half as amazing as her girlfriend, she'd surely be a saint.


	125. Ghastly: Being a Stroppy Dick

**Chapter 125**

"Valkyrie!" Civet cheered when she reached the top of the stairs. Grinning, she reached out and the two hugged tightly. "I'm so glad you're feeling better."

"I feel like normal," Valkyrie shrugged. "Nadia said you looked after me the whole time. Thank you."

"Aww, thanks," Civet smiled, leading her through to the back Ward. "But Doctor Kenspeckle did most of the work. Did anyone tell you what happened in the ward?"

Valkyrie frowned. "I slept a lot and then woke up but wasn't myself. No one really elaborated."

"I expect they were exhausted," Stentor said from the second ward doorway, grinning broadly. They waved at each other. "You've got a really kind girl, you know. She stayed with you for six of the nine days you were asleep. And she's an absolute cutie."

"Yeah, she mentioned that part," Valkyrie smiled instantly. "She's moved into my house actually."

"Oh, exciting gossip," Civet clapped his hands. "But before that, take a seat. So, err, how do you feel about Doctor Kenspeckle?"

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean? I, like, respect him, and he's really nice and stuff. I don't know what I'm meant to say here."

"Oh, good," Stentor said, and then turned and opened Kenspeckle's lab and called the doctor over, who looked at Valkyrie with astonishment and then glared at her.

"Silly girl. You were meant to come in immediately. I swear, those Dead Men don't care about your continued health at all," he muttered, bringing in a table of medical stuff.

"It's good to see you too, Kenspeckle," Valkyrie smiled.

He grunted but didn't move away when she kissed him on the cheek as thanks for all his help.

"Well, tell us about the move in, then," Civet grinned, sitting on the bed next to Valkyrie.

"Stand up," Kenspeckle grouched.

"I'm actually on holiday time as of an hour ago," Civet grinned cheekily and Kenspeckle didn't say anything back, a testament to how much he enjoyed his assistant's company. "How did you two decide to make the big decision then, Detective Cain?"

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "Nadia's parents are moving to India and she doesn't want to go, and I really wanted her to move in for a while because I want to spend more time with her, and I hated how upset she was at her parents. So yesterday afternoon after I got back from work–"

"You went to work?" Civet gasped.

"I was just a phone call and visiting China's, and that was basically just tea and chatting," Valkyrie responded quickly. "I also have control over finding Skulduggery, but that's a whole story in itself. So anyway, I just asked Nadia if she wanted to move her stuff into my room while she was staying with me, and then we were talking about the house and the things we want in the future and Nadia said she wouldn't mind moving in. So that's that. We don't have her stuff from home yet, but it's the decision part, you know?"

"I do," Civet nodded, smiling softly. "You kids do grow up quickly. It feels like only a few weeks ago I was spoon feeding you, and now you're moving out with your live-in girlfriend. Soon you'll be getting married!"

Valkyrie laughed, as did Stentor, and it wasn't too long before Kenspeckle had finished his checks of Valkyrie and found no neurological or other types of lasting problem with Valkyrie other than her own shock of what had happened while she was 'gone'. He said it was like a miracle had occurred in that split second she ran to Nadia's aid and could only explain it with a shrug, saying the brain was an incredibly complex muscle. But of course, she wasn't there just for herself.

"Where's Solomon?" Valkyrie asked. "I didn't see him in the ward."

Kenspeckle sighed. "Mr Wreath decided that he didn't wish to remain in this hospital."

"Excuse me?" Valkyrie asked, standing a little straighter. Last she'd heard, Solomon wasn't able to handle talking, let alone walking out.

Kenspeckle turned to face her. "I'm sorry Valkyrie. Solomon left very early this morning, at barely six. He was acting perfectly healthy and was physically healed."

"He'd been tortured for weeks! How can that be considered healthy?"

"I think you're forgetting this isn't a psychiatric ward, Valkyrie," Kenspeckle told her patiently. "I made sure Mr Wreath was healed of everything I could, but I do not have the time to counsel him, nor did I see any reason in my assessment to do so. I did advise him to seek personal support in the upcoming weeks, and he assured me he would."

"Where?" Valkyrie asked quickly.

"He didn't say anything, and as his doctor, I can't reasonably hold a healthy patient back," Kenspeckle said. "I'm sure Mr Wreath will find a comfortable place, or perhaps is currently travelling to your house seeing as I'm under the impression he's lived there for several months now."

Valkyrie wasn't sure if he would but thanked Kenspeckle regardless. He was at least right in that he couldn't hold Solomon back, but Valkyrie didn't expect his mental health, or at least his emotional health, to match his physical health.

She left the hospital quickly and got onto Tanith's old motorbike, thinking about where Solomon could go. There were a few options. Perhaps the old Temple? Not likely seeing as Solomon was happy to leave that place when it had come to it. Would he have gone looking for Skulduggery? Valkyrie wasn't sure because no one knew if he understood what he'd been told when he'd been in the hospital and unresponsive.

Her heart clenched as she took off down the road and slipped into traffic on a busier road. Solomon had become a father figure to her in recent times. Nadia had told her how incredibly brave he'd been to try and stop Craven when he'd been saying he'd kill and torture her, alluding even to Griever's Down, the place she'd almost been... well, she didn't want to think about that. It took a lot of strength to stand up for someone else after being tortured for two weeks all while bleeding to a quick and painful death on the floor. She needed to find him and bring Solomon home to give him the help he deserved. He was the only one of them that hadn't done anything wrong!

Valkyrie wasn't sure where to look but ended up on the road to the Temple regardless. It was early morning, but she weaved in and out of traffic on the bike, cutting straight through the main city and around the trams to the old Necromancer building. There, she shut the bike off and looked around the graveyard.

The street was deserted, as per usual, and there were no vehicles, though that meant nothing in the modern times of taxies. Valkyrie shook her head, hopped the old fence and tried the doors. They were locked, but when she went around the side, the tunnel she'd used with Skulduggery to break in was wide open as they'd left it. Valkyrie hesitated and then decided she didn't have to do this part. Smirking to herself, she called up the team her brothers had made out of the Sanctuary workers and waited for them to pick up. A few sentences later, and her least favourite team members were on route to crawl down a dingy hole and search for Solomon.

Maybe it was a little petty, or downright wrong, not to do it herself. But she was in charge, and since Skulduggery did everything 'for Solomon,' no one could argue talking to Solomon was important. That meant finding him. That didn't mean _she_ had to get on hands and knees for it.

Regardless of not searching in there herself, Valkyrie took off to a new location that had just occurred to her. The whole way she had to psych herself up for it because she didn't like the idea of what she might find, and she was probably right because as soon as she turned the corner into Cemetery Street, her stomach lurched.

There was no car in the driveway. The Bentley was nowhere to be found, according to the other detectives. Valkyrie pulled off her helmet and looked at the big house with serious confliction.

After tapping her finger on the handlebar a few times, Valkyrie got off the bike and walked up to the house. She had no magic or at least nothing she could use. But to be fair, she didn't think she needed any. She was just upset because the house was Skulduggery's and she was more hurt and angry with him than anything or anyone else.

She knocked on the door. No one answered, and after a skyward look asking for strength, she used her set of keys and unlocked it.

There were no sounds from within. Valkyrie took a few steps in and gently closed the door behind her, getting goosebumps when she breathed the faint aftershave and other scents she associated with her guardian. If felt almost as if he'd _died_. For real, good and gone and not coming back. And she was his not-daughter, looking through his abandoned house for the last time. For a moment, she almost felt tears come to her eyes, but then she reminded herself of how he'd not shown Nadia any mercy when he took her to the Spider's and sacrificed her for no reason whatsoever. That got her eyes dry and angry pretty well.

After thoroughly searching, Valkyrie didn't find anything in the house, not even a clue as to where Skulduggery might have gone. With a deep sigh, Valkyrie left the house and sped down the road, happy to leave that place behind, at least until she had family with her to make it easier. She wasn't entirely sure on where to go from then on. Solomon had told her himself he had no attachment to his house other than for storing his books and other personal items, and she didn't know of any close friends, nor any additional housing he had. Like her, he was limited to their makeshift family.

With a jolt, Valkyrie had a sudden and not incredibly pleasant idea. She wasn't entirely sure how it would go, but there was a very, very slim chance that Solomon might have done something as simple as go to the nearest safe building he knew – and the nearest family to the Hibernian Cinema was Ghastly's shop.

Feeling as if she was breaking Tanith's trust despite knowing her sister would never stop her visiting Ghastly, Valkyrie soldiered on, knowing this had to happen at some point. She reasoned that she had intended to talk to her brother at some point anyway. She had to. More than that, she had to convince him to move back in. Even more than all _that_ , she was pretty sure she had worked out all those things that Saracen, Erskine and Dexter had hinted about when they'd been bonding last night over ten bags of crisps, fizzy drinks and heart to heart updates on what had happened without her.

She believed that Ghastly and the rest of her family knew about Skulduggery being Lord Vile, not including Tanith and Nadia. Not that they'd told her outright, but it had been hinted at somewhat. What that meant, Valkyrie truly did not know.

If it were true, it opened up a massive bag of cats. Was Ghastly's anger mostly over unresolved feelings, or was it something different? Was he more upset with Tanith or the others believing Skulduggery had remorse for his actions? Would he out Skulduggery over everything that had happened?

The last one was difficult for her to even have an opinion on. There was so much wrong in what Skulduggery had done recently and in the past. But there was so much guilt, remorse and good in him that she didn't want him to suffer in that way either. She wasn't sure it was possible to come up with a satisfactory answer either way.

She shook those thoughts from her head when she pulled up outside Ghastly's shop.

Her feelings had to be put aside from Skulduggery and Tanith. That was between Ghastly and the others. She was his sister, he was her brother. End of. She loved him as much as Tanith and Skulduggery, even if he was an idiot she wanted to scream at.

Ghastly's shop was open and Valkyrie walked straight in. The bell jingled, and Valkyrie heard Ghastly from within call he'd be there in a moment, but Valkyrie didn't have time for that. Quickly, she hurled through the shop and pulled open the kitchen door to exactly what she suspected.

"Solomon!" She cried and jumped into his arms.

"Ouf!" He grunted, and after a moment of shock, wrapped his arms around her. "Hello, Valkyrie."

"I went to see you at the hospital but Kenspeckle said you already left," she said emotionally into his shoulder. "I went to the Temple and there are detectives searching it for you right now and I checked Skulduggery's house and it was really weird, and then I thought you might have come here. I'm really glad to see you again."

He pushed her back gently and smiled at her. He looked more strained than usual, but there was genuine happiness in his eyes. "You don't have to worry about me, Valkyrie. I am perfectly healthy."

"Yeah, but you've not exactly been in a great place recently, and you left so early," Valkyrie explained, grabbing a seat. Ghastly was sitting quietly on the other side of the table sipping tea. "I thought you might've wandered off or something."

Solomon scoffed. "I'm not senile yet," he told her. "I merely came to Ghastly's house and we were talking about recent events. I cannot believe some of what I've been told, and I didn't feel like contacting anyone when it's all so overwhelming."

"Yeah it was the same for me," Valkyrie said, and they smiled at each other and hugged again over the table. "I'm so glad you're okay, Solomon."

"I'm fine, I'm fine," he reassured her gently, and they sat back now. "Now. Tell me. How are you?"

"I'm grand," she said quickly. "Busy already. Took over the search for Skulduggery but I've not done much yet. Nadia's parents are moving to India in a week or so, but Nadia actually agreed to move into our house yesterday so that was fun."

"That sounds exciting," Solomon nodded.

"It was. I shouted at my other brothers a lot for how they were acting when I was out of it," she admitted a little more quietly, addressing both Solomon and Ghastly this time. "I wasn't really impressed with how they were acting towards Nadia. After she rescued you, they just left her in the hospital alone and didn't speak to her at all–"

"Wait," Ghastly interrupted, leaning forward with a frown. "I thought Fletcher rescued Solomon?"

Valkyrie glared angrily, though not at Ghastly. "No. That was a story made up by Corrival to lead civilians and, he hopes, the Spider's away from Nadia seeing as Fletcher can get away a lot faster. It's useless though. After she got you, Solomon, she had to run away with you and the Spider's saw you both. Don't you remember?"

"No, I don't," he said with a deep frown.

"Oh. Well, I'll tell you the full thing later I guess, but Skulduggery had left a message with the Sanctuary, but it's in such shambled no one saw it for hours, and when they did, they sent Fletcher ahead and he got to Nadia right on time and he teleported you both to Kenspeckle's before some Spiders in their Spidery form killed Nadia."

Solomon rested his head in his hands. "This is worse than I thought."

"Yeah it's pretty shit," Valkyrie agreed. "Honestly, I'm more upset with Skulduggery about that than anything else. I mean, with the Sanctuary, he was probably really bad mentally and couldn't really do a whole lot at all, but with this? I don't think he had a plan. As soon as Nadia was out of sight, he bolted. It was caught on a local camera."

"Coward," Ghastly muttered, and Valkyrie didn't say anything. Skulduggery deserved it.

"But yeah," Valkyrie said. "The guys essentially took out Skulduggery being a monster on Nadia who was in a really bad place before that, and they tried to feed me the whole Fletcher thing too. Turns out, Fletcher was the one offering to be the scapegoat for the whole thing so they'd leave her alone and was blocking them getting into the bathroom she'd locked herself in too. He was being really decent to her."

Solomon nodded and Ghastly looked impressed. "Got more of a spine than I gave him credit," Ghastly said roughly.

"I gave him and Myra a little gift as thank you, but I want to do something else eventually. Maybe dinner? I don't know, but chocolate doesn't seem enough."

"Let me do something," Solomon interjected. "He saved me too. Let me think of something."

Valkyrie shrugged. "With all that's going on, I'll take all the help I can."

There was a brief silence then, and Valkyrie could feel the new topic breaching when Ghastly looked down at the table. She looked at him, waiting, and when he looked up and saw her, he blushed. "Is it that obvious?"

"Just say it," she told him quietly.

"How's Tanith?"

"Good," she said honestly. "A little bit upset you haven't come over the house, but otherwise, she's great. Sickness cleared up, not much nausea. Nadia's helping with bits now. Staying off her feet. If you called her, she could tell you better."

Ghastly shook his head. "She hates me. I'm giving her space."

"Coward," she told him bluntly.

He looked at her, shocked. "Excuse me?"

"You know what I said. You're being a coward." She saw him about to speak but she interrupted him before he could go on his tangent. "If you want to know what's happening with her and _your_ kid, you need to try and work something out with Tanith. The only thing Tanith is properly stressed about right now is you, and if you'd just pull your head out the sand you'd see that. Why haven't you done anything?"

He spluttered. "She broke up with me! I'm giving her space. She said she'd contact me."

"That doesn't mean you act like her and your family don't exist, Ghastly," she said a little quieter. "Come on. Why are you avoiding home?"

"I'm not avoiding home."

"Really?"

"Yes! Tanith doesn't want to see me."

"Is this actually about Tanith?"

"Of course it is! Why wouldn't it be?"

"I think you're mad about Skulduggery still."

"Of course I am!" He half-shouted. "He almost killed you!"

"Yes, but you're not coming home because of it," she said softly, and she saw him give up when he sagged. "I love you Ghastly. You're family. You just can't let your hatred get in the way of this."

"I'm not," he said angrily, getting up with his cup and going to the sink. "I'm angry because my so-called _brothers_ are forgiving Skulduggery."

"What? No, they haven't," Valkyrie corrected, a little confused. "Ghastly, you haven't spoken to them in weeks. They're furious with him. I had to pull them from the case because they were too involved."

"You can't understand," he muttered darkly, putting the washed cup on the draining board.

"Excuse me? I understand perfectly well, but I don't let my anger at one man affect my whole family. Skulduggery's done an awful thing, but he was let off for the bombing. He won't be let off for what he did to Nadia. I'm not saying he did a good thing in helping bring in that bomb, but that's out of our control now. Skulduggery will be punished, but right now, you're just punishing yourself and our family."

"It's not that simple, Valkyrie," he insisted, running a hand over his face.

"No, it's not. I know that feelings from the war are coming out Ghastly. I know what Skulduggery did, I know the man he was, and I know how this is affecting you, or at least I know enough to say that I don't think you're concerned with the bombing at all," Valkyrie said quickly, stilling him from walking straight out the room. He looked at her with wide eyes, almost panicking. "I know about all of that. I think the others do too, and they know why you're upset and that's why they've left you be. Plus, they all seem kind of mad that you've been ignoring Tanith."

Ghastly, not seeming to like any of that, rushed from the room. Frustrated, Valkyrie went to follow him, but Solomon grabbed her arm.

"Stop," he said firmly. Then, more gently, he stood with her. "We should give him time to process."

Valkyrie sighed but had to agree. Overwhelmed already, and not even midday, Valkyrie grabbed onto Solomon again for a hug. At least she had one person back.


	126. The New Sanctuary

**Chapter 126**

Solomon had to take a taxi home, and while the driver followed the great laws of Ireland, she sped on ahead just as Tanith had taught her.

At the mansion, Valkyrie parked the bike right by the front steps and left the helmet on the seat since it was a very blue-skied day and didn't look as if it would rain. Apparently it would storm that night, or that's what the radio had said that morning, but for now it was a nice day.

Solomon had to be five or ten minutes behind Valkyrie, so she decided to forewarn the others. In the front entrance, Valkyrie merely whistled loudly and it barely took a moment for the men to rush from all corners of the house towards her. Tanith and Nadia came right behind the men with frowns.

"Damn," Dexter cursed. "Who taught you that?"

"Pa," Valkyrie smirked. "He said he did that to 'bring you forth', and I figured it would still work after a hundred years."

"I feel manipulated," Saracen grinned and they all went into the parlour living room.

"That's conditioning for you."

Valkyrie put an arm around Nadia, hugging her from the side. Nadia looked up at her a little confused, which was understandable because Valkyrie had said she'd come back with Solomon and had turned up happy without him.

"Do you have news?" Anton asked from his chair.

"I found Solomon," she announced to the room, taking her seat with Nadia. "He'll be here in a few minutes, decided the bike was too dangerous for him."

Tanith grinned. "You mean my bike."

"Actually, I've taken it from you," Valkyrie told her sweetly.

"Oh, have you now?"

"Yes. It's mine and you can't have it. I will be teaching your child to ride it in the near future," Valkyrie grinned.

Tanith shrugged. "Sounds good to me. _I'll_ get an _upgrade_."

"As lovely as this is, I'd like to know what's going to happen with Solomon," Anton put in with a small smile of his own.

"Nothing's going on with him. He was released this morning and he went to Ghastly's house because it was the nearest to the hospital and he didn't know what's been going on these last few weeks. Ghastly had been telling him when I got there, and I updated them both on some outdated information and when Ghastly got upset, he stormed off and Solomon said he'd follow me home. Well, he argued about the bike first, but he'll be here in the next few minutes."

They all nodded slowly. "How is he?" Erskine asked in a small voice.

"Quiet," Valkyrie admitted. "A little slower? I think he's just taking a little longer to take things in, but he talks the same, acts the same, uses magic. He's the same man as before. I think it's all just very overwhelming to have all the change and bad things happen to him in the last few months."

He nodded and Dexter put an arm around his shoulder. "Did he mention…?"

"We didn't talk about that," Valkyrie told him, referring to the torture. "I just updated him on what I know, nothing else. We spoke about Skulduggery and he was obviously upset over him, but he was ready to come with me here, so I don't think he's going to be running after him or anything. Skulduggery was honest about one thing, Solomon didn't know anything about any of this. He's just the victim."

Erskine nodded quickly and took a deep breath. "That's good."

"We'll be there for him," Dexter said quietly, looking at the ground.

"I imagine he'd like that," Valkyrie smiled softly, and saw the taxi stop right outside the property gate. "He's here now. Look, I know I shouldn't need to say this, but don't harass him and don't annoy him. He needs time."

"We know Cub," Saracen stopped her. "This isn't our first rodeo you know."

"I'm not a rodeo," Erskine glared.

Saracen grinned and began saying something about a bucking horse before Dexter smacked him and the front door opened. A moment later it closed and Solomon walked around the corner looking for all the world as if nothing bad had ever happened to him.

"Good afternoon," he nodded to the room, going around the sofa and sitting on Valkyrie's other side. The room had rearranged itself. Skulduggery's chair had been removed by someone, and the sofa's had moved in a U shape around a large square coffee table. There were two spare chairs by the fireplace for reading, but the main area was for talking, looking out the window and being a family.

It was nice, and homey which Valkyrie liked too. But, because of the recent events and changes, the seating plan had changed. Erskine, Saracen and Dexter sat together on one long sofa, Anton and Tanith sat on the loveseat alone opposite those three, and Nadia and Solomon sat on either side of Valkyrie on the middle on the U sofa layout. It felt easier to see everyone, or maybe it was because there were two fewer people to look at. When – or _if_ , Valkyrie said firmly in her head – Ghastly and Skulduggery returned, it would actually mess up the seating plan. Something in her mind, completely separate from the situation at hand, clicked in her mind and she realised it was time to update her home to their new lives. She was sure Nadia would enjoy that given their conversation yesterday.

"Tanith," Solomon said when he had sat. "How have you been?"

"I'm alright," Tanith said almost nervously. "Stressed, I supposed, but I'm getting more excited for the baby to be here."

"I'm glad," Solomon smiled, and Tanith seemed to relax, finally taking in that Solomon was the same person as he was before, separate from the dramas of the last month. An innocent man. "Anton, have you recovered from your injuries? I wasn't given much information on what's happened to you."

"I will be fine soon," Anton revealed. That was news to Valkyrie – she assumed he was well already. Another note for later. "How about yourself?"

Solomon was quiet for a moment and lent forwards and back very slightly a few times before answering. "I've been better and worse. Valkyrie was gracious enough to allow me to live back here, so I'm sure I'll have enough to keep myself occupied. For one, I need to find a new object."

"Oh yeah," Erskine said suddenly and got up. He walked over to the mantelpiece above the fireplace and picked up the small black thing. "Here." He threw the thing and Solomon was still fast enough to catch it. "It's the jewel that was on top of your cane."

"Oh, so it is," Solomon smiled. After a slow moment of considering it, he looked up. "Thank you. My mother gave me this when I first joined Necromancy. I was worried I'd never see it again."

Saracen shrugged. "It looked important."

"It is. Thank you," he said and pocketed the trinket.

"It's fine," Dexter said, looking a little guilty. Valkyrie assumed he hadn't been in favour of keeping it. "Solomon, would you like some lunch? We were just making some…"

"I think so," he said, standing up. Everyone in the room did the same and they went quietly over into the kitchen, Nadia and Solomon sticking close to Valkyrie. It was a little strange to be boarder by her loved ones, but she could understand. There was still a little tension as they all wondered what was okay to mention and what was off limits. Valkyrie was downright curious about what the Spider's army was like, what Craven was doing, what the place was like, but she knew she couldn't really ask about that.

Plus, her head kept going straight back to redoing the house and she was struggling to stay focused. It was a fun idea!

Slapping herself internally, Valkyrie decided to step up and started asking people what they wanted and needed, and it wasn't long before they were all gathering food, plates and different things together and taking it all to the informal kitchen table to squeeze around like children. Tanith especially looked a bit squished, but she had a big smile on her face, and it really did feel as if a weight had fallen from her family's shoulder now this member was back.

"What time do you leave?" Nadia asked when there was a lull in lunch conversation.

"What's happening?" Valkyrie asked, looking at Tanith in the assumption it was a baby thing.

"The Sanctuary called an emergency meeting while you were out," Dexter said.

"We're voting on the new administration and the new building," Erskine continued. "Meritorious and Pa will be there, and all Irish mages are invited."

"Oh damn," Tanith joked sarcastically. "Guess I'll just sit comfortably at home with no boring politics."

Valkyrie tutted. "I have to go, don't I?"

"You're one of five remaining Head's," Dexter pointed out. "I think Pa would kill you if you didn't come."

"So are we just filling in the other Head spaces and the building? I don't think we're really needed for that," Valkyrie said, buttering some bread. "I mean, I don't care who works the phones. I just kick people's asses."

"Think of it as a government vote," Anton told her. "It's not enjoyed, but it is expected. And you have no right to complain if you weren't there to vote on the next leaders."

Valkyrie grumbled but didn't have much choice in any of it apparently, so she went along with the Dead Men. She brought Nadia along too, although she looked nervous, and she understood why – Nadia's parents _could_ turn up. Solomon decided to stay back with Tanith and Saracen, who refused to go outright.

Without Ghastly's van, they had to take a car. The men went in that while Valkyrie coerced Nadia onto obviously-Valkyrie's-Bike. Nadia claimed it was a stupid name, but once she had the helmet on Valkyrie could only see an extremely tiny girl in a massive helmet and all her complaints became adorable. Something in Valkyrie's brain couldn't work when she saw Nadia being cute, that much was apparent. Once they were on the bike it was a slow ride over to the temporary Sanctuary.

That temporary Sanctuary was just a hall, really, in the middle of nowhere on a dirt road. Nadia had let her drive faster the further they went, so they were there a little before the car, but there were a lot of vehicles around looking very conspicuous. After helping Nadia off the bike and setting their helmets down, Valkyrie took her hand and they went into the Sanctuary.

In the double doors, the room was exactly as Valkyrie expected – literally a large room with a small kitchen area at the back with a window for passing tea and coffee through. Just an average Irish community hall. Boring, plain, nothing to it, but in the middle of nowhere which was the idea Valkyrie supposed. Squeezing Nadia's hand, they went directly to Pa.

"Elder Deuce," Valkyrie smiled.

"Detective Cain," he said deeply, his eyes narrowed on her slightly but a turning up at the mouth. "You haven't come to see me about the case you took from under the Dead Men's feet."

"I've been investigating independently for the last few days. I sent a group out this morning to search the Temple, but it ended up being unnecessary."

"Yes, one man in particular came to tell me about it," he growled. "I expect you to keep a closer grip over them from now on. Finding Skulduggery is my business. His _pathetic_ hatred towards you is not."

"I'll do my best to kerb his anger," Valkyrie shrugged. "The others will be here in a moment. Do you know if Nadia's parents are coming?"

"This is an open invitation," he explained, his shoulders lowering slightly when he looked at Nadia. "I wish to apologise for my reaction at the hospital some weeks ago. It was not appropriate, nor right of me to become so angry. I should have used my sense faster."

"That's okay," Nadia said, smiling up at him. She was squeezing Valkyrie hand nervously. "It's probably stressful being an Elder, and this is your family and all."

"Thank you, Miss Robin," he said quietly. "It hasn't been the happiest time of my life, no. But when we have the new Sanctuary set up, I think we can move on from a lot of the damage."

"I hope so," she agreed more confidently.

Just then, the others came in with their serious faces on. In fact, only Anton looked calm, but that was the scariest thing about Anton for other people – they couldn't see if he was angry or not until his gist was out. Valkyrie knew the little signs, but even then, she could see why someone might fear Anton.

"I see you made it, but no Rue," Corrival commented as Meritorious marched over. "Eachan. Are we ready to begin?"

"Not until four," he whispered back. "Valkyrie. Welcome back. I hope you're working swiftly on finding Skulduggery?"

"Already begun. I located and brought home Solomon earlier today but I still need to ask him if he has ideas on Skulduggery. He still needs time to recover mentally and I don't want to push."

"Just keep me informed on the big things," he said quickly, looking around and straightening his robes. "Bring Mr Wreath in for questioning when he's of sound mind."

"I know, it's on the list," she said. "I'll be talking to the prior team to find out everything they already know and finish loose ends, I was just working independently for a new perspective. I have it covered Grand Mage."

"I hope so," he muttered without moving his lips, smiling and waving to someone else. Tipstaff came over to them with a clipboard and the doors were closed some way behind them moments later.

"It's time, sirs," he whispered to the Elders. The Dead Men and family stood back a few paces to give them room.

"Thank you for joining us on short notice," Meritorious began immediately and the room shut up. "I understand we are still struggling with the loss of so many colleagues and friends, and without the use of our former Sanctuary, but with all the pressures of recent events, I'm sure we'll all agree to move onto the point of this meeting. We need to choose and immediately relocate to a new Sanctuary to prove the strength of Ireland before others move in to threaten us. I open the floor to suggestions."

"Waxwork museum!" Someone shouted immediately. It was the woman apart of the Four Elementals, the one that made them a group of five, and also not an elemental. She looked annoyed. "We didn't need to move yet anyway."

"Bulldozed," Corrival said back firmly. "Developers in Dublin wanted the building, and we couldn't risk it being found. We raised the building and removed the Sanctuary last year."

There were some mutterings, and then another hand raised. "Build a new place, like the Indonesian Sanctuary."

"We do not have the time," Meritorious countered. "We need a building at least, and away from the cities with the Spider's threatening to bring war."

There was a lot of muttering for a moment, but then Erskine made a sound next to Valkyrie. "Roarhaven," he suggested.

The room went quiet and even Valkyrie wasn't all that sure why he suggested it. Erskine hated Roarhaven. He'd been kept prisoner there for years.

"There _is_ a Sanctuary there," Corrival said after a very long silence. "And it is away from the cities."

"The Spider's used to haunt that area," Meritorious argued immediately. "They know the layout."

"But they don't have the Sanctuary. It's at the literal opposite end of the country to their last known hideout, and they wouldn't expect us to move to Roarhaven for that exact reason," Corrival nodded, thinking hard. "As well as there simply being other… connections they wouldn't expect us to put aside."

Meritorious looked around the room and asked for other suggestions. There were some responses, but none were viable to the Elders and after a long look at each other, they nodded their heads. "We move to Roarhaven."

"What about another Elder?" Someone asked.

"We will be reviewing candidates shortly," Meritorious said diplomatically. "Now we have our building, we may begin the task of settling, and then we will find a replacement Elder. I suggest the community begins thinking up candidates for our next meeting."

There was a lot of muttering, but for the most part, there were offerings of coming to help move to the new Sanctuary considering the lack of workforce, and about specific Heads of Department. Valkyrie was confirmed Head Detective without a Co-Head, as well as First Detective, and the Dead Men were also still under the same contract as they were previously. Several workers Valkyrie recognised from the Sanctuary were appointed the missing Heads as well as a few other important positions, and by the end of the hour, it seemed the Elders were happy that everything was sorted.

The relocation was scheduled immediately, and they all exited the building, the Dead Men hanging behind. Valkyrie kissed Nadia's cheek.

"That was quick," Valkyrie whispered to Erskine.

"It usually is," he muttered back. "It's just boring. Meritorious usually does a speech at the start though."

"I figured."

"I'm glad he didn't."

"Same," Valkyrie smiled.

When the public mages had left, Valkyrie left the Dead Men and told the detectives she was in charge of that they would be having a meeting in the new Sanctuary the next day, which was agreed to easily, although she got some side-eye. Not being bothered to deal with their bad attitudes as that was the main part of tomorrow's meeting, she left it short and sweet and dismissed them to do whatever they did when they weren't doing what she said.

"Ready?" Dexter asked her, standing by the door.

"Yes," she said slowly, seeing Nadia with a nervous look and an arm around her stomach like she was sick. "Is everything okay?"

"They're here," Nadia muttered, and Valkyrie saw Nadia's parents standing in front of her motorbike, serious-faced and surrounded by mages in suits.


	127. A rubbish fight

**Chapter 127**

"Don't cause a scene," Valkyrie immediately whispered to her family, walking down the steps with her hand in Nadia's.

"Don't arrest them," Nadia whispered back quickly.

Well that made things more difficult, Valkyrie supposed, but she guessed it should have been obvious. She didn't want to put a strain on her relationship by arresting Nadia's parents, especially when she'd just gotten what she wanted in Nadia moving in.

Coming up to Mr Vinay and Mrs Keena as well as their bodyguards, or Valkyrie assumed they were bodyguards, they stopped a few steps away. Mr Vinay opened his mouth to speak, so Valkyrie took her chance.

"Excuse me, Mr Vinay, Mrs Keena, but your animosity isn't welcome at this peaceful meeting. If you wanted to be a part of the vote, you're too late."

"I'm not here to argue," Mr Vinay said bluntly. "Nadia. We’re leaving. Get in the car. _Now_."

Nadia squeezed Valkyrie's hand tightly. "I'm staying in Ireland, Dad. I'm not leaving."

"Nadia, can you _please_ just do this," Mrs Keena pleaded quietly. "We've found a lovely house, and you can have friends visit us, even Valkyrie can visit us, but this country won't be safe much longer."

"I don't care," Nadia said quite calmly. "I'm old enough and smart enough to decide what I want. I want to stay here with Valkyrie. I want to stay in Ireland. This is my home."

"If you don't come with us yourself I will manhandle you into the car," he father threatened. "You don't get a choice in this. You're a child."

Nadia didn't say anything, and Valkyrie took that as it was. "She's not going anywhere. You need to stay away from that bike, and this gang you've found? It needs to disappear. Immediately. We will charge them with assault if they put a hand on any one of us."

The guards didn't make any movement that they gave a crap, and that worried Valkyrie because that meant they didn't care about their authority or themselves. Valkyrie counted quickly and found there was eight guards, as well as the two parents she wasn't allowed to hurt or arrest. There was herself, Nadia, and her three brothers. They could fight the guards, it was just keeping Nadia with them at the same time.

But Valkyrie knew how the law worked. She gave the signal.

Erskine immediately swept four of the guards off their feet and Dexter barrelled into another. Valkyrie was almost punched and had to grab the fist and put herself in front of Nadia to keep a distance, almost throwing herself to the floor in the process. Struggling with the man's strength, she kicked at him and his elbow bent a little as he buckled, and Valkyrie used that to get in close, elbow him in the nose and before he'd finished crying out, she'd kicked him again between the legs and pushed him to the ground. Two others were on her within a second.

Valkyrie took a step back, pushing Nadia further behind her, and snapped forward like a snake and punched the smaller man in the face hard enough to send him straight to the floor. She heard onlookers oohing and getting excited about the mess, but before she could think a moment more, she got punched in the nose herself.

It knocked her back several steps. Pulling in a gasping breath, she staggered forward and smacked away a second fist before slinking an arm around his neck and flipped the two of them to the floor. It wasn't ideal, but Valkyrie's head was spinning and her nose was surely broken. Using her momentum, Valkyrie got a knee up between them and dug it into the guard's stomach, held his dominant hand down and used her other fist to start pounding his face.

She barely got three hits in before she was thrown off of him by one of the others she'd thrown down already but this time she was on the receiving end of the fists. She struggled desperately, wriggling and making it awkward so he couldn't hit her properly when she heard a small war cry and Nadia shoved the massive man hard enough he fell over.

Valkyrie was so surprised her tiny girlfriend had been able to push the man straight off of her, she blinked several times before making any effort to stand. In that time, the three men attacking her had regrouped and were staring her down.

Valkyrie raised her fists to begin when Nadia shot forward and, with no care whatsoever to the danger she was putting herself in, slapped one of them in the face. Valkyrie looked in awe as the man seized and fell to the floor as if his whole body had locked together from the Shock she'd sent through his body.

The two guards looked at the absolutely furious Nadia with a small amount of wariness this time.

Grinning and deciding this was the most adorable she'd ever seen her girlfriend – the sun had come out and was illuminating the small amount of red in Nadia's black hair, making her look like a very short, incredibly beautiful, incredibly _angry_ angel, enhanced when she clicked her fingers and summoned fire – Valkyrie jumped forward and grabbed the biggest one, turning his attention to her, and shot her palm into his chin which sent him stumbling back. Nadia attacked the smaller one, pushing him with the air followed up with a fireball before turning to look at Valkyrie's large man and jumping on his back, putting her fiery hands onto his neck and holding on like a crazy woman.

Almost laughing, Valkyrie kneed Nadia's smaller one with all her returning strength just as the fire caught onto his clothes and began to envelop him. He grabbed Nadia's wrist and yanked her off of him with a cry of pain, slapping at his neck to stop it spreading, and Nadia felt to the ground. The larger guard didn't waste that moment – he grabbed Nadia and pulled her behind Dexter who was grappling violently with what could have been an alternate, brunette Tanith-esc woman.

Valkyrie jumped over Dexter and kicked the car door closed before the guard could get Nadia into it. Mr Vinay was standing in front of the guard and Nadia with a furious face before Valkyrie could do anything else.

"You need to stop," Mr Vinay growled.

"Let me go!" Nadia screeched.

"Quite, Nadia!" He shouted back, not looking away from Valkyrie. He took a step forward and the guard opened the door. Glancing around, Valkyrie saw that there was no one to help her get Mr Vinay to back down as they were all fighting at least one guard each. "Ever since you've come along, you've only led Nadia down a road to misery and indoctrinated her into thinking she can get away with anything. She believes a war _can't kill her_ for God's sake! This is your fault!"

"Nadia can think for herself," Valkyrie defended. "I'm not letting you take her to India. She doesn't want to go."

"It's not your choice," he growled and Valkyrie got ready when he moved his hand to strike her.

"Anand!" Mrs Keena shouted furiously. Mr Vinay clenched his fist. "Get in the car. We're leaving."

"You're not going anywhere with her," Valkyrie said with forced calm. Nadia screamed like she was being murdered as she was forced towards a second car. Valkyrie went to go to her but Mr Vinay blocked her path and the man roughly shoved Nadia in and slammed the door shut on her. "Let Nadia out and we can talk, we can make a compromise."

"We aren't compromising on the safety of our child," Mrs Keena snapped and got into the same car as Nadia.

Valkyrie lunged and grabbed Mr Vinay by his shirt, using her height to throw him behind her. She heard Dexter grunt as Mr Vinay, she guessed, fell onto him, and before anything more could happen, she had an idea and placed her hands on the bonnet. She gritted her teeth as Mrs Keena and Nadia began screaming at each other, and then Valkyrie found the core of her magic and let it flow through her. She felt a sharpness her Elemental powers never had, a heat her Necromancy had lacked, and a solidity her magic had never had before. When she felt it reach some level inside her, something she instinctually knew was the right limit, she let it go through her hands and into the car, frying the electronics within.

There were bangs and pops within the machine and Mrs Keena didn't mess around staying inside the car, being the first to jump out. She was furious, but without the adorableness Nadia had, and advanced on Valkyrie. Nadia practically fell out of the car behind her.

"Mum!" Nadia screamed. "Stop it!"

Mrs Keena ignored her daughter. "Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?!"

"Nadia!" Erskine called. "Over here!"

Nadia shot off just as a guard went for her, barely escaping his clutches. Valkyrie was reluctant to hurt Nadia’s mother, but it looked as if Mrs Keena didn't want a physical fight anyway, so Valkyrie ignored her. Dexter had an unconscious guard next to him, and Mr Vinay was furiously squirming beneath him – which would have been extremely humorous to witness in other circumstances – and the other guards seemed to be unconscious also. Except for the one advancing on Nadia and Erskine.

She didn't need to worry though. As soon as the guard got close enough, Erskine took aim and sent a single punch into the man's neck, effectively sending him to the ground, gagging. Valkyrie grinned at him and he shut the car door for Nadia. She had good brothers.

The crowd seemed somewhat satisfied as well. Now she just had to decide what to do with Mrs Keena and Mr Vinay. Fun.

"You cannot restrain me from my daughter!" Mr Vinay practically frothed at the mouth. "You men are just mercenaries in the Sanctuary’s hand, controlling the Grand Mage and young children! You ought to be ashamed."

"That's a little harsh," Valkyrie said. "Nadia's older than me, wouldn't she be manipulating me?"

Mr Vinay spat on her shoes.

"Right, well," Valkyrie said, taking a step back. "Look, the only reason you two aren't being arrested is because Nadia said not to and, honestly, they were absolutely awful bodyguards. Who were they even meant to be? You were trying to fight the Dead Men, you really should have found people more competent. That said, they're getting arrested for the attempted kidnapping of a minor and for attacking without being provoked, and whatever else we can dig up on them. You two can leave, but if you do this again, I'm just going to put you in cells. Do I make myself clear?"

Valkyrie wasn't sure if they had listened because they were shaking so angrily, but it didn't matter. She got onto the bike and Anton grabbed the other helmet for safe keeping so she could ride easy. The others got into the car and at the last minute, Dexter released Mr Vinay. Valkyrie sped off down the street, the car following her, and Dexter went to flirt himself a ride home.


	128. Small talk

**Chapter 128**

On the ride back, Valkyrie took some deep breaths and took some dangerous routes to scout ahead and double back on the car repeatedly. It was unnecessary – Mrs Keena and Mr Vinay seemed to have given up for the time being. But the more she stewed on it in her head, the more irritated she got at the mess of a fight that had been. She got the gates open and followed the car through, glancing in her mirror to make sure no one slipped in. They didn't. She was just feeling a little paranoid.

Valkyrie opened the car door and Nadia jumped into her arms.

"Hey, it's alright," Valkyrie soothed, gently nudging Nadia into the house. The men sat in the living room and Tanith's smile faded from where she was waiting for them. "Are you hurt?"

"No," Nadia sniffed and discretely wiped her eyes. "I'm fine. I just can't believe they did that."

"I mean, they did come here," Valkyrie said, and then regretted it when she got an offended look. "Well, they did."

Nadia pouted. "I know. I just didn't think they'd try and get me where people could see."

"They're getting desperate," Anton said from his place of the sofa next to Tanith.

"What happened exactly?" Solomon frowned.

Valkyrie and her family took the next ten minutes explaining some of the more specific things he had missed concerning Nadia and her parents. He listened carefully.

"I see," he said slowly. "How many more days until they leave?"

"They didn't say an exact day," Nadia said, sounding much calmer. "But I imagine it's within a week, maybe just a few days."

"Hmm," Solomon thought. "Perhaps it might not be utterly appropriate to suggest considering how upsetting this must have been for you, but you may want to think about retrieving your possessions from your parents' home if you plan on living at Valkyrie's home. If they plan on leaving with you, they may choose to ship everything to India in advance, or else throw it away so they don't have to bring it to the new house."

Nadia sunk into the sofa. "What if it's already gone?"

"Then I'm certain Valkyrie can deal with that," he said with a smirk, looking at Valkyrie. Valkyrie blushed. "However, it may be best to try if you have anything you desperately want to keep. You likely can't retrieve everything but you could get what's most important."

"They have my passport," she said after a moment, looking up at Valkyrie.

"We'll go get it, don't worry," Valkyrie smiled comfortingly. "What time is it?"

"Just gone five," Tanith supplied.

"Alright. Look, it's been a long day. Let's get your stuff tomorrow. I'm sure Saracen can help us, right?"

"Sure," he shrugged.

"It'll be a breeze. What really matters right now is what are we having for dinner?"

"Don't care," Tanith said, giving them free rein.

"I vote Nadia cooks!" Erskine said, shooting a hand in the air. "Who thinks Nadia should cook?"

All the men and Tanith, except Solomon, put their hands in the air.

"Nadia makes good food," Dexter grinned, giving Nadia a wink.

"Fine, fine," Nadia smiled back, a blush on her face. "But Valkyrie has to help."

The two girls went through into the kitchen alone. At first, Nadia went around finding all the things she wanted to use for her dish, and when she was ready, she sighed and leaned on the counter.

Smiling, Valkyrie went to her and pulled her into a hug. "How are you now?"

"Sad," she muttered into Valkyrie shoulder. Valkyrie picked her up and put her on the side which put their heads almost level and Nadia's legs around her waist. Nadia smiled. "They were really mad at me."

"They'll get over it. They just think they're protecting you," Valkyrie said, kissing her cheek softly. "In a few years when all this is over, they'll see you made the right choice."

"I know, it's just hard."

"Hey, in the fight, when you zapped that guy?"

"I Shocked him," Nadia corrected. "A strand of energy throwing they taught me at boarding school."

"Yeah, that. Why didn't you use it when that guy was dragging you to the car?"

Nadia rolled her eyes. "I can only use it when I'm concentrating. I only learnt it within the last month at school and I didn't really pay attention in lesson…"

"Why's that?" Valkyrie asked, taking her opportunity.

Nadia hesitated. "I just felt really upset and down. I didn't want to be at the school anymore, but I almost kind of didn't want to go home. I felt stuck, I guess. And the school was threatening to send me home, but my parents were saying I couldn't come home or I'd be in trouble."

"The school said you were sick…?"

"Yeah. My mum told you that, didn't she?"

"Your dad was there too."

"Yeah, but they didn't really listen when I told them why I was sick," Nadia whispered. "I told them it was just stress and not liking being there, but they didn't care."

"Is that why you're so thin?" Valkyrie asked, plunging right into the core of what she'd wanted to talk about.

Nadia shrugged. "I know I'm too thin. I just don't feel hungry when I get upset or stressed, that's all. And I get physically sick from the anxiety. I'm not doing it on purpose like my parents seem to think."

"So you'll eat as long as you're here?"

"Of course," she smiled, her dark eyes shining gratefully at Valkyrie. "I like being here. I've been a lot happier being here, even when you're out working I'm happy just being in the house. It's nice."

"I'm glad," Valkyrie smiled, pecking Nadia's lips. "Will you tell me more about your time at that school?"

"I guess. What do you want to know?"

Valkyrie thought about it, going between the two things she wanted to know. "How about the people? You said you had these 'kind-of-friends' and your roommates?"

"We should cook and talk," Nadia suggested, and Valkyrie put her down on the floor. "I'm not a child."

"I know," Valkyrie grinned, and patted her girlfriend on the head. "You're just tiny."

"I'm not telling you shit now."

"Aww, come on!"

Nadia instructed Valkyrie on what to chop up, and when she'd begun, she began telling her about how when she started at the school she had roommates that were already friends and weren't particularly concerned with making Nadia happy, welcome or included in their activities. After Christmas, however, two of the girls moved. "One was pulled from school because her brother went to prison and her parents were embarrassed and wanted to home school her because they thought she'd get bullied for what he did. It was funny, in the end, because no one ever found out what he did but there were rumours all about her because of it. And the other girl decided my room wasn't good enough once the first girl was gone, so she was able to move room. Another girl moved into my room after that and when she made friends with my roommates, they started to include me more."

"Were they better after that?"

"Well, they invited me places, and I was allowed to be a part of their activities, like going to parties and going shopping, gossiping, and all that fun stuff. It was nice because that new girl – her name is Rebecca by the way – tried really hard to include me. At first, the other girls didn't really care about me, but after a few weeks, they started to like me a bit too. To be fair, I think I am a bit harsh. I was feeling so bad about everything and was so stressed about schoolwork I never really said when they did something I didn't like or correct them on what they got wrong. I just wanted to get through living with them without them not talking to me again. And it helped, they would make me go to dinner, and I would eat with them, and I had more energy to do all my work, so it was good. I guess I was just grateful to have people to walk with and eat with. So they were my friends, they just have no idea that they kept making jokes that upset me."

Valkyrie nodded, turning the hob on and sticking the pot of vegetables and oil on it to heat. "Are you still talking to any of them?"

"Right now? No. But I promised I would," she trailed off, and looked at Valkyrie's smiling face. "I don't know if I want to baby. I just want to, I don't know, be happy here."

"But you said they're your friends. And now you can tell them you don't like their jokes and you'll have a better friendship. Rebecca sounds like she likes you, right?"

Nadia made an unconvinced sound. "Rebecca was nice at first. But she decided she didn't like me later."

"Why?"

Nadia hesitated. "Do you remember when I said I went on a few dates with someone else?"

Now she was getting to the good bits. "I do. I've kind of been wanting to know a bit more. Since you said that she wasn't nice in the end either."

"No, she wasn't, and the girl I dated is Rebecca's best friend. She never believed me when I said her friend was horrible, and she gossiped about me to the whole school."

"She sounds like a bitch."

"She was! She was really mean in the end. I mean, after I ignored her for two months everyone forgot about it and she started being nice like nothing happened and I _did_ talk to her but I was thinking in my head how I didn't like her."

"Makes sense."

"And she continued being friends with Emily even after I said everything she did to me and I just can't believe she would do that."

"What did she do exactly?"

Nadia opened her mouth to say and snapped it shut at the last moment. She wasn't sure at first if she'd offended Nadia by asking, but after some time cooking in silence, Nadia tapped the wooden spoon clean of the vegetables stuck to it and wrapped her arms around Valkyrie. Valkyrie held her tightly. "She was just a bitch, Val. A really big, fat, horrible bitch."

"Am I better looking?"

Nadia smiled. "Yes."

"Am I stronger?"

"Yes."

"Am I cooler?"

"Yeah."

"Do you love me?"

She looked up at her. "Definitely."

"And you trust me?"

"Of course."

"Then you should know that you can tell me, and remember I will always love you and that this bitch Emily is nowhere near you, and if she does go near you, I'll slap her back to wherever she lives halfway around the world."

"She lives in America."

"I'll slap her back to America."

Nadia laughed a little and kissed Valkyrie. "She just would make me do things I didn't want to. It wasn't too much stuff, like, it wasn't really physical past hugging and kissing, and holding her hand in public, and wearing her jacket. But she was really controlling in every other way. I had to call her every few hours, even if I had a class, and I had to sneak out to see her every day after school, and I couldn't do schoolwork when I was with her, and when I stopped doing any of that because I decided not to date her, she was just really horrible. She sent me texts, letters, she told everyone I knew how awful I was, she said I was cheating on her and was breaking her heart. She somehow found my email and kept sending me messages like that! She only stopped when I came back to Ireland."

"How long was that?"

"Um, I met her in February, we went on a date in March, and I stopped dating her after a month, and then there was all the harassment until I left in May."

"She's definitely a bitch."

"I know. Can you put the boiling water in that pot?" Valkyrie went and did that, and then went back to hugging. "I love you Valkyrie. I'm really glad I live here."

"I know, I love you too. If I ever meet a bitch called Emily or Rebecca I'll put them in their place. But it would be nice to meet your other friends. I've never met any of your friends before. I promise to make them not make jokes."

"We'll see," Nadia smiled, kissing Valkyrie nose.


	129. Getting down to business

**Chapter 129**

Early the next morning, Valkyrie was woken by her phone. Reaching over, she grabbed it and pressed answer.

"Hello?" She grumbled, sitting up.

"Detective Cain," Corrival said through the phone loud and clear. "Your team came to me this morning."

Valkyrie looked at her alarm clock as Nadia moaned and rolled over. "It's seven thirty."

"Well, they got here at seven sharp," he snapped. "Get here quickly. Do you know where Roarhaven is?"

"Of course."

"Get here quickly."

Corrival hung up on her and after a moment, Valkyrie put her phone down on the bed.

"What was that?" Nadia asked, rubbing her eyes.

"Pa called me. Apparently, the other detectives just finished talking about me to him."

"They're not very nice," she said quietly.

"Some of them are alright, but my brothers were choosing mostly the overpaid henchmen and follow-along henchmen type of people for the team, not actually competent people," Valkyrie told her, getting out of bed. "Where's my trousers?"

"You threw them in the wash," she groaned.

"Oh yeah." Valkyrie went into the overstuffed walk-in wardrobe, which was barely walk in because she could only just pull the door closed behind her. For modesty reasons. "I have to go into work and deal with them now. I'm cutting most of them from the team."

"Okay," Nadia said back. "Will we still be able to get my stuff from my parents tonight?"

"Yeah," Valkyrie said, trying to sound confident. "If not, Dexter and Saracen will take you, don't worry. We'll work it all out."

"Uh-hu."

Valkyrie finished getting dressed in the tiny wardrobe and pushed her way back out. "Will you tell the others I've gone to the Sanctuary when you see them?"

"Sure. Don't forget breakfast," Nadia smiled, kissing Valkyrie lightly when she went over to her sleepy girlfriend.

"I'll get coffee at work, don't worry. See you later!"

Valkyrie was quick to leave the house, knowing it was long overdue that she went to see her team and figure out a real plan. She had done her personal tasks, or at least enough of them that it barely mattered anymore, but now it was time to deal with the Sanctuary section.

It almost felt stupid, she mused as she pulled out of the garage on the motorbike, that she had to deal with a complaint within her team when there was a war brewing. Didn't they have better things to do? Corrival was an Elder dealing with enough rubbish in their world without her team being idiots, especially when they already had a meeting planned for today.

Roarhaven was a good forty minutes from her house, so she knew Corrival would be in a bad mood. The town itself was disgusting with dirty streets, dingy houses and broken up roads Valkyrie had to swerve around. She'd been there before, of course, as it was a mage town and where there were mages, there was usually some type of trouble. That called for her and Skulduggery, or it did in the past. Now it was just her and she didn't know how to feel about all that still.

Pushing that from her head before she went down that rabbit hole of emotions, she pulled up to the short, stout, box building that made up the Sanctuary. There were guards outside, Sanctuary workers rather than Cleavers, but they didn't question if she was allowed in. Still, she had a few wary looks from the odd few. Skulduggery's actions affected them all. Idiot. But, being the kind-of-granddaughter coupled with being the outright favourite of Elder Deuce and probably the Grand Mage also had its uses. She got into the nasty building easily.

Cleavers, workers, busybodies and anyone who was someone was milling in and out of rooms, tunnels, tiny holes that acted as corridors and stairs always leading further down. It all looked dodgy and dark to say the least. Within the throngs were workmen brought in to do the job of making the place habitable and it was instantly amusing because the logo was of her own family business. Corrival didn't know it, nor did many others, but the company the Sanctuary hired to fit their new heating, electric, floorboards, banisters and plaster and paint the place was her own. All the people wary of the Dead Men would hate this, that was for sure. Not only did one of them help blow up the last place, but a company run by another fitted out the new place? How fun. Valkyrie knew she needed to keep that even quieter than she already was unless she wanted a lot of angry complaints.

After looking around and being pointed in the right direction by Tipstaff, Valkyrie went to the new 'Detective and Investigators Department', D.I.D for short. This was hers now; she was only sixteen.

The walls had already been done up in a light blue inside, and the floors were an orange-brown and there were tons of lights up above, but it didn't quite remove the feeling of it being dark in there. People looked at her when she entered and she made sure to stand tall. First on the list: find her office.

She found it alongside mission number two. Her team was outside it like children sent to the Head Teachers office. Time to get to work.

"Wait here," she ordered immediately before they could even open their mouths. They scowled, but the ones that looked more inconvenienced than angry where the ones she was interested in. Of the team of twelve, only five of them looked like that. They were the five she was likely to be keeping. They were the ones keeping their heads down and doing their damn job, the ones that wanted to keep doing that job instead of waiting around outside her office. And now she felt like Corrival might have rubbed off on her a bit much.

Inside, she put her helmet on a cabinet and looked over the large space. There was a large desk with a chair, a plant, filing cabinets, and a long table that took up the other side of the room that looked like a meeting table but Valkyrie knew was meant more for her family.

She supposed this meant they weren't getting their Dead Man office back.

She sat at the desk and looked over the mess. This was all that remained. Papers, some barely held together from the blast, others newly printed. She had to do all her paperwork again. And to the side was all of the Pleasant investigation papers. It was thin and when she looked through it, not very detailed. As she got through it to the present day, she saw how ridiculous the details were and how personal judgements against people in the office as well as towards those they interviewed had affected the writing. It wasn't even hidden, they had just written outright that they thought a witness was "an idiot that couldn't spell the word 'Pleasant' correctly".

Valkyrie scowled and moved the other papers she had to deal with onto the side cabinet and brought the Pleasant Investigation to the meeting table. She opened the door and stood back. "In."

The fifteen teammates came in and Valkyrie got them to stand and sit at the meeting table. Sickle, the one that was constantly mad at her and seemed to be the ringleader, sat at the head and smirked at her. She slammed the door closed and it made a thunderous slam. He lost his smile pretty quickly when she slammed the papers into the table.

"I would love to say it's good to see you since I woke up from my coma," she started in a deep, angry voice, looking them all in the eyes, "but _unfortunately_ , you've all made that rather difficult for me. I think we should start by letting you all tell me why these papers are unprofessional, incomplete and riddled with personal drama. Did the Dead Men tell you to do this? Or did you just decide to throw all protocol and professionalism out the window by yourself?"

The room was quiet, but slowly, all the pathetic idiots glanced over at Sickle who was rather pale but also gritting his teeth angrily. "You _cannot_ talk to your elders like this, kid," Sickle let out after a forty second silence. Valkyrie was almost impressed he lasted so long.

"May I remind you, I am Head of this department and also First Detective, Sickle. Age isn't the only status in life. Tell me, was this your idea?"

"My – Cain, you cannot seriously think we're going to simply listen to you and follow along?" He laughed incredulously. "You're a child!"

"Yes, Sickle, a parentless child with no experience whatsoever, too stupid to know right from wrong or, I don't know, read through the paperwork that will eventually have to be presented to the _Elders_. Is that right?"

Sickle glared. "I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to. I can see your hatred. You might hate Skulduggery now, but you did before too. You hated me as well. You know, we were already preparing for you to snap, but I hadn't expected Skulduggery to break before you. We're meant to be joining together to find him and deal with all of this, not fighting within ourselves. But it looks as if you don't know how to behave."

"Now see here!" He started, going red with rage.

"You've been removed from this team," Valkyrie told him with a deadly calm. He spluttered all over the table. "Get out of my office. You can take over paperwork from the other detectives that are _actually_ trying to keep the peace in our country."

It took some spluttering, but when he realised his allies had abandoned him, he growled, stood up hard enough for the chair to clatter to the floor, and stormed out.

Valkyrie let him leave the door open. With deliberate slowness, she picked up each paper and read out the name of the ones she was keeping. "Amanda. Nathanael. Kinsey. Tuppence. Grant. You can stay. The rest of you can get back to your regular work. I don't want to hear a peep from you unless it's a real problem. Consider all your work to be on review until such a time as I deem to be up to standard. I will be considering all of this-" she stabbed her finger on top of the pile "-as a part of that review. Get out."

The others left quickly, and when the last had shut the door behind them, Valkyrie sighed. "Right," she said slowly, looking over her five remaining members of the team. "I believe we've all met before but we haven't directly worked together. To make this easier, I should say this. I don't want any nonsense. I don't want gossip. If I see, hear, or even _think_ that your about to start any of that crap, you will be removed. I want this case considered dealt with by the end of this month, so we have a week and a half left. Is that understood?"

They nodded.

"Good. To make it clear, we are not attempting to kill, or double kill, Skulduggery. We must all be incredibly cautious and if possible let me deal with him, I know how to talk him down. I realise it probably feels a bit weird, but I don't think he'd try to kill me, whereas I don't know if I trust his mental state to not kill anyone else right now. Right, so, tell me what you've done so far."

.*****.

**_Nadia's POV_ **

Four o'clock had come and gone by the time Nadia got a message from Valkyrie. It was short: 'Going to be here till I die. Dex and Sar with take you to get your things. Sorry I can't help baby. Don't know when I'll be home but I love you.'

Smiling a little sadly, Nadia texted Valkyrie back not to worry and went to find Dexter and Saracen who had been in the kitchen with Anton baring down their backs cooking dinner while the entire kitchen was white with flour. "Um, hi," Nadia said quietly. Anton didn't look any less scary, but he did give her a small smile.

"Hey Nadia," Dexter grinned broadly. "Heard from Val?"

"She asked if you could help me get my things from my parents' house if it's okay with you?"

Anton shrugged and waved the two big-eyed men away. "You can clean when you get back."

Dexter and Saracen shuffled quickly from the room without another word and pushed Nadia along with them to the garage. "What did you do?" Nadia asked.

"Flour fight," Dexter grinned, kissing Saracen's cheek.

"I won," Saracen claimed with an easy grin, starting up the oldest car there. Well, the oldest car was Skulduggery's, but that wasn't here and wasn't the same as the beginning-to-rust box they were using. This one was Echo-Gordon's from when he was alive, whom she's spent the afternoon with working on some magic while he instructed her.

"You did not!"

The drive to her old house was filled with bickering and when they arrived, Saracen parked them a few streets away from where her old friends used to live. She sighed quietly and unbuckled her seatbelt.

"Hey, Nadia," Dexter said quietly, turning around in his seat to face her. "What's up?"

"Nothing, I'm fine," she smiled as convincingly as she could. "I just want this to be all done, you know?"

"I do," he nodded, looking at her in a way she didn't know how to describe but had seen Valkyrie do a few times. "I know we've had a rough patch recently, and that you said you forgave us and all but I want to let you know that we're here for you. We've dealt with all of this in the stupidest way we could. But now we've worked out how stupid we are, we want to be there for you. Just like we are for Val."

Nadia smiled at them, feeling her heart swell with how nice he was being. "Thanks," she told him, hoping he knew she meant it.

"It's alright. It just means you have to say what's going on," he pressed.

Nadia hesitated and shook her head. "It's nothing. I miss Valkyrie when she's at work I guess, and I want to get on with the things me and Valkyrie have been talking about, but I'm fine."

"I feel like there's something else."

"No. Well, I spoke to some old friends today, and they all got back in touch. I didn't think they would do that."

"Something bad."

"Nothing recent."

"What about a long term badness that we could talk about?"

"That just sounds dreary."

"Nadia," Saracen cut in in his serious voice. Her stomach dropped. He knew something. "As Valkyrie's brothers, we take care of you. I know we've been pricks, but we want to change that. So if you want to tell us why you've been hurting yourself, we'd like to help you."

Nadia's heart and stomach might have switched places when he said that. Her whole body broke out in a cold sweat and her head started spinning. "I don't know what you mean," she said in a forced voice. "I don't do that."

"Hey," Saracen said softly, "don't panic. It's just me and Dexter. With my magic, I've known for a while, but I didn't want to force you out, so to speak."

"I don't," she said again.

"We haven't told anyone. It's only us. I swear." Nadia nodded without meaning to. "I – _we_ – want to help you. Even if you just talk to us a bit. Can you do that?"

"I – I need to get my stuff," she said quickly going for the door handle.

"Your parents are in the back garden, we can't go yet."

"Oh," she said, setting her arse back down despondently.

"Come on," Dexter said, climbing awkwardly into the back of the car. He sat down and the whole car shook. "Show big brother Dexter."

Nadia let out a small laugh despite her fears and pulled the arm of one sleeve up. "See? Nothing."

"It's healed up then," Dexter nodded. "Did you get those handy healing stones?"

"Yeah," she said quietly. "Once they heal enough to be safe, I use the stone and it doesn't even scar. I haven't done it in a while. I'm trying."

"We know," Saracen softly.

"How about these eating habits of yours?" Dexter asked.

"I spoke to Valkyrie about my weight last night," Nadia told them before they made any assumptions. "I've already put some weight on, and I'm going to put on more. I was just too stressed and upset to eat before. So please don't make it into something it isn't. I'm not _crazy_ or anything."

"Hey, it's alright," Dexter grinned. She smiled back. "We're not accusing you. Just trying to help. And for the record, even if you were having issues with eating, you wouldn't be crazy."

"Well, I'm fine. I just need time to be happy. I just want all this over and for us to – for me and Valkyrie to be settled."

"Wait, what was that? All of us? You want us to be friends?" Dexter grinned, knocking their shoulders together. Nadia smiled. "Aww, that's a pretty smile. Saracen, doesn't she have a pretty smile?"

"Yes."

"She wants us to be family!"

"We are family."

"Yeah but she likes us!"

"I already liked you," Nadia said, rolling her eyes. "I just would like to have more time with Valkyrie and maybe everyone else. I feel like there's a lot of, I don't know what to call it, but kind of like… _unbalance_ in the house? I'm not sure if that's the right word."

"No, actually I've thought it too," Dexter said, serious suddenly. "There's been a lot of change but with everything looking the same, it feels wrong."

"Exactly! Me and Valkyrie were talking about doing up the place and making it more of a home for all of us rather than what it was before. I mean, it was Gordon's house before, even though Valkyrie lived in it, and nothing has really changed since he fitted it out. We could do it all up like we like it. Then we could all be there, maybe even Ghastly if he wants, but without us all on top of each other. And more white, light stuff. It gets so dark in there."

"You're not wrong," Saracen agreed.

"And then we could all have a whole section of the house to ourselves," Nadia said quickly, hoping inwardly for their approval. "Tanith and baby will have an area of they can be a little family, and you two can be together, and me and Valkyrie, but we could still get together downstairs when we want to. I just feel like we all want more space to adjust and deal with things but we're forced into a single room to do that. We all need a little apartment to relax in when we're not spending time together."

"Sounds like a done deal to me," Dexter said, clapping his hands together and leaning back. "You'll have to ask Anton for making the apartment rooms, and Erskine is the decorator. I will smash walls, and Saracen will eat the kitchen to make room for a new one."

"You think it's a good idea?" She asked.

"Yes," Saracen said. "I think we'll all agree with this plan. But I don't think Valkyrie will have much time."

"I can do it," Nadia grinned excitedly. "And the kitchen is fine, you just got a new one."

"Aww, your so cute when you're excited," Dexter grinned. "Saracen, isn't she adorable?"

"She's going to Shock you."

"Please don't Shock me."

Nadia glared at him. "I'm not adorable."

Dexter grinned. "You are."

Nadia gave him a Shock while Saracen laughed.


	130. Burn, baby, burn

**Chapter 130**

Valkyrie's frustrations at her work didn't end that day. She was able to spend some time talking with Nadia on the phone, hearing about how well getting her things from her parents' house had been as well as her brother's approval of redoing the house. The house ideas were exciting to Valkyrie, the concept of big change that she and her girlfriend got to dictate and make exactly to their tastes. The dead-end work was not.

In the end, Valkyrie stayed at work and slept on the sofa in Corrival's office. When she woke up six hours later at about five in the morning, Corrival was still in his office, passed out in his chair with his chin on his chest and snoring up a storm. Valkyrie felt immediately guilty for taking his sofa and decided she'd somehow get one for herself so she wouldn't steal his next time. She made herself and Corrival a pot of tea in the corner of the room and when the kettle clicked, he rubbed his eyes.

"Time," he demanded groggily.

"It's five thirteen in the morning. No one's come with an emergency. And here's your tea," Valkyrie recited as she put the pot on the desk and sat across from him. "Sorry I took your sofa."

"It's fine," he said quietly, beadily pouring tea into his cup and holding the warmth. "This war-brewing needs to stop. These damn Spiders are making my life miserable. I was meant to be brought tea and deal with the boring missions and crime, not prepare for a war."

"You can retire again afterwards," Valkyrie said comfortingly, sending a quick text to Nadia that she knew wouldn't be seen for a few more hours. "Once Skulduggery's dealt with and the Sanctuary's finished we can work on the Spiders directly. The Sanctuary is partially done, and I'm on the Pleasant investigation, so it isn't long now."

"You said last night," Corrival started, closing his eyes and leaning back in his chair. He reminded Valkyrie of her grandad, "that you removed half your team."

"I did. I looked through their paperwork and spoke with them and only five of the group wasn't letting their anger and hatred get in the way of their work. I had one report that claimed the interviewee was, and I quote, 'an idiot'. I've filed why I got rid of them, don't worry."

"What did you do with them?"

"Put them on review and they're on normal work. The ringleader is stuck here on unknown observation and review, but I told the staff to make it obvious. I want him to regret being so stupid, but ultimately, I know there isn't much we can do about firing anyone right now. I've told the remaining team that I'm not on Skulduggery's side, but they don't entirely trust me."

"And how close are you now you've seen their work?"

"Not particularly," Valkyrie muttered bitterly. "I'll be working from scratch. But I have a few ideas on drawing him out. He hasn't visited or contacted us at all, his car hasn't been seen. I think he stored the Bentley. He knows we'll recognise it."

"Yes," Corrival stated.

"To be honest, the only one of our plans that I think will work is waiting him out. He'll show himself when he feels like it, or rather when he gets bored of hiding. As soon as a big, loud bang goes off, he'll be straight there."

"I'd rather it didn't," he told her blandly. "But you are right. There are criminals getting in at every point of the country. We don't have enough staff to deal with those getting in. And we're getting pushed more by the Americans, and the English are kicking off because a lot of criminals are jumping between here and there to keep out of getting caught. I wouldn't be surprised if we get an unexpected visit from other countries soon. I wouldn't be shocked if we have spies all over this Sanctuary."

"You just let me get Skulduggery."

"I am, dear," he smiled. "What are you planning to do with him?"

"Talk, first. I – I need to know why he did it. But legally? I don't know. Technically he's only required to come for an interview since he was let off for the bombing stuff. But what he did to Nadia needs punishing. I just don't know if it's going to do anything."

"Yes, they were my thoughts also," he agreed quietly. "I'm trusting you to find the right way of dealing with this. A lot of people want him to burn."

"Let's hope so," Valkyrie said, gulping down her still hot tea. "I'm going to get to work. I'm going to be going along to all big sounding cases, so if people get angry, it's because I'm waiting for Skulduggery. Just tell them to fuck off or something."

"You have incredible abilities to deal with colleagues."

"They're my underlings, it's fine."

"Get out," he chuckled gruffly.

**.*****.**

She wanted to go home and snuggle in bed with Nadia. She'd never snuggled in bed properly but over the hours she had travelled, searched and written reports, she had decided it was a must and that just made her want to give up more. Not only that, but Nadia had told her she had fallen asleep twice sunning herself on their bed with the last of the late August sun soothing her. Valkyrie probably wouldn't get to do that until next year now.

She'd gone along on thirteen cases over the last six days, going home only once to sleep downstairs – she'd fallen asleep with her shoes on she'd been so tired. Saracen had made her breakfast and she'd been called off to a suspected bomb site before she got to see Nadia. There hadn't been a bomb in the end, nor a skeleton, and she'd been very upset. In fact, she hadn't seen a single part of Skulduggery for the entire time she'd been on the case. All she'd done is help catch a few up starters and got herself punched a few times. Not useful.

Of course, as soon as she sat on the motorbike to finally go home to see her girlfriend, she should have known she'd get another call. At first, she thought to ignore it or pass up looking, but she had that feeling. That gut feeling. So, she got the place and went straight over.

The location wasn't far from her home, which did caution her because she didn't know if that meant she was wrong or if Skulduggery had some strange insane plan she wasn't predicting and maybe this was his doing. Then she cursed herself and left the bike in a hidden alleyway. She turned the corner to see what all the shouting was about hoping to see her detectives on top of Skulduggery, but instead, she saw way down the street a building on fire.

 _Damnit_.

Valkyrie sprinted down the street, hearing the mortals running away. Swearing aloud, she saw two men and a woman in an upstairs room of the large office building running around shooting fireballs left and right. They disappeared into the flames again and Valkyrie's priority became taking those mages down and slapping them into the smallest cells she could find.

A man tried to stop her from going into the raging fire, but she pushed the mortal off and barged the door right off its hinges. The flames ripped out the door immediately, the heat making Valkyrie cry out even as she pushed into the building. There was a staircase next to her and she knew she was being stupid to run in without any useful magic but it wasn't a choice. The smoke was thick and burned Valkyrie's eyes, getting even worse on the second floor. She threw open the doors into the blazing office area and caught sight of the idiots who were laughing and jeering at some mortals who were screaming and crying on the floor.

Valkyrie jumped out the way of the flames and debris, hoping they wouldn't look over because there was very little cover and the extreme heat just in the floor was keeping her moving. She knew there would be Fire Brigade units on the way, if they weren't already there, which meant she had to at the very least secure the three criminals before firefighters came running in. She also had no magic to help and had to save those mortals. Hopefully the other detective that had called her to the scene had alerted the Sanctuary to the extreme situation.

Breathing shallowly and sticking close to the ground away from the smoke, Valkyrie got close to the group, using the overturned tables, the sound of screams and general smogginess of the room to stay hidden. The criminals were so interested in their victims they probably wouldn't have noticed anyway. In fact, they weren't even throwing fireballs anymore.

There was an overturned table next to the criminals, right behind them, and Valkyrie hid behind it. She concentrated, focusing on her magic like she'd had to when she began training, drawing deep from inside, and when she felt ready, she stood and pushed.

A beam of light, as white and pure as it had been the first time, shot from her hands and smacked one of them in the chest. The man, a grin still on his face, turned to ash immediately–

She hadn't expected it to do that.

The mortals screamed more as the two others turned to her in shock.

"Who are you?" One of them asked. The other was looking around in confusion for her friend.

"Detective Valkyrie Cain. Dead Man. You're under arrest. Get on your knees now, or I'll be forced to punch you really hard."

"You're just that kid," he scoffed but did click his fingers. He was an Elemental then. "Carrie, kill the mortals."

"Simon – Geoff's gone!" She screeched, turning in circles and looking frantic. "Where's Geoff?!"

"Did you – what did you do to my cousin, you bitch?!" Simon screeched and hurled over the table onto Valkyrie.

Immediately they were fighting, pushing, pulling, punching and rolling all over the floor. Valkyrie was the weaker opponent, that much was obvious, but she had more training and was able to twist her way out of almost every hold he tried to get her into, backed out of every punch and dodged the kick he sent her way. But she was forced back into the flames and only became aware of how close she was when she felt pain in the back of her head and had to run from Simon while patting the back of her head frantically to get the flames out.

Meanwhile, Carrie was making a racket trying to find the now disintegrated Geoff and the mortals were making a run for it while the floor was falling through to the levels below. Taking a chance, Valkyrie jumped over a section of fallen floor and turned back, shooting out a beam of light at Simon which he only missed because he fell on his arse. Grinding her teeth in frustration and feeling tears drip down her face from the pain of the smoke, she shouted at Simon to give up, to which he swore at her, so she leapt back over the hole on top of him and punched him square in the face. He grunted and then punched her back, making her fly across the room. Simon pulled out a gun.

That was when the window smashed and Skulduggery flew in.

He still had perfect timing.


	131. The Confrontation

**Chapter 131**

Valkyrie didn't quite understand how it happened, but there was a flurry of movement, fists and running and then she, Skulduggery, Carrie and Simon were fighting in an alleyway beside the building. Valkyrie could still feel the heat of the roaring building even as far away from it as she was, and even more painfully, she could feel Carrie's teeth biting into her arm through her jacket.

Screeching, Valkyrie smacked her back and ducked when Simon aimed a gun at her. He shot but Valkyrie didn't know where the bullet went. She jumped back up and tackled Carrie with all her rage, slamming them both into the wall, grabbing the cackling woman's hair and cracking her skull back against the bricks.

Another gunshot rang out at the same moment mortals screaming reached higher pitches and the building's roof collapsed in on itself.

Simon glanced at it before taking off running, and the woman spat in Valkyrie's face. Valkyrie didn't waste even a second, she punched Carrie with her fist and broke a knuckle – and probably Carrie's head too, if she hadn't before.

Cursing and knowing she was breaking a lot of rules, Valkyrie took off down the alleyway after Skulduggery and Simon, using screams and gunshots as her way of finding them with all the chaos around her. Thinking quickly, Valkyrie pressed the 'one' on her mobile until it beeped and she knew her family was all receiving signal of her location – they'd come and help she hoped – but she didn't think they'd ever get to her in time. There was another gunshot and this one sounded more like Skulduggery's gun. Grinding her teeth, Valkyrie shoved a woman out of her way and barrelled down a deserted street until she saw Simon fly across the road and roll to his feet with one of the biggest, nastiest grins Valkyrie had seen on an idiot.

Only a moment later, the Skeleton Detective came strolling out of a shop through the wall he and Simon had cracked open.

Trying to stay undetected, she jumped behind a tree bordering the road and looked out at them. They both had guns, and she was sure they both had bullets left. She checked her phone and saw she already had a message from Anton. He was in the hotel though, so she didn't even spare a look at it.

What was she meant to do? Simon was mocking Skulduggery but was also backing away. Quickly, Valkyrie snuck a look at Skulduggery, and he looked vicious – prowling towards Simon with deadly intent, Valkyrie was sure, but she didn't see his gun. He was his most angry when he put his weapon away so he could beat people by hand.

They were almost level with her tree now. She just needed Simon to lead Skulduggery closer and she'd… she'd…

She'd what? What was _she_ able to do to Skulduggery, other than dissolving his bones? Clenching her eyes shut, Valkyrie hoped she'd think of something soon.

**.*****.**

**_Nadia's POV_ **

"You okay?"

"Hmm? Yeah, just folding clothes," Tanith said, one hand on her stomach as she stared at a little yellow duck onesie on her lap. "How are you holding up?"

Nadia shrugged and kneeled on the floor next to Tanith, who was in her nursery rocking chair, and began to fold the pile of baby clothes she'd washed for Tanith the night before when she'd been bored and Tanith had been too tired. "I'm fine."

"You don't sound it."

"And you're not folding clothes."

"True," Tanith sighed, shifting uncomfortable and looking at the clock.

Nadia's heart jumped. "Are you having contractions?"

"I've still got three and a half weeks to go," Tanith said quietly, a frown on her face. "And they're far apart and don't last long. I _think_ it's just stress but they did say the baby could come early."

"Do you want me to call the midwives just in case?"

"No, don't be silly. Most births are at night, right? If it's still going on this evening or tomorrow morning, then we can call. But I doubt its anything extreme yet. I was walking around earlier, and I probably just upset my body."

"So… not stress then?"

Tanith grimaced and Nadia knew she was in for a story. "Maybe a bit of stress. I – I spoke to Ghastly today."

"What did he say?"

"Not much," Tanith muttered, a glare in her eye as she finally and furiously folded the duck outfit. "I was telling him that he should be at the birth, and that me or someone in the family would tell him when it was happening, and he goes, and this is the bit that got me _really_ mad, he goes 'oh, don't worry Tanith, just tell me when it's about to happen'. About to happen? What the fuck does that mean? Me in labour _is_ it happening."

"What did you tell him?" Nadia asked with interest as she carefully picked up her stack of sleeping outfits and put them in the dresser.

"I asked him what he meant, and he said that since we're not together I wouldn't need him for the whole thing, so he should just come for the birth. As in, the last ten minutes of the entire labour for the part where I birth them. And yeah, I see that the birth is the important part, but I've heard some people have short births with basically no labour and it flashes by and what if he's not there for it? What's he going to do, set off as I start to push? My mum spat me out in five pushes, and my brother was the same, he wouldn't have even started the van up! I told him that and he just sounded defensive, god did I chew him out. And he hung up on me because, _apparently_ , _I_ wasn't listening. I wasn't, but the point is, he has done the bare minimum when it comes to this as a process and he's expecting me to do it all now. If he wants to be a part of this, surely he can at least come to the birth?"

"I think he should be there," Nadia agreed. "Between you, me, Valkyrie and the other Dead Men, we're going to clean all the nappies, clean all the clothes, feed and burp the baby – and he's going to get a few minutes where they're sleeping."

" _Exactly_!" Tanith bit out. "Aggh, I'm getting so frustrated with this. I'm not asking for any moral support or anything out of the ordinary. Maybe it's because he's seen more time where men weren't involved in births or something, but I think both parents should be there. His brothers shouldn't be picking up the slack on a baby that isn't even theirs."

"I agree," Nadia nodded, picking up the stack of pressed, perfectly flat reusable wipes Tanith had bought from one of the mothers she'd met at her check-ups. They were all made out of incredibly soft fabric and each one was different. According to Valkyrie's calculations, using reusable nappies and wipes was going to save Tanith over two thousand euros in the first two years alone. And they could be worn for longer if the baby needed them at night while they toilet trained, so long as their tosh didn't outgrow them. Nadia was honestly impressed nappies could cost that much. "Though you know we'll all help as much as we can. We can't wait to meet your baby. I'll definitely help with as many all-nighters as you need."

"I know. You guys are great, you know that?" Tanith smiled at her. Tanith's phone beeped then, and she grabbed it with a suddenly tense look.

"Is it Ghastly?" Nadia asked, closing the drawer.

"No. It's Valkyrie. She's in trouble," Tanith said, forcing herself to stand. Nadia quickly helped her, and they left the room and went downstairs to the parlour room. The others were already there getting their boots on.

"What's happening?" Nadia asked quickly.

"Val's in trouble. We need to help," Dexter told her quickly, standing and throwing his jacket on. "Don't know why. She's in downtown Dublin."

The television, which was on in the other room, suddenly caught Nadia's attention. Saracen and Solomon heard it also and Nadia went to turn it up. On the screen was a burning building. The news reported, now blaring out sound, was reporting the building shooting up in flames in record time and how the roof had collapsed. She could see people running around inside, trapped.

"She's in there?!" Nadia shouted.

"No," Dexter said, checking his phone. "She's a few streets away. Probably with whoever started it. We need to go."

Barely a moment later, and without a second to get her voice in, they were all gone. Her, Tanith and Solomon looked at each other.

Tanith suddenly went impossibly white, doubled over to lean against the couch and hissed in pain. "It's just the stress," she said in a strained voice.

"Nadia," Solomon said quietly. "Could you please call the midwives and make them aware that Tanith is having contractions."

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

"What are you doing?"

Valkyrie stared at Skulduggery, eyes blazing furiously. "We need to talk."

"Please, Valkyrie, you're better than that. You sound far too clichéd right now."

"Stop it. You know you need to talk to me," Valkyrie growled, forcing herself to her feet even as her broken fist and probably fractured knee shot pain through her. "I'm not arresting you, but you need to come into the Sanctuary."

"You're _not_ going to arrest me?" Skulduggery asked, tilting his head.

"No. I wish I was, but I'm not."

"Ah. There's the difference. You seem very angry."

"Yeah, I wonder why Skulduggery," she said sarcastically. "Why did you do it?"

He paused for a moment, and then his shoulders sagged just a little. "Which part? The bit where I helped blow up the Sanctuary with you in it? The bit where I didn't come to see you in the hospital? The hiding? Sending Nadia straight into Spider territory?"

"That bit!" Valkyrie shouted. "The part where you sent my girlfriend on a suicide mission with no help, no backup, no nothing! What were you thinking? You are insanely lucky that she's alive!"

He didn't say anything, just looked at her.

"Answer me! Why did you _do_ it!?"

"I don't know," he said after a moment.

" _You don't know_!?" She screamed. "What do you mean you don't know?"

"I don't know," he told her more assuredly. "I didn't know what I was doing. It felt like I was being compelled to send her there. I don't know why, there's no way someone like me could be manipulated to do that, but it was impossible to stop."

"That doesn't make sense."

"I know. But that's what it felt like."

"But you knew what you were doing? Surely that was enough to stop."

"I couldn't Valkyrie!" He suddenly snapped. "I don't know what happened! It just did!"

"Don't get mad with me! I haven't done anything! These last few months have been fucking awful, and it's all because of you! You sent me into a sex dungeon alone, I lost my magic, you got yourself captured with your own stupidity, I tried to save you and Bliss was _killed_. You helped them when you could have _tricked_ them, and yeah I know you were tortured, but you still could have made a damn attempt!"

"You don't understand, Valkyrie."

"I don't understand? Skulduggery, I've been tortured, I understand what it's like, but I don't understand why you hid and pretended what you did was okay when you could have admitted you were wrong and your family could have helped you overcome this. You hid from us and worked behind our backs."

Skulduggery was very quiet, and even with the roar of flames and screams in the distance, it felt heavy and almost awkward. "I don't know what happened Valkyrie."

"Let us get you help," Valkyrie told him, get stomach feeling nauseous. "Our family is on the way. Please, I just want you to come and talk at the Sanctuary and then come home with me so we can get you the help you need. Solomon is there. Him and Nadia will forgive you so long as you just admit what you did was wrong and make an effort to get help."

"And you?"

"Me? I will forgive you Skulduggery. I've never blamed you for anything, even with what I know of your past. I'm glad to have you in my life. But you need to step up and act like you should. God, Solomon acts more like a dad to me than anyone else and he's been here for a few days compared to you. I just want you to be there, to try and get help, to admit you did the wrong thing and face it. Is that so hard?"

Skulduggery shook his head. "It's not that easy Valkyrie. I didn't mean for all of this to happen."

A car screeched to a halt on the other side of the little shop they were stood in the middle of. With the walls blown through from her and Skulduggery's fight that had landed them in the wreckage of a building they were in, it was easy to hear. "That's them. Please Skulduggery, I'm just asking for you to talk and come home. That's all."

"I can't do that right now."

"What? What do you mean?" Valkyrie asked, her voice shooting back up in anger.

Skulduggery didn't answer as Dexter rounded the corner to the messed-up shop, and the two of them took off after Skulduggery but they stood no chance. The moment they were in the open air, Skulduggery flew up into the air and was gone faster than they could blink. Valkyrie watched him, feeling all sorts of angry, furious words boil within her, and as soon as he was out of sight, the emotions dissipated and Valkyrie's eyes watered. She kicked a brick as hard as she could.

"What happened?" Dexter asked quietly, sitting on the dusty, broken road. There were footsteps behind them and Valkyrie pulled herself onto her shaking legs as her Sanctuary team rounded the corner with open mouths and bulging eyes.

"You're too late." Valkyrie looked at her family. "You should go home. I need to debrief the team and report to Pa."

Saracen winced and put his hand up like a child in school. "Might not be possible. I just got a text from Nadia. Tanith's getting some contractions. It looks like she's in labour."


	132. Tanith gives birth!

**Chapter 132**

The drive to the house was full of excited tension as Valkyrie debriefed her team and Corrival on the phone via a multi-call or whatever it was called, and it ended with perfect timing when they pulled up at their house. Jumping out, Valkyrie ran into the house and to the parlour where Tanith was kneeling on the floor, legs apart and clenching her fists together, swaying and looking pale. Nadia was stroking her back gently and gave Valkyrie relieved look. After seven days and eight nights apart, Valkyrie and Nadia got to smile at each other for a moment before Valkyrie kneeled next to Tanith and rubbed her back as comfortingly as she could.

"How's it all going?" Valkyrie asked when Tanith took a gasping breath and her tense muscles relaxed a little.

"Good," she nodded, smiling just a little. "It really hurts. Twelve minutes apart. God, it – it makes _everything_ down there hurt!"

Erskine snorted a laugh behind Valkyrie and the other two Idiots barely masked their laughs. In the room was Tanith, of course, and Solomon and Nadia who had been there for the hour or so that everyone else had been gone. Then there was Valkyrie, obviously, as well as Saracen, Erskine and Dexter. Ghastly had apparently been given a text by Solomon, with no response, and Anton was on the way but couldn't do anything until midnight because of the hotel. He had informed them, on the phone on their way home, that he had set the next place for Ireland but he had almost thirty people on board and couldn't just move the hotel right then.

"Should it feel like that?" Valkyrie asked warily, looking at Nadia.

"The internet claims that you may feel, and I quote, ' _rectal_ _pains_ '. You should also have a bunch of mucus flowing from you."

"Flowing from me?" Tanith laughed.

"Has your water broken?" Valkyrie asked.

"Either that or I pissed myself on the sofa," Tanith cringed, and Valkyrie noticed then that the sofa Tanith usually sat on was covered in towels and also that the gorgeous hardwood floors were covered in towels with a fair amount of liquid beneath Tanith alongside dripping liquid and blood on her inner thighs. It was really gross. "We need to go either way. I’m pretty sure they’re coming and the water breaking might take hours."

With that, Tanith was loaded into the car via Erskine who was able to essentially airlift Tanith. Dexter took the bike back to the garage and they split into two cars, one of which had a car seat. Tanith, Saracen, Nadia and Valkyrie went in the car-seated car which they planned to leave at the maternity hospital. Just as they got out of the front gate, another contraction set in and Tanith carefully breathed through the pain with Valkyrie gently massaging her neck in the very cramped back seats.

By the time they got to the hospital, Tanith had had a few more contractions and they were officially nine minutes apart. Nadia informed her that usually, they'd have to wait to be five minutes apart, but because of how stressed Tanith had been and how bad the pregnancy had gotten at times, as well as being almost four weeks too soon, they were being brought in early for safekeeping.

Quicker than Valkyrie thought possible, Erskine and Dexter locked hands and were carrying Tanith upright between them into the pretty cottage-like maternity hospital. Nadia and Valkyrie held hands and grinned in excitement together, getting the chance to kiss for just a moment before they were whisked to a large, clean room upstairs with a bed, sofa, small wardrobe and baby basin.

“Right, before we get ahead of ourselves,” the midwife, whom Valkyrie didn’t know, began after they had put Tanith in the bed. “Let’s get your trousers off and I’ll give you a check, and we’ll also have a look at baby’s heart. Do you know the gender?”

“No, we don’t know the _sex_ of the baby,” Tanith said with a roll of her eyes. “Val, can you…?”

Valkyrie undid Tanith’s trousers and pulled them down as the midwife pushed the men and Nadia out of the room entirely. When she came back, Tanith was bare from the waist down and had pulled her top up under her breasts to give the lady room to work.

“Alrighty then, let’s have a look.” The midwife did an ultrasound of the baby, checked the heartbeat, took Tanith’s vitals and then took the opportunity to shove her whole fist into Tanith’s vagina.

Tanith grabbed Valkyrie’s hand and ground her teeth as the woman twisted her hand and checked her cervix. All Valkyrie could do was stare at their enclosed hands with a gaping mouth as Tanith crushed her already broken fist.

Just when Valkyrie thought she was going to start screaming for her sister to let go, the woman exited Tanith and she let go of Valkyrie’s hand. Breathing deeply, Valkyrie cradled her hand to her chest.

“It looks like you’re well on your way!” The lady said happily. “I’ll call your scheduled midwife and she’ll be here shortly to help with the delivery. We can get your changed into your birthing outfit now while you can still move. Are you going to be having an epidural?”

Tanith laughed nervously and said she didn’t. Valkyrie already knew the reasoning behind that. Tanith wanted to experience how badly it hurt out of sick curiosity. She had taken to calling her a masochist, but it apparently hadn’t stopped her.

The men were let back into the room and, although the woman seemed scandalised, Saracen went through the suitcase for Tanith and got out the things she instructed him to get. Valkyrie took it and helping Tanith into the bathroom.

Walking carefully, Tanith, the midwife and Valkyrie went into the bathroom to get Tanith changed. It took so long trying to get her changed, as she had wanted a quick rinse in the shower first, that her normal, scheduled midwife turned up before they were done. Valkyrie attempted to give Tanith some modesty by not looking at all her bits but the nurse ruined it by deciding to quickly check Tanith's progress by putting her fingers up her vagina when she leaned over the bathtub for a contraction right there.

The sisters locked eyes. They giggled.

After helping Tanith get her comfortable breastfeeding bra on, as well as a very lose, large top that she was sure belonged the Anton, Tanith wrapped a large towel around her lower half and they went to the bed. The others were still there, looking at all the baby clothes and nappies and talking very excitedly.

"Is Mr Bespoke on his way?" The second midwife asked as Tanith sat down. She looked nervously at all the men standing around.

"He's been told," Tanith told her tightly, laying on the bed. "He'll be here, I think. Erskine, can you call him?"

Erskine was quick to run and do his job.

"And who will be your birthing partners?"

"Val, my sister," Tanith said. "Hopefully Ghastly will get here. This is the rest of our family, the baby’s uncles. They can all stay, and Nadia too. They’re welcome to watch."

“We have a policy of only two people in the room,” she said kindly, “but they’re welcome to stay behind the curtain as long as they don’t get in our way.”

“Oh yeah, that’s fine,” Tanith shrugged.

"Grand," she smiled, and immediately closed the curtain that cut off the sofa which the four men and Nadia were sat on. They'd still hear, but not see all the nasties. "Have your waters broke?"

It felt like a whirlwind of events happened after that. Ghastly didn't pick up, so they kept trying, and Tanith's parents and brother were called and would come the next day after the baby was born.

The midwives left after a while and the men were allowed to open the curtain. Tanith, wrapping her lower half in a towel, bounced on a ball and spoke to her mum on the phone while Valkyrie and Nadia held hands and spoke with Erskine about changing up the house which he was immediately on board with. Saracen and Solomon were discussing the car situation and something else in low voices. Dexter kept making jokes to keep the mood light and kept trying to call Ghastly. Eventually, Tanith, having finished talking to her mum, got the one call they'd been waiting for. From Ghastly.

"Where are you?" Tanith asked, putting it on speaker and being helped to sit in the bed. "We're all at the hospital."

"'M coming," he said gruffly.

"Where are you though?"

"On the motorway," he said, and then a horn was blared, and they heard him mutter some obscenities under his breath. It wasn't like him to swear. "How far along are you?"

"I've got contractions every six minutes and I'm four centimetres dilated. The heartbeat is good and they're in a good position. No waters yet."

"Good," he muttered. "I'll be there soon."

"Wait-" Tanith tried, but he'd already hung up. Valkyrie scowled.

"Dick," Valkyrie muttered.

"Tell me about it," Tanith said, taking a breath and resuming her pale, contraction face as another one came at her. The rest of them spoke and rubbed Tanith's back and held her hand, the men and Nadia hiding away only when nurses had to check things under the covers.

Half an hour went by with no sign of Ghastly, but Tanith did get to six centimetres dilated, meaning she was over halfway there, and she was managing the contractions, and the heartbeat was good. Her waters broke by themselves, making her think she had peed herself. Another half hour later and Tanith was exhausted. Everything was still good, but no real progress, nor father present.

Tanith actually was able to nod off for a few hours, which the men took as a chance to sleep also, but Valkyrie and Nadia were too excited and took the chance to talk, giggle, kiss each other and generally do what they should when teenagers were left alone with everyone sleeping. Okay, maybe not everything, because it was the same room as said sleeping people, but they kissed a lot.

It was almost one in the morning when Ghastly turned up. He barged into the room, making Nadia jump away from Valkyrie in fright, and waking everyone in the room in the process. There were large bags under his eyes and his clothes were only a little wrinkled. Tanith tried glaring at him, but that was when she got a really bad contraction and Valkyrie had to press the red button to call the midwife.

"God, this is awful," Tanith muttered, clenching at the sheets as the midwives ushered Nadia and the men away behind the curtain and Ghastly leant against the wall by Tanith's left side while Valkyrie held Tanith's hair and stroked her head as a nurse shoved her hand into Tanith once more. "It's got worse."

"You're doing really well Tan," Valkyrie encouraged, letting Tanith grip her good like she was killing it. Her other one was swollen from the break she got earlier but it was okay enough to help Tanith. Her knee, which Solomon had checked, was painful but actually just a pulled muscle, so that was fine. Like her pain was _anything_ to be compared to Tanith's. She was whimpering in pain but did her best to hold it in. "Soon you'll have a baby and it'll be all over, I promise."

Tanith nodded, gritting her teeth until the nurse extracted her hand.

"It looks like we're ready to push," the midwife said. "Do you feel ready, Miss Low?"

Tanith's answer came with her pushing the baby almost immediately as another contraction hit and it was all a-go. The first one was handled with gritted teeth. The second came with lots of nurse encouragement and a low whine of pain. After that, it was mostly short screams at the end of her pushing. Five minutes went past, and the men were calling encouragements and pacing behind the curtain, waiting with excitement and trepidation, and Tanith had pushed the baby so their head was just past the cervix. Then another push and the head was out!

Tanith had to stay very calm and still, but Valkyrie's heart was jumping – it was a disgusting, nasty mess but the head was out and Valkyrie could see it! She'd never unsee it, but it was so amazing!

They waited for a moment and another contraction hid and all by itself, her body pushed the rest of the little child out and it was caught by the midwives. There were baby cries and everyone in the room was crying. The nurses placed them on Tanith's chest and rubbed them as Tanith sobbed.

Crying herself, Valkyrie was helped to cut the umbilical cord and, in a surprise to Valkyrie, Tanith asked if Valkyrie would be the baby’s godmother – not that either of them were Christian, but it was the status. Crying even more, Valkyrie agreed and stroked the crying baby’s back. They were all bluey-purply and covered in white, nasty stuff, but they were honestly the most gorgeous child Valkyrie had ever seen. They even had little tufts of hair on their head!

"Boy or girl!?" Nadia shouted above the boys on the other side of the curtain.

"Just a sec," Tanith called, her tears stopping only for a great grin to take its place as she and Valkyrie carefully moved the baby around. After, Tanith moved the rags and checked. "It's a girl! Oh my God it's a girl!"

Of course there were celebrations because everyone other than Valkyrie – and Nadia because she'd convinced Nadia it was a boy – had guessed girl. The Idiots began chanting 'Girl! Girl! Girl!' and Valkyrie could hear Nadia sobbing happily, probably hugging someone, and the baby was happy. A few minutes later, Tanith gritted her teeth as the placenta was released and also 'birthed', and she was then cleaned with wet towels by the midwives and Valkyrie as modestly as they could before the sheets and towels were pried from under Tanith's sensitive body and new ones were placed, and then a sheet was placed over Tanith's lower body and the curtain was removed. It was a messy, but easy process

"Oh my God," they all said, other than Solomon who was wet-eyed but simply smiling. "It's a baby," Dexter commented.

"Yeah, no shit," Tanith grinned, looking at the little thing.

"She's eating!" Erskine squealed.

"Err, not really. No milk yet," Valkyrie told him. "There will be soon."

"Exactly," Tanith smiled, looking down with complete adoration at her baby girl. They'd all been told that there might not be milk production for a few days, but the baby suckling could help that along, so that's what the baby did. They'd have to bottle feed until then. "I love you so much."

Valkyrie pulled Nadia under her arm and they looked at the precious little thing and Valkyrie decided she loved babies more than anything and wanted at least ten, and they all had to be this precious and perfect and wrinkly and cute.

"Can I have one?" She asked Nadia.

Nadia snorted a laugh. "You can give birth."

Valkyrie scrunched her nose. Maybe just one or two then. Or she'd be that cool aunt. Yeah, she'd just be the cool aunt. She had tons of siblings to give her nieces and nephews, she'd have to be happy with that she supposed.

Ghastly coughed quietly, and, trying not to lose her smile because she was even more protective of Tanith and the baby now and that made her way more mad at him, but she shouldn't be like that at the birth of his daughter, she looked at him as pleasantly as she could. Tanith had a stunned expression like she forgot he was there for that entire process. "She's beautiful," he said, shocked.

"Of course she is," Tanith smiled, looking back at the baby.

"Can I hold her?"

It took a moment, but carefully, Tanith detached the baby and handed the naked baby to Ghastly and immediately threw all sorts of swaddles and all the tiny blankets on top of the sucking-at-air baby.

He placed her onto his chest and looked down at her with a soft smile as tears flowed down his cheeks. "I love you," he muttered, and gently rocked her, whispering to her the whole time. It was honestly adorable and it started Valkyrie’s tears all over again.

**.*****.**

The next day, when Tanith was able to just about stand, Valkyrie helped wash her in the bathroom and collected the frozen sanitary towel from the nurse for Tanith to wear. Apparently, it was "like fucking heaven to my vag" which had made Valkyrie laugh way more than she should have.

The baby had been weighed and measured and was completely healthy with no sign at all of Ghastly's curse which Tanith didn't care about, but Ghastly was obviously incredibly grateful for, especially considering it would have been slightly difficult to explain to the mortal staff. Being in a non-magic place had made the whole process significantly safer though, which is why they’d taken the risk.

There had been mutterings of names, but so far, Ghastly and Tanith hadn't really spoken to each other apart from switching who was holding their daughter and not much had happened in regards to it. Tanith had been able to get some sleep because they all wanted a chance to bottle feed and Tanith's milk had yet to come in, so she looked okay, rather than like she'd been through something traumatic – which she had, in a way. After getting dressed plus the towel, she looked a little more alive and had begun again to suckle to stimulate the breasts, as she called it. Baby liked it anyway. It was just weird to Valkyrie when everyone kept saying 'breasts' and ‘suckling’ like it was normal everyday words.

Anton had come too, a few hours after the baby had been born. He had held her and not long after, him, the men and Nadia had left to clean and get food, and Tanith's parents and brother had turned up. Ghastly, who was still there, got glared at. Luckily for him, the baby was the priority and Tanith was complimented for her work and how amazing she did, and everyone doted on the baby. Of course, they asked what the name would be.

"I haven't decided yet," Tanith smiled, looking at the child. "I think it's between Mia and Laila."

Ghastly stuck his nose up at those but didn't say anything. Valkyrie's eyes narrowed at him but he didn't see. Tanith pushed it out, she got to name it as far as Valkyrie was concerned.

"Oh, I don't know," Tanith's mother started. "You know we always name girls in the family Mary or Susan."

"Yes, Mum, but I don't want that," Tanith said politely. "I want Mia or Laila. I like those names. Valkyrie, what do you think?"

"I like Laila," Valkyrie nodded. "You could always give her a middle name or two. My middle name was my grandmother's name."

"Oh – Ghastly, what do you think?" Tanith's mother asked quickly. Apparently, she'd abandoned her glares in hopes of support. Traitor. "You don't like these names, right? How about something traditional like Mary for the baby, I believe you have family names as well."

He hesitated, looking at Tanith and Valkyrie with nerves before answering. "I do. My mother’s Chosen name was Anna."

"Anna isn't awful," Tanith conceded, looking at her baby. Valkyrie could tell she looked a little defeated.

"Hey, Tan doesn't need a family name," Tanith's brother chipped in quickly. "It's the twenty-first century, Tanith can do what she wants. I mean, _no_ _one_ used family names anymore. And I like Mia."

"Laila," Valkyrie muttered.

"I like that one too," he nodded quickly. "But mostly Mia."

Valkyrie shook her head. "Mia sounds like Myra, and even if she's nice, it just puts a funny feeling in my stomach. I know it isn't about her or anything, but I just hear the work Myra when you say Mia. But Laila is a pretty name. It's deceivingly feminine. Makes you think she's all sweet and pink and cute and then bam! She's kicked you in the nuts and stolen your money. I like Laila."

Tanith grinned. "I think it's a very feminine name too. And I do like the deceivingly cute bit about it. She's going to have so many people wrapped around her finger."

"Exactly," Valkyrie nodded, feeling her mission headed straight for success. If the baby wasn't a boy, she'd at least get some headway in the name. "And again, you can always have middle names. Like, Laila Mary-Ann. It's in spirit, rather than literally her name."

Tanith nodded a little stronger now and Valkyrie could see she was more certain on what she wanted. Tanith's mum didn't look sure but with a prod from her husband, she was able to let it go after Tanith promised that, no matter what, the middle names would be in the spirit of the family names. Ghastly still didn't look happy but Tanith was ignoring him so long as he refused to speak for himself, or that's what it looked like anyway.

After a while, Tanith's family left and it was just Tanith, Ghastly, baby and Valkyrie in the room.

"I really like Laila," Tanith muttered, looking at her sleeping baby, who was in the bassinette next to her bed.

Ghastly grunted.

"Are you going to say anything?" Tanith finally asked, her voice soft.

Ghastly looked down and finally back up at his daughter. "You never mentioned Laila before."

"I hadn't thought of it yet. I know you were unsure of Mia, so this one is different. It would be nice to hear a contribution Ghastly. I know we're not together but she's your daughter too."

"I know that," he muttered. "What will her last name be?"

Tanith was very quiet and Valkyrie could feel the awkwardness and conflict begin to rise. Feeling this was her first chance to chime in as the baby’s godmother and stop a fight, she got involved. "Why not a hyphenated name, or a new one? It could be a mix of the two or something else entirely."

"I don't like hyphenated names," Ghastly said quickly. "I'd rather one name."

"Well, I would rather she be after us both or just me," Tanith demanded, her voice getting an edge to it. "I carried her, I should get that choice. Or something different if you can think of it."

"Why not Bespoke? She can choose for herself later, why is my name so bad right now?"

"You're the one that shot down both of us together, so I'm shooting down you as my daughter's last name."

"You don't need to be petty Tanith," Ghastly scoffed.

"And you don't need to be purposefully difficult!"

"Guys!" Valkyrie interrupted, effectively stopping the squabbling parents. "You're going to wake the baby." They looked guiltily over at her all swaddled up in the cot. "How about you just pick a new one. That way it's more equal. And, to make it fair, if Tanith has more of a say in the first name, how about Ghastly gets more of a say in the last name? Unless he's going to act childishly, in which case, he needs to stop and walk away."

Ghastly's jaw clenched and Valkyrie could feel immediately that he was going to take his frustration at the situation out on her when Tanith gasped. "Your name!"

"Me?" Valkyrie asked.

"Yeah. Edgley has connections to me and Ghastly, both positive. It's not either of us directly, and as you’re godmother, it makes sense for you to have a little something in there. I mean, she's going to change it later right?"

Ghastly bobbed his head in consideration. "I don't have objections to Edgley. Gordon is a good man. Decent. So is Valkyrie, and she’s going to be involved in her life after all. It is unconventional to use another person's family name, but I don't mind so much."

"Then the last name is settled. So, Laila Mary-Ann Edgley?"

"I'm still not sure," Ghastly muttered, rubbing his face. Tanith rolled her eyes. "I always envisioned her having my mother's Chosen name."

"How about we make the middle a little different then? Marianna? It's a merging of names, but includes both families," Valkyrie tried.

"But Laila?" Ghastly asked. "I don't see a cutesy little girl, I see a pushover."

"Have you known a Laila before?" Valkyrie asked quickly before Tanith choked him.

"Yeah," he said after a moment.

"Did you date one?" Tanith asked.

He thought about it for a moment. "No. I just didn't like the ones I met. All of them have been very weak-willed and I don't want my daughter to be like that. I want her to be strong, assertive and confident, and to take on the world headfirst."

"Ghastly, she will be all of that, and she will take on the world," Tanith said, taking on a gentler tone. "We just have to raise her like that. We can do that, especially with Valkyrie and the other guys helping."

It took a few minutes of quiet consideration on Ghastly's part but finally, with more confidence, he nodded. "Laila Marianna Edgley."


	133. Three days old

**Chapter 133**

Valkyrie went home with Nadia that evening after some persuasion by Tanith and with the knowledge that Ghastly wasn't there to get in Tanith's way. Tanith's parents were staying the night and after Valkyrie had debriefed Tanith's brother on the naming situation, he'd been all for helping keep the peace, especially because he thought the name was adorable. So, home she went. Nadia had been at the door for her when she got there.

"I love you," she muttered into Valkyrie's shoulder immediately.

Valkyrie breathed in the scent of Nadia's hair. "I love you too baby. You mean everything to me."

"You're being silly," Nadia smiled, a blush coming to her cheeks. "I made some cakes. And Fletchers eating them all, you need to save them."

Valkyrie laughed and put an arm over Nadia's shoulder as they went for the kitchen. She was starving!

"Hey Val," Fletcher said, mouth full of cake. "How's Tanith?"

"She's fine, and so is the baby. She's so beautiful."

"Aww, cute," Fletcher said, then picked up a cupcake. "Want some cake?"

Valkyrie took it from him. "How are you and Myra?"

"I'm good. Myra's at uni at the moment, so I have some free time."

"So you spend it eating cake. I like that. How's work?"

"Insane. The Sanctuary has me teleporting back and forth all over the place. I keep getting offers from other Sanctuaries too, and Corrival said I have to tell him about them all and that takes up, like, all my spare time," he said, shrugging at the end. "It's all good though. Really good money."

"Well, that's good then," Valkyrie smiled, then complimented Nadia on her cake making. "Do you know where the guys are?"

"I don't know. Probably asleep though, since you were all at the hospital last night," he said.

"Wow Fletcher. That was one of the most observant comments you've ever made," she teased, giving him a wink when he gave her a salty look.

He cleared his throat before answering. "Yeah, well, I'm not incompletely incompetent, as you'd say. Tell Tanith congratulations for me."

"Will do. See you later," Valkyrie smiled and she and Nadia went off in search of the men, who ended up being upstairs. Dexter, Saracen and Erskine were spread over Erskine's bed like sardines and Anton was fast asleep on the sofa, a cushion covering his face for whatever reason.

"Hey guys," Valkyrie grinned brightly, opening the curtains.

There was groaning around the room as the four men complained about the bright light, getting even worse when Anton flung the pillow straight between Erskine's legs. Nadia had to cover her face to hide her laugh.

"Come on, time to get up! Don't you want to know what the baby name is?!" Valkyrie asked them, and they were all sitting up moments later. "It's Laila Marianna Edgley!"

"Aww, that's cute!" Erskine said.

"Why'd she get your last Chosen name?" Dexter asked Valkyrie. "Didn't think Ghastly would go for that."

"Well, Ghastly didn't was a hyphenated name with Tanith, and Tanith said she wouldn't have just Bespoke or just one of them when the baby is part of them both, so they started fighting about it and _I_ said they'd have to choose something more neutral. They decided on Edgley since they both like me and Gordon. Plus, she's going to change it in ten to twenty years from now."

"True. It's sweet she gets to have your name, have you told Gordon yet?"

"No, he's on the list. We're hoping Tanith can come home tonight or tomorrow morning. I have the first bag of dirty nappies to be washed downstairs so that's fun," Valkyrie grinned. "Have you heard from Pa?"

"Other than to send Tanith more congratulations, not really. He wants to hear from you because apparently your team has been trying to get a hold of you and you weren't answering," Dexter told her.

"Phone died."

"I told him. He said you had to charge it and call your team or else."

"Fun. I'll do it later," Valkyrie said, pulling up the desk chair and sitting down. Nadia leaned her hip against Valkyrie's shoulder. "Nothing else I guess?"

"Just mail," Saracen sighed. "Err, there's actually some for Nadia. It was at the gates last night when we got here. We err, fell asleep before we could tell you."

Nadia nodded and took the offered letter. It had been sat on, as shown by all the creases in the paper. Valkyrie saw that it just had the words 'Nadia Robin' in the front in Mrs Keena's handwriting. With a sigh, Nadia opened up the letter and pulled out the sheet inside.

After a few minutes of silence while Nadia read, she gave the letter to Valkyrie, but Valkyrie just put it on the desk and pulled Nadia to sit in her lap. "What does it say?"

"Just that they are leaving today, and that they are disappointed in me," Nadia said, wrapping her arms around Valkyrie. "They also said that I should expect a letter from Daadii, my grandmother. She's probably really mad with me."

"Well, Mrs Prachi did say before that you had to, like, stand your ground and stuff didn't she?" Valkyrie asked. "This is you doing that. She told your dad to back off."

"Yeah, but I don't think she actually expected me to move in with you and not go to India with my parents, even if I didn't go to the school," Nadia said, sighing again and letting her go. She looked a little defeated. "It doesn't matter. I like it here, I just don't want to get all these letters saying how awful I am."

"You're not awful. In a few years from now, when the Spiders are dealt with and the dust has settled, they'll see that you did a good thing. I'm sure they will. They're just mad because their baby is growing up, and honestly if Laila ever grows up I'm going to be mad too."

Nadia snorted a laugh. "You're going to be so annoying about this."

"House rule is that she's not allowed to grow up. She can't break it or it's a lifetime of being grounded. End of!" Valkyrie announced.

"God, I remember saying that about you," Dexter said. "You were all little and cute and we thought we had a few years where you'd be all over boys and cute stuff and want a horse."

"Yeah, you thought wrong," Valkyrie told him.

"I want a horse," Nadia nodded. "Can I have a horse?"

"If I can have a dog."

"No, I want a cat and a horse and no dog," Nadia told her.

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "I think we need to break up."

Nadia slapped Valkyrie's arm. "What else were you like as a kid?"

"I think that's for us," Anton intervened with a smirk.

"Exactly," Saracen nodded. "I remember the time Gordon told us you tried to run away from home."

"Oh my God," Valkyrie moaned and hid her face in Nadia's shoulder.

"She was living with her mum, so she was maybe six at the time? She wanted to go to swimming lessons, but that day was her piano lesson and she wouldn't be convinced that she could go to swimming the next day and had decided she hated piano for whatever reason. For the record, she was the best in her group at the time so she loved it. While her mum phoned to say she wasn't coming to the lesson because she was having a tantrum, Valkyrie had packed her school bag with granola bars, socks and her toy penguin."

"But the best bit," Erskine continued with a giant grin, "was that she went to her mum to open the front door for her! She couldn't reach the latch."

"Her mum opened it too," Dexter finished. "She walked all up the street and apparently stood at the end and suddenly ran all the way back in and hugged her mum."

Nadia 'aww'-ed her, because apparently that was adorable, but Valkyrie continued to hide her face. She remembered that day. She remembered having a fit about swimming and piano and it was a silly story, but she also remembered vividly getting to the top of the street and seeing Mr Hogan walking his little terrier dog. He had seen her, his eyes had widened and he started crossing the road towards her, walking quickly, and she had felt all the blood drain from her face. Then she ran to her mum and hugged her and acted good for about a week so she wouldn't have to think about anything else.

Valkyrie looked up and noticed Saracen's eyes narrow. "Do we want to have a takeaway for lunch?" She asked quickly.

The other agreed and Saracen didn't question her, and she let the men decided what to have while she went to wash. After scrubbing the memories viciously away, she felt refreshed.

She threw on a load of her own laundry and the nappies in a separate machine, of course, and she answered the door and paid the guy. She ate and sat with Nadia, texted Tanith, ordered the first lot of pictures to be printed of baby Laila and emailed the renovations company that had previously added the security measures they had wanted. They would probably have to redo all their work in a new layout so that was pretty annoying in an ecological and economical sense, but it was what they wanted and Valkyrie wouldn't let the environment get in her way.

Tanith got to come home that evening despite Laila being three weeks and a few days early. She was very strong and Tanith had a heartbeat monitor on her foot full time to keep an eye on her. Dexter the two with Erskine who was way too excited about it and took them to a magical paediatrician to give Laila a lookover while Valkyrie and Nadia cooked a pasta dinner. Thankfully, Laila was perfectly healthy except for being a little behind on growth, and she'd have to go in for a lot of extra appointments in the weeks to come, but Tanith and all of Valkyrie's family was just grateful both mother and daughter were healthy.

Ghastly had left at some point and no one heard from him, nor did anyone bother texting him Laila's results. If he wanted to make no effort, no one was going to help him along.

When they got back, Gordon got to see Laila and shared more stories about Valkyrie – that didn't have bad memories attached but were way more embarrassing – and Nadia nagged Valkyrie to play the piano for her. She was able to not do it by the skin of her teeth because the piano wasn't tuned. The stories revealed all the stuff she had learnt as a kid and it wasn't okay!

Laila was a quiet baby, and since Tanith's milk had come in, she was a good eater too. Which, for a baby, was really good. To compensate for not being able to bottle feed Laila anymore, the men were allowed to pick out her clothes. They were lucky Laila was so patient with them because they spent almost twenty minutes very gently getting her to put her arm through an armhole rather than just putting it in the hole with a little more force like a normal person would have. Laila had just drifted off to sleep after. Dealing with the Idiots was tiring after all.

Solomon helped Tanith with getting her stuff up the stairs and carried Laila for Tanith since she was still in pain from giving birth. He was very doting on the baby, and it was nice to see him look like himself rather than have that haunted shadow in his eyes when Laila wasn't around.

Valkyrie and Nadia went to bed early.

"I've missed you," Nadia said, snuggling into Valkyrie's side.

"I missed you too. It's been a crazy few days."

"Mm. Do you want to watch a movie?"

She and Nadia got changed into their pyjamas, separate from each other, and Valkyrie's eyes followed Nadia around the room when she came in from the bathroom. Valkyrie had seen short shorts before, Tanith had a few and so did she, but she wasn't even sure where these started on Nadia. They were _tiny_. They looked more like underwear than shorts, but they had pockets on the back side. Valkyrie spent so long staring and contemplating that she didn't realise Nadia was standing right in front of Valkyrie's face.

"You okay?" Nadia asked quietly.

Valkyrie looked up and tried very consciously not to stare at her breasts that were pushing up out of her top. She had to have been wearing a push up bra and Valkyrie appreciated it. "I'm fine."

Nadia twisted her hands nervously. "Do you like it?"

"The shorts?" Valkyrie asked, her eyebrows raising. "Yeah, I like them."

"Good," Nadia said, and quickly straddled Valkyrie's lap and pulled her into a hug. "I just thought you'd like to see them."

"You sound nervous," Valkyrie said, feeling her redden.

"I am," Nadia laughed. "It's silly. We've, you know, slept in the same bed and we've done stuff before. I wasn't nervous before."

"It's okay," Valkyrie smiled, wishing she'd thought to put on something other than Erskine's old, ratty jogging bottoms and Anton's gigantic, comfortable shirt. It was not quite the vibe Nadia was trying to create. "Should I change?"

Nadia blushed darker. "I can help you," she said breathlessly, and Valkyrie could see she was shaking a little. Not wanting to stop whatever Nadia wanted to do, Valkyrie let her pull the top off, leaving Valkyrie's top half entirely bare. Nadia had only seen her breasts once before.

"I love you, Nadia," Valkyrie whispered, kissing her neck.

Nadia looked her over but didn't seem like she was confident enough to touch. Feeling like she would be forcing Nadia if she did anything, Valkyrie asked if she wanted to watch the movie. Nadia nodded quickly and they snuggled into each other, Nadia having a hand on Valkyrie's belly and Valkyrie holding Nadia's thigh. Valkyrie's heart would skip every time Nadia moved her hand even a little. Halfway through the movie Valkyrie was definitely not paying attention to, Nadia suddenly pushed Valkyrie flat on the bed, covered her breast with her hand and kissed Valkyrie soundly.

No more clothes were removed, but they touched each other all over and moaned into each other's mouth's way past the end of the credits, talking softly and giggling to each other. They fell asleep in each other's arms and Valkyrie felt as if some barrier had been crossed – one that she'd be very glad to leave behind.


	134. Detective-ing

**Chapter 134**

"Aren't you sweet," Corrival smile softly at the three day old infant in his arms. He was sat on the parlour sofa, Tanith next to him and wearing his Elder robes. "Yes, you'll be a very smart girl. Pretty, too. You have your sisters' nose."

Valkyrie smiled brightly. She'd noticed Laila's nose looked like hers too. Tanith rolled her eyes. She was convinced the nose was identical to her biological brothers, but Valkyrie knew better. Genetics _definitely_ didn't work that way. Just as she knew her new haircut following her run-in with the burning building had left her with an awful haircut that was way too short and it didn't suit her face. Tanith didn't know what she was on about.

Laila chose then that she didn't like to be with Corrival, and he was very quick to hand the squirming baby back to her mother. Slapping his knees, Corrival pulled himself up. "She's a beau, Tanith. But I think it's time myself and Valkyrie get to the Sanctuary. Much to do, after all."

"Of course," Tanith said, pulling Laila's clothes off for a nappy change. "Have you found anything out on the Spiders?"

"We know they evacuated where they were," he said with a sigh. "We knew they would as soon as Mr Wreath was liberated, of course, but we have had a team go in and check. There was nothing but a few tools and an old furnace that was probably there in wartime, and a whole lotta blood. We suspect they've been capturing mortals for sport. They knew enough to stay away from the nearby town, so that's why we hadn't connected it with them previously."

"Hmm," Tanith said, wiping Laila clean while the baby did a big yawn. "I'm assuming there were no bodies then?"

"Nothing. I had expected them to leave some note, or warning, or something along those lines, but no."

"I'm surprised Craven wasn't there," Valkyrie said. "I mean, he didn't bring Skulduggery back when he should have, he was the last to see Solomon seconds before he was rescued, and I doubt he's making life easy for the Spiders with how annoying he is with his superiority complex. Seemed like they'd want to get rid of him."

"Maybe they need a Necromancer?" Nadia asked, giving Valkyrie her bag of food for lunch. She was so cute, giving her food and stuff. Valkyrie grinned at her.

"There is a chance, but Spiders are quite particular in how they do things. Manipulating the Necromancer Temple for a distraction, yes. Use others to do terrorist acts, yes. But work alongside someone for their magic when they could do everything themselves? I very much doubt that," Corrival said. "Regardless, we must look down every avenue, so your contributions, Miss Robin, are not unwelcome. Are you ready to leave, Valkyrie dear?"

**.*****.**

Valkyrie, some six hours of straight desk work reading and signing off on paper later, cracked her knuckles and sat back in her chair.

It had been a bad day. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened, but it had been hard on her. With the crimewave still happening, now about two months into it, Valkyrie had a ton of paperwork to keep on top of and with her having time off for so long, there was just so much. She wished she could bring people in to help her.

Her team had been debriefed a second time for the point of it in terms of her interaction with Skulduggery. They seemed slightly more satisfied that she wasn't going to help him escape the country, and they had concluded that he wasn't leaving for the foreseeable future.

Their predictions on that had been for these reasons, the ones stuck on the pinboard in the office: Skulduggery was in an awful place mentally and probably didn't want to leave home; Skulduggery kept vendettas and those he loved on equal priority and right now, all of those priorities were in Ireland; Skulduggery would likely try to contact Solomon again; Skulduggery may have become actually insane and may suddenly turn up at the house or the Sanctuary as if nothing happened, or else to continue to do mentally unstable things; or the worst of all, Skulduggery may turn evil on them.

The last one was more aimed at killing civilians in an insane fuelled rage from all the torture and confusion, but Valkyrie feared something along the lines of Lord Vile showing up. She couldn't mention it to her team, obviously, but it was a risk. The main gist of the ideas she and the team had made were that Skulduggery needed physic help, he needed to talk and vent and rage and get it out and be comforted. But all the said torture and his general personality meant they'd have to capture and restrain him first. Valkyrie had a feeling they could get him to be willing but only if they used the perfect amount of guilting and absolute, overpowering manpower to make him do that. Since it wasn't likely, they hadn't even bothered to write that down as an option. He was just so hard to predict they couldn't get the manpower near him fast enough to act out and it was killing Valkyrie inside.

Corrival and Grand Mage Meritorious were probably having a worse day. An English Sanctuary agent had turned up with a 'notice'. It had informed the Elders that if they didn't assign a new Elder in sixty days, they'd be an international meeting to assign one for them. They had informed her mostly for ideas on who she trusted but she had come up blank. China had been suggested but both Valkyrie and Corrival shut it down – Corrival despised her and Valkyrie knew Elder Crow had not liked the idea.

Sighing, Valkyrie stood up and stretched, deciding to take her paperwork to the Filers herself for the walk.

The office was quiet, most people concentrating in the late afternoon so they could go home, or out on actual work. Valkyrie left the department and went for the one down the hall, putting the thick stack on the counter.

"Evening," the red-haired man nodded, taking the files. "Catching up?"

"Yeah," Valkyrie smiled. "How's your department doing?"

"It's good. I like Roarhaven. I mean, it's dark and dirty, but it's quiet. I like that," the guy said, looking over her files to make sure they were good. "Don't like this Sanctuary yet. I like windows, me."

"It would be nice to see outside. I guess that would be hard, being as we're underground," Valkyrie commented politely. "Are the files good?"

"Just a second, detective," he said, muttering to himself as he looked them all over. A few were going to leave for other officials, that being the Elders mainly, but the rest would be filed in the new Cabinet room. "Alright, it looks good. Hey, did you ever, err, well, find out who that other person was?"

"What other person?" Valkyrie asked, standing a little taller.

"The one that came in and looked 'round the Receptacle," he said, putting the stack on his chair and leaning an elbow on the counter. "You know, Pleasant said there was that third guy, he went into the Receptacle and stole stuff? They never found a body for an assassin."

Valkyrie shook her head. "I had forgotten about him, but we think he was called Stolen," she said, thoughts quickly occurring. "Do you have the reports for the bombing written up yet? I need them."

"Sure thing, detective," he said and fetched them for her. Valkyrie immediately went to her office and started reading them.

She was interested in the Receptacle inventory. Next to each item name, there was a cross for it still being there, for it being damaged but identifiable as an object, or for being missing. For the most part everything had been destroyed, or rather, they assumed it had been destroyed as there was no recognisable proof of its existence any longer.

What Valkyrie wanted to do was discern how much time there had been between the bomb going off and what they believed to be the time Stolen went into the room. According to the files, detectives claimed it would be an eight minutes time span for the assassin to be in there and somehow escape. Assuming the thief got out alive.

Valkyrie knew there were only two real doors in and out – the double ones at the front. She knew of no secret ones. But she bet Meritorious would.

She went straight to his office, and he wasn't there. His secretary said he was in a meeting, with Corrival. After a few cute grins and carrying her paperwork, Valkyrie found out it was a meeting between the two of them solely and was able to find out where they were. The door was unlocked at her approach.

"Valkyrie," Meritorious welcomed. He had bags under his eyes and he looked noticeably thinner but had a full plate of sandwiches besides him paired with an orange juice. It looked untouched. "What have you found?"

"Not what I've found, more so than realised," she said, sitting down quickly while Corrival relocked the door. "No one ever investigated the whole Receptacle thief thing when the old Sanctuary was blown up. I need to know how the man, Stolen, could have gotten out of the room."

"You want to know the other doors," Meritorious nodded, understanding quickly. "Do you have a map?" Valkyrie pulled an old map that indicated where things were placed around the room out of the file. "There are three secret passages. One of them on the left middle area of the room on the wall. That one travelled past the offices, with access to them also, and then went down a slope and outside. The second was on the right at the very front, a blind point to the cameras also. It was a shoot that went straight into the ground. Only problem there, you had to get past the other doors and security points before you could get in or out once you went down."

"Skulduggery took them through a section of that system," Valkyrie remembered.

"He did. It wasn't the same doors and chambers, and we know he didn't unlock the ones necessary to get in and out of the Receptacle area and outside. But that doesn't mean he didn't do anything secretively, or that our thief Mr Stolen wasn't capable of getting himself through the security. The third option is through the ceiling. I find that unlikely, however."

"Where is the ceiling tunnel?" Valkyrie asked. Corrival handed her a cup of tea.

"Here. The very back, middle of the room. Just out of sight in practically every place except to the cameras. And the cameras saw nothing."

"He has a special Cloaking Sphere," Valkyrie reminded him. "It's unlikely we'll see him at all on camera, plus detectives have already checked the footage that was recovered. There was no sign of an unknown man anywhere. I only know it was Stolen from China. She spoke to Skulduggery right before the whole Nadia thing and you know she has other sources."

Meritorious shrugged uncharacteristically and took a long drink of scorching hot tea. "What's your thoughts?"

Valkyrie wondered that also and looked over the map, drawing crudely where the escape routes were. "Well, we know he didn't touch the door again. So, he had enough time, I think, to get something on the left and leave through the office tunnel that goes outside, but _only_ if he got something from the left. I don't think he'd have escaped the blast otherwise and I get the impression this Stolen dude isn't stupid enough to not know his escape plan." She drew an oval over the area she thought he could have taken something from if he had used that escape route. "Option two is the underground system, and I think that would have been hard, and he would have needed a ton of inside knowledge, but there is a slim chance he could have gotten out that way. The underground system was only minorly damaged, right?"

"Right," Corrival nodded.

"But he didn't set the alarms off," Meritorious interjected.

Valkyrie shook her head. "But he turned the alarms off, right? Or messed with them somehow. That why he has such a short window after leaving the other two because we have to account for messing with the signals. He could have used his knowledge of signals to open the doors and close them to not trip the system later if he was confident the structure would protect him. But he wouldn't necessarily have wanted us to not know he was there. We don't know his style yet. Regardless, he could have gotten a _lot_ of stuff with this method but was likely limited to this quarter of the room to get far enough into his safe zone." She circled a large chunk of the room. There was a ton of missing things from there.

"True," Meritorious nodded, taking a bite of his food.

"Or the third option in the ceiling, which I also find hard to believe. He grabbed things from this area," Valkyrie said, doing an oval essentially covering a beeline from the double doors to the escape with the two shelving units either side of the run. "He'd have to grab it, hoist himself to the ceiling somehow, making him a great jumper or somehow able to hover with magic, get the panel open to get in, and somehow climb into the shaft. Then he'd have to monkey climb to the roof or use magic again. Not impossible in itself, but where does he go? Did he jump down the back when we were looking at Skulduggery and Craven out the front? If he did do that it would explain his magic, but we know he was the one to mess with the signals so surely that would be his magic?"

"I agree," Corrival said with a nod of his head. "I've seen a lot of assassins and thieves and as long as he knew either of the other two routes, he wouldn't have chosen the roof. If he was an Elemental or our theory of being a Signal worker is proven wrong then I'd reconsider it, however, as it would be significantly easier if he had control of the air. Going through the office escape would work, but that leads to an open field. He could have used the Cloaking Sphere, but if he had the talent and skill, going underground would have been easier overall and less likely to leave him in the blast range as it was more completely sheltered from the fallout."

Valkyrie suddenly thought back to the file China had given her two or so weeks prior. She'd read it briefly. "Bliss had some correspondences with Stolen. In one of them, Bliss had questioned Stole on his 'technique'."

"What did he say?" Meritorious asked.

"I'm about to find out," Valkyrie muttered, pulling out her phone and calling Nadia. She picked up on the third ring. "Hi sweetie, could you do me a favour?"

"Sure, what is it?" Nadia asked. There was a spattering of laughter on the other end. "Are you at work?"

"I am, this'll be really quick," she said. She instructed Nadia to go to their bedroom and to Valkyrie's desk. After telling her to code to the safe, Nadia grabbed the right files for Valkyrie. "Could you please turn to the Stolen pages. And do not, and I mean this, do not look at anything else. There are pictures in there you don't want to see."

"Okay," Nadia said nervously, There were a few shaky breaths as she carefully flicked through the files and a moment later spoke again. "I've got it. What do you want?"

"Scan it and tell me when they start talking about Stolen's magic. What does he say about it? Read it directly, you're now on speaker."

There was a pause while Nadia scanned the pages for the part Valkyrie needed, and then she said "ah!" and read aloud. "It doesn't say who's speaking but it's a, I don't know, script or whatever it's called. It says: ' _The Sanctuary is confused. The Grand Mage does not know how you got into his Sanctuary, but they are only going to tighten the security now. How will you complete your mission?'_ Next line, _'I can handle it.'_ New line, _'And the Dead Men?'_ New line, _'I will rip their arms off.'_ New line, _'How?'_ New line, _'Why do you want to know? Got work for me?'_ New line, _'No, I want to know how you will complete the work. If you fail, it will put plans behind schedule. My work will suffer and The Master, The Tormentor, will be displeased.'_ New line, _'Didn't think you'd care. I'll smash their faces and rip them apart. You leave it to me.'_ New line, _'Give me a reason to and I will.'_ New line _,_ _'Do you remember that gang, the one that massacred the old African Sanctuary's Elder and her family? Remember what it looked like when you investigated? I watched you look over their bodies and laughed at your faces. So dumbfound, so stupid. I can't tell you how I kill. It would take the fun out of it.'_ Are they talking about Elder Kafele?"

"Yes," Meritorious said in a hard voice. "It essentially means he can pull people apart. We need to know if that's his magic, we can't make an assumption."

"Right, he could be a trained assassin," Corrival added.

"Does it say anywhere which of those it is, Nadia?" Valkyrie asked her.

"Give me a minute," she asked and they waited for her to read. "It says something about seeing Craven and wanting to, err, blow him up from the other side of the hallway… later one of them says that The Torment had hired the Wild Brothers or something like that, and it sounds like both speakers don't like them. Apparently, they have a personal goal to kill them. They say… they say _'if I had just a single second with them I'd start ripping their limbs off. You know I would, now, huh? You liked that Elder, didn't you?'_ "

"That might be it," Valkyrie said. "He said that he could do it in a second, and he's referring to his past crime. Is that enough to say he has additional strength as his magic?"

Corrival was already shaking his head. "I don't think so Valkyrie. I think you're onto something, I do, but not without looking at those logs in more detail or real proof one way or the other. I'd be happy to pick this up tomorrow."

Valkyrie could sense his dismissal now they knew she had unsubstantial evidence. "Alright. I'll talk to you soon Nadia," she said and hung the phone up before getting a reply. She'd call her back when she was out. "Thank you for talking with me," she told the Elders.

Meritorious waved her thanks away. "Just find our killers. I'm sure whatever he took is important to the Spiders, and through them, us."

Valkyrie gave her goodbyes and left, gathering her things and leaving for home.

She had a lot to think about. At least she had her helper now.


	135. Poor Tanith! She never gets a break

**Chapter 135**

Valkyrie looked over the papers and nonsense she had written and found in books in the last five hours or so. A plate of half-eaten korma lay on the large windowsill and Valkyrie had Laila in her car seat on the table next to her, fast asleep. They had given her a lovely baby yellow rocker to take naps in, but she hated it. She seemed to really love the car seat though, and whatever three day old Laila wanted, she got.

"She's a lovely baby," Gordon said absently as Valkyrie glared at her own rushed handwriting. "I remember you being so small. But you had really dark hair when you were born, though only a little. Laila is blonde."

"Yeah, about two strands on her head," Valkyrie croaked, stretching until she heard her spine snap twice. She let out a breath in satisfaction. "We're not any closer."

"I think it's going to come down to this," Gordon said, putting his hands up. "One, he's an Elemental, but a very talented one and able to use air and stone somehow to kill people. In that case, the roof is the best option because it _seems_ to be the worst. Two, regardless of magic, he is very smart and able to get pasts any signal and ward we can imagine and that ability trumps his magic, and so he used the tunnels below. If he could get through the tunnels, it would be the best way, so we need to know how smart he is. Or thirdly, he's an Adept with some type of super strength and had to use the hidden corridor behind the offices and simply wasn’t picked up on any camera or seen by anyone by a stroke of luck. Or bad luck, rather. There is no reason he can't be strong and fast after all."

Valkyrie nodded. "And we know the top three things he could have taken from those areas. And a few that he might have taken out of those areas if he's somehow insanely fast or our timings are off. God, this is so frustrating. How are we meant to test and check these things?"

Gordon smiled at her. "Perhaps you should go to bed, Valkyrie. We’ve made some headway, after all, identifying the possibilities. Personally, I feel it is most likely the Spider's would have wanted The Box of Variability since it was theirs once, and it is missing. But again, I'm not so sure about the idea of our Mr Stolen being an Elemental and taking the middle route upwards. Not many assassins do choose that path after all."

"But not impossible," Valkyrie finished. "I know, Uncle. I'm keeping my mind open, I just want it finished, I'm not going to fill in the blanks with my imagination. Surprisingly, I actually _like_ to do my job properly," she said tiredly, rubbing her eyes. "I am going to bed. Are you okay for me to leave this crap here?"

"Sure," he shrugged. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Valkyrie took Laila to her next babysitter for the night so that Tanith could sleep a little longer before she had to breastfeed again, which was Anton and an eager Erskine. They were playing cards and Valkyrie left Laila in the car seat on the table between them to keep hawk eyes on after they promised to take her to Tanith when Laila woke up and then take her again when Tanith was done nursing. The post-partum symptoms were just as strong for Tanith as the pregnancy issues, and Valkyrie honestly felt awful for her big sister. She tried to hide it, but Valkyrie could see how scared and worried she was, how much physical pain she was in. Being a mother was hard and it made her feel so much more grateful for her own, as well as be in awe of her mother’s strength for doing so much child rearing as a widow.

After a quick stop in the kitchen for snacks and drinks, Valkyrie tossed her thoughts aside and went to her bedroom.

"Hi," she said quietly to Nadia. "I got tea."

"Good," Nadia softly replied, putting whatever she was holding down. "Did you find what you needed to?"

"No, but I will," she smiled. "Here. So, what have you been doing all evening?"

"Cooking, washing, made the bed, dusted downstairs, made dinner, stopped Erskine from ruining dinner, and looked after Laila for a while."

"Busy, then," Valkyrie smiled. "You don't have to do all this by the way. Thank you."

"It's okay, I'm happy to help. Um, I actually need to tell you something before we watch a movie or go to sleep," Nadia told her. "I think my friends from school want to come and see me. They don't know that my parents have moved–"

"They can come here," Valkyrie cut her short.

"Really? I didn't know if you'd like them to, especially since I don't think I really made them out to be the nicest. They're really good people, we just had a rough start and after the whole Emily thing came out they were honestly so supportive and lovely to me. I think you’d really like them all, especially Fleet, she’s really outgoing like you," Nadia rattled on.

Valkyrie took her hand. "This is your home. If you want someone here, I only need to know to let them in the wards, but I won't stop them. Alright?"

A grin spread on Nadia's face. "Thanks, baby. I'm really excited to see them. They said they were worried about me and have been asking how I've been and about you. I think they might try to interrogate you."

"Sure, like they can weasel anything out of a First Detective," Valkyrie snorted.

"Yeah, they've been gushing about how crazy it is that your First and all that. I think I'm just used to you. You’re boring to me."

"It's more likely that you know how immature and stupid I can be and you can't see me as anything other than that," Valkyrie rolled her eyes and kissing her on the nose. "When are they coming?"

"This Sunday, I think," Nadia said cautiously.

Valkyrie nodded. "Sure thing. We can deck out that back bedroom with mattresses and have a real sleepover, like people on the movies! Or, well, as long as you don't mind me there all night. I can just stay until we have food if you want. They are your friends after all."

"You're staying," Nadia told her sternly. "If you don't, they'll lay into me that you're not there. God, you really have no idea how many people admire you. Girls around the world want to be your girlfriend, your best friend, the one you call up for help."

"I have you for all of that," Valkyrie smiled and kissed her on the lips before she got the chance to say anything more. "You're all I want. I promise."

**.*****.**

"Valkyrie!" Erskine cheered when Valkyrie came through the front door. His enthusiasm made her spirits heighten even if her case hadn't progressed after working through it with China for an hour. Him, Dexter, Nadia and Tanith were in the living room with little five day old Laila and when Valkyrie came around the corner, Nadia stood and hugged Valkyrie.

"Hey sweetie," Valkyrie whispered to Nadia. "Have a good day so far?"

"No," Nadia whispered back. "I got a letter from Daadii."

"Uh oh," Valkyrie said, and they shuffled to the sofa wrapped in their hug. Once sat, Valkyrie was handed the letter in question. She looked at it a moment and raised an eyebrow at Nadia. "I'm not sure if you remember, but this language here? I can't read it."

Nadia took it back, cheeks darkening. "Sorry. I just – I wasn't thinking. She's really mad at me."

"I thought she sort of gave you, you know, permission to do what you needed?"

"Yeah, not to run away from home," Nadia said, her voice becoming frantic.

Valkyrie nodded, the picture coming together quickly. "Your parents only told them all the bad stuff. You leaving for me, doing all the work here, having no contact with them, me punching your dad in the face."

"Basically yeah. And the fact me, Dexter and Saracen essentially broke into their house and ' _stole_ ' my things," Nadia reminded her. "She's furious. She wrote that if I don't call her the moment I get this letter – which was this morning – she'd call the authorities to collect me. That's what she wrote."

"She realises I am the authorities?" Valkyrie asked.

"I don't think she means you," Nadia snapped, throwing herself onto the sofa. "What am I meant to do?"

"Tell her what you think. You were able to before. Ring her up, and after she's done asking what you were thinking, explain to her it was like the last time you two spoke. Your dad was being a dick, neither of them wanted to listen to your wishes and you took it into your own hands. Explain that I did hit your dad and tell her that he has more than enough rights and abilities to report that. And that if he does, I will report him slapping me once previously also, as well as his attack in my home."

"I can't do that Valkyrie, you know that."

"Baby, I'm not telling you to get angry with her. But if you want her to understand the position your parents are putting you in, you have to tell her. She's can't know _without_ you telling her," Valkyrie softly comforted her. She could see how stressed Nadia was. "Here, how about we make a pot of tea and then decide what to do?"

Nadia nodded and Dexter helped her get the things together in the kitchen, giving her a chance to question Dexter on it. She had, indeed, been stressing about it all day and he had helped her calm down, but he had noticed she had been unwilling to eat more than half of anything he put in front of her all day. Nadia's stress-starving made Valkyrie stressed!

"Alright then," she said, putting the things down on the coffee table. "This is yours."

"Thanks," Nadia replied, taking the plate. "Do you want Laila?"

"Of course!" The baby, all swaddled and adorable was put into her arms and Valkyrie happily abandoned her snack of a lunch. After spending a minute telling Laila how perfect she was, she was able to divert her attention to the previous task.

"What would you do, Tanith?" Valkyrie asked.

"Honestly? I wouldn't even bother with ringing. No one can get in the house. But, I can fight off anything that could possibly be paid to stalk and kidnap me. Or I usually can anyway. My insides hurt only half as much as my crotch."

Valkyrie snorted a laugh. "Do you want me to freeze your underwear?"

"I'm already doing that," she scowled up at the ceiling. "I don't know how people do this without so many people helping. I've had, what, five men and you two girls? Seven live-in babysitters. This is the only way to do it."

"I bet you could do it alone," Valkyrie encouraged. "I bet it would suck, but you've been a great mum so far."

"I've mostly just slept."

Valkyrie frowned, realising that this was the first conversation she'd had with her sister since she gave birth. And the entire giving birth journey in the hospital had been centred around the baby and jokes about Tanith's destroyed groin. Before that, they hadn't spoken in a week and a half, except a single sentence as they passed each other. She was doing an awful job of being a sister, regardless of if her girlfriend needed help too. "What's up Tanith?" She asked kindly and brought herself and Laila over to the sofa Tanith was sitting on.

"I don't know," she groaned, rubbing her eyes. "I'm just so tired."

"Your body went through a lot, it's normal to be tired. If someone gave birth and had more energy it would be weird," Valkyrie said.

"Yeah, but I just – I just don't feel all that motivated. If I didn't have you guys to help, what if I – what if I didn't look after her? What would happen?" Valkyrie watched as Tanith kept staring at the ceiling, tears filling her eyes.

"You can't talk like that," Valkyrie told her firmly, taking a deep breath to stop herself from automatically getting upset. Tanith was always so strong it made her feel unstable to see how cry. "If you were alone, you, me and everyone else know that you would do _everything_ for your daughter every moment she needed something. You've been a great mum, and you know that any parent would want as much help as they could get and use it too. That's all you've done, accept the help around you, and that isn't a bad thing."

"But what if I couldn't do it? It hurt to stand up and go to the bathroom, and it would hurt to turn and take Laila from you now. It hurts to feed her myself, even though I'll do it for the sake of her health. How could I look after her if there was an emergency and you all had to go and deal with it? I don't think I could do it."

"You _can_ do it, and you know you can too," Valkyrie said. "They say women can feel depressed after giving birth, right? Maybe we can find a professional that can help you overcome these feelings you’re having and maybe teach you something about babies so you feel better? I know you can do it all, but it might help you feel more confident to go over it with someone."

Tanith thought about it a moment, her eyes closed. She nodded. "That might be a good idea."

"I'm glad. And for the record, I bet any parent or parents would take seven live in helper to help raise their child. And it means Laila is getting to bond with us all from the start so she'll know how much she means to us all, and that’s a good parent thing to do. More love is always the best option, right?"

Tanith smiled a little. "I guess so."

"It is. So use us to recalibrate and have time to yourself, because then when you do need to look after her alone you will be as healed and rested as you can be. Isn't that the goal?"

Tanith nodded with a little more vigour.

"Good. See, soon you'll have the baby raising thing in the bag and in a few months when Laila is sleeping through the nights you can be like you used to – happy and bubbly and trying to get me to talk about my emotions more! It'll be great because Laila will know enough to shout in panic and fear with me and we'll run away together."

Tanith rolled her eyes. "Leave her out of it."

"Nope. We will support each other in the frightening moments of your rage," Valkyrie smirked. “And so you know, no one would think badly of you if you just did part time breastfeeding if it’s hurting you. I know it’s important for her to get the antibodies or whatever, but having a healthy mummy is the most important thing for her no matter what. Formula is really good for babies, and even if you only breastfeed once a day it’ll still give her lots of benefits without hurting you so much. I remember all the pictures of the nipples people get breastfeeding and I wouldn’t force that on anyone.”

Tanith smiled sort of sadly and put a hand on Valkyrie’s leg and squeezed to show her thanks. “You’re a good sister. I’ll try the classes and talk to someone at the maternity place and see what they can do.”

“I can ask Kenspeckle too. He might know someone.”

“Let’s wait and see how bad this post-partum gets before we jump to specialists,” Tanith said, taking a deep breath. “I’ll go to one if I need to, but let’s go slowly. I did _just_ give birth. Maybe it’s just because I’m really tired, in pain and scared she’s going to die still? The first two weeks are the scariest with SIDS and stuff. When we’re through this next fortnight, if I’m still feeling as bad, then we’ll move for big changes. But give me a chance to adjust and see first.”

“Okay, I’m happy with that too,” Valkyrie smiled before leaning over and kissing her sister’s cheek. “I love you.”

“Love you too sis,” she yawned.

"We do actually need to work out what we're doing with this letter Nadia got though," Valkyrie redirected for Tanith, looking down at the baby that had started to suckle at the air. She was having a good boob dream.

"I say," Dexter cut in, "that Nadia needs to respond. Even if it's only by letter, but there needs to be a response. We don't know how truthful or exaggerated Mr Vinay and Mrs Keena have been to your grandparents, Nadia, and although we know that some of what was told was not altogether true, Valkyrie is right when she says that your grandparents won't know that until you tell her."

Nadia looked a bit miserable and Valkyrie expected it was because she was upset that she'd have to face the music. Valkyrie would be the same. Mrs Prachi was a harsh and powerful woman, and although Valkyrie still liked and respected her for it, she also wouldn't want to call her up and try to explain away lies.

"I suppose so," Nadia muttered.

"We'll help," Valkyrie smiled as Dexter got the phone.

"Now?" Nadia asked, sitting up.

"It's easier to get it over with," Dexter said apologetically. "Come on. It'll be over before you know it. But let's get Saracen down here just in case we need some help."


	136. Would you like a sweetie, sweetie?

**Chapter 136**

From three in the morning to ten, Valkyrie stayed with eight day old Laila, Nadia coming in and out of sleep to check on her, so that Tanith could keep healing from her birth as Laila had decided she didn't want to sleep at all. For hours she cried and screamed, and it was only when Valkyrie finally went into the cool, still September air outside at seven in the morning that the baby settled. Unfortunately, Valkyrie hadn't expected that and as a result, had to stay outside in just her shorts and a t-shirt. Laila was wrapped up plus a blanket, as she had been only going to get her phone charger from the car parked out front, but she wasn't going to waste the opportunity to sooth the baby to dreamland. Carefully, she'd gone back inside when Laila was in a deep sleep and put her down in the parlour bassinet.

Dexter had come down with Erskine bickering loudly and Valkyrie had been too slow to stop them. Being tired, she'd angrily told them that they could take over and that Laila needed feeding and stormed up to her and Nadia's room – to fall headfirst into the pillow and pass out.

She woke around two as Nadia stroked her hair.

"Good afternoon," Nadia gently said, kissing her forehead. "You didn't sleep at all last night."

"I did a little," Valkyrie groaned, smelling the coffee. "Before Anton got me."

"Was he looking after Laila?"

"Yeah, but someone started messing about at the Hotel. He texted me last night that it was all good, but Laila didn't want to shut up. Ended up outside for her to sleep."

"Maybe it was too hot for her."

"She had cold feet inside. I only went out for a moment but she got mad when I went back in, so out it was," Valkyrie explained. "She doesn't have frostbite, in case you're worried. Can I have my coffee?"

"Sure. I was thinking," Nadia started when Valkyrie had sat up, "that maybe we could go out today? Since you did a ton of Sanctuary work already, and you did your babysitting and everyone else is here to hold things up."

Valkyrie smiled. "Of course. Where were you thinking?"

Nadia bit her lip. "Okay, I might maybe be being a little nosy, and probably overstepping, but I thought we could go to the village you grew up in? I wanted to see where you grew up."

Valkyrie had to take a deep breath through her nose before she dared even swallow her burning hot coffee. She hadn't expected that at all. "I suppose we can. What made you think about it? And for the record, it's not overstepping to ask me anything, you should know that."

Nadia blushed a little when Valkyrie stroked hair behind her ear. "I know. I was just curious. I've been talking with Gordon a lot while you've been gone about the house and his business and writing and you, a lot about you as a kid actually, and it just made me want to see it myself. He said that right after your father died your mother would take you to nursery on a Wednesday afternoon and he'd meet her and they'd have fish and chips and talk about you and your dad. I thought it would be good to see it myself."

Valkyrie smiled slightly, remembering her mum's face in her mind. She was a very beautiful lady, she remembered, and an amazing mum. "Let's get ready."

The two of them dressed – in the same room but faced away from each other – for the trip excitedly, deciding they would buy food there for lunch, breakfast in Valkyrie's case, and went downstairs to get Valkyrie's things that she'd dumped on the kitchen side at some point and it got left there since. Tanith, Laila, Ghastly, Erskine and Dexter were all in the kitchen when they walked in.

"Hi," Valkyrie said, sensing she interrupted something. Ghastly looked both miserable and desperate, and Tanith looked ready to either cry in frustration or punch something. "How's everyone?"

"Fine, fine," Tanith muttered, taking a sip of her tea. Laila was looking up at her with wincing eyes. "Thank you for looking after Laila last night, by the way."

"It's alright, she was just a little bit grumpy," Valkyrie smiled, stroking the baby's cheek. Ghastly tutted from his place by the counter.

"Excuse me?" Tanith snapped at him.

Sensing Ghastly's imminent demise, Valkyrie interrupted. "Me and Nadia are going to Haggard for lunch."

"Sounds good," Dexter jumped in. "Lovely beaches there."

"I know, I lived there," Valkyrie smirked, getting her card and keys from behind him and putting them in her pocket. "I thought we'd take a walk around, but there's no reason you guys can't come too."

"Great!" Dexter said, clapping his hands and looking around eagerly. Erskine jumped out of his seat quickly, Dexter wrapped an arm around a sighing Ghastly and manhandled him towards the front of the house. Tanith gave Valkyrie a tight smile but agreed to come on the walk, saying she needed the exercise. When they had all left to get ready, Valkyrie hugged Nadia and apologised for inviting everyone along but Nadia didn't mind the intrusion, claiming she was saving up events like these to aid her 'I deserve a kitten' campaign.

Valkyrie told her to eat shit and Nadia laughed in her face.

Since Tanith and Laila were in Gordon's old car, she and Nadia joined. Valkyrie drove so that the boys could talk in the other car all together, by which Dexter meant get mad at Ghastly about whatever Tanith was upset about when he said 'talk'.

"Tell me about it," Valkyrie demanded as soon as she was in the driver's seat. "It's going to take me ages to sort this seat out, oh my God."

"Just don't crash, my baby doesn't need that type of trauma," Tanith muttered, texting someone.

"There's a trauma she does need?" Nadia sassed from the back seat beside the baby.

Tanith snorted a laugh. "I'm going to start from the beginning, alright. So, it's midday. I've just gotten Laila back from Erskine after he insisted on taking some sort of photoshoot. I'm feeding her on the sofa. Next thing I know is Ghastly is in my face asking to hold _his_ child. _His_. _Hiiiis_ _._ So, I just about lose it immediately, but I read once a suspicious, ridiculous article that bad feelings transfer to babies when you breastfeed them and while I think it's bullshit, I also keep thinking about it and I don't want Laila to get all sorts of bad voodoo, so I tell him to leave until I'm finished. Dexter makes him leave but it only lasted until they made tea and came back. Laila was still going, so I was stuck basically. You can imagine how awkward that was. Ghastly held Laila for a few minutes and then she started pooping and I think it just made Ghastly freak out and he started getting this look on his face and I just mama-beared out and got mad again, which is stupid, but I did. He started asking me why I was so mad, and it took less than point three of a second for me to start shouting about how little I heard from him since I left hospital and then I started asking why he took so long to get to the hospital when I was giving birth and he was just all quiet and pathetic and it just made me madder. In the end, the guys came and took Laila who was screaming, me and Ghastly were screaming and we ended up in the kitchen before we calmed down and Erskine was the one to tell us how stupid we were being."

"I didn't think you'd shout and have an argument in front of your kid," Valkyrie said protectively. "You two shouldn't fight in front of her. Or at all, preferably."

"I know, Val. I know that, but when he's asking me for his child that I am literally breastfeeding, and then he asks what my problem is, it makes me very mad."

"Oh, yeah, I totally understand that part," Valkyrie agreed quickly. "I'd be screaming too. I just mean that Laila doesn't need that. But it's too late now."

"I know. I just don't understand how Ghastly thinks he can turn up at any point and just demand his kid? How shitty is that? He never acted like that before, and I never would have dated him at all if I'd thought he could act like that even a little bit."

"I know, Tanith," Valkyrie soothed.

"Maybe you should make a contract," Nadia suggested.

"Saracen suggested that," Tanith said seriously. "Last night when I interrupted him and Dexter talking about Ghastly. I just don't know if I want to go down that route. We have a very individual life, and a lot of people are involved. I mean, we essentially have a roommate agreement, live in a house together rather than have a traditional family home… I just don't feel a solicitor could understand and make an arrangement considering how unique we are."

"You might be right, to be fair," Valkyrie nodded as she made the turning out of the house after finally getting her seat how she liked it. "This really isn't very normal. But Gordon might be able to help a little with the whole custody thing because he took a little while getting me, and I bet it was a fight and a half to get Skulduggery, a single unrelated man I'd never met to be my guardian after he died. So maybe you could make your own agreements with Ghastly, but not so strictly. Just some boundaries and lines you don't want touched, but not a full on bi-weeking rotation of who gets to keep her in their room."

Tanith nodded, looking back at her phone when it buzzed. "I had just hoped things would be different. He's acting so, you know, defensively. It doesn't suit him at all."

"I know," Valkyrie said, and they left the conversation at that miserable ending.

"Nadia," Tanith started back a tab bit brighter. "What do you want to do in Haggard?"

"See the place," Nadia smiled. "I want to see Valkyrie's old house, and the pier, and the sea. It'll be good to be able to actually see a place that I hear about a lot."

"I wouldn't say 'a lot'," Valkyrie defended.

"I hear about it a bit then, and I want to know what it looks like," Nadia corrected. "And anyway, with my friends coming over this weekend I thought it would be good to see where Valkyrie grew up. Like having inside information on each other or something."

Tanith laughed at Nadia's phrasing and they giggled and joked the rest of the way to her old town and parked by the pier. Seeing as they were already hungry, the family met back up and went on a stroll down the beach to get fish and chip to start. Laila was in her baby wrap snuggled against her father's chest sleeping peacefully. It was her first real outing and Valkyrie made sure to get a cute picture of the two of them. Despite how Ghastly had been acting out recently, he was very sweet and gentle with his baby daughter and it was adorable.

Their lunch was peaceful, sitting on the wall separating the path from the drop down – there was a bench too which Ghastly and Laila sat on to stay safe, but close enough that they weren't excluded – and they ate their haddock and chips. It was only when Nadia nudged her that Valkyrie looked backwards and noticed her cousin.

"Crystal?" She called out. Crystal turned from perusing the menu and spotted Valkyrie and her family. Valkyrie got up and went to greet her.

"Hi Stephanie," Crystal said softly. "I didn't think I'd see you here."

"I didn't think I'd see you," Valkyrie replied and hugged her cousin. "Does this mean you aren't going to uni then or is that still a few weeks away?"

Crystal immediately grimaced. "It starts mid-September, almost on your birthday," she told her. "I've told Mum I'm not going and she's furious, but not as furious as Carol."

"She'll be with her boyfriend though, she should be happy," Valkyrie said, leaning against a lamppost.

"Yeah, they broke up," Crystal said, rolling her eyes. "I didn't like him. I think Dad did a dance when he heard. Except now she's saying that if I don't go, she won't and that means I'm ruining her future. I've been getting so mad with her lately."

"I would too!" Valkyrie agreed strongly. "You do what you need to. You said you had work in place over summer so you're being proactive, right? You're doing exactly what you should."

"That's what I said!" Crystal said passionately. "I'm saving to move to Australia. Mum and Dad don't know yet so don't tell anyone, but everything I'm doing is to move out there. I have an internship organised for January, all I need to do is get a little bit of money together and I'm good, plus I work to support myself which is very different to Carol staying home and not going to uni because she doesn't want to go to class by herself."

"That sounds good, what's the job in?"

"It's just accounting, but I did well in maths and my business classes at college so I thought it would be a good way to move to Australia you know?" Crystal confided. "I don't know if using this to migrate over is good or not, but it's what I'm doing. I don't want to be in Haggard forever."

"No, I'm the same, I'm happy for you. Keep on and you'll be there in no time. Just remember to get your visa sorted."

"Already done," Crystal nodded happily. "Um, I think your girlfriend is coming over."

Valkyrie turned and Nadia was there. She wrapped an arm over her girlfriend and kissed her temple. "Did you ever out ask your friend?" She asked.

"Me? Oh, um, no, I chickened out," Crystal admitted. "She began dating someone in our school that bullied me and we're not even friends anymore. It was all a bit messy."

"I'm sorry," Valkyrie said genuinely.

"Not your fault," Crystal shrugged, smiling again. "Hey, have you seen the new arcade place down the street? It only uses two cents again! The last one had ten cent machines."

Of course, this was something she and Nadia thought would be fun to do, and the others decided to come also, and that meant introductions. Tanith, Ghastly and Laila were easiest because Valkyrie brushed over them as a unit and focused on the baby and Crystal thought she was adorable, of course, and was a great distraction from Ghastly's scarred face. Erskine was polite but way excited for the arcade, and Dexter made Crystal blush enough that Valkyrie was sure she was suddenly way more confused about her sexuality. Dexter was good at making people consider sexuality. A talent, he'd called it in the past.

Herself, Nadia and Crystal fell in line and they walked behind the others to the arcade, everyone being careful to call her Stephanie and not mention anything magical, though it wasn't hard at all. They talked about people in Haggard and they laughed about how they had used to fight as children and admitted the times they had done things to get the other in trouble which Nadia, having grown up almost completely without other children, thought was great. Valkyrie paid for all three of their money which Crystal tried to refuse but Valkyrie got her to comply when she grinned and claimed it was just a little help towards her Australia move.

Together they won a bunch of sweets from the machines, and a few toys, and played a few rounds of table hockey together. Crystal and Dexter doubled as a team against Nadia and Erskine at one point and Crystal had been incredibly good at it despite the fact she was beetroot red and practically squeaked when Dexter nudged his hip against hers cheekily. It was all in good humour though and by the time they left to get snacks, they were all talking like good friends. Valkyrie actually regretted not getting in contact with Crystal specifically because of how well they were getting on.

They went down the high street next, having a good time looking around and getting some nibbles at the corner shop. They stopped so Laila could eat as she had to so much, having their snacks and Crystal trading stories about school and the worst things fellow students had done with Nadia. Sleeping around and getting 'engaged' was a common theme, though all of it was because of how obviously ill thought out all of it was. Still, it was made even better when Dexter and Erskine laughed and chimed in with crazy things that had happened when they were 'deployed with the army', as well as Tanith's own stories which Valkyrie knew for a fact was just things that had happened to Tanith herself and she was just pretending it was to other people in her imaginary school. Ghastly was quiet, and Crystal avoided looking at him at all costs, having been told he'd had an accident in the army causing the scares which she didn't question.

Their bubble was burst eventually when old neighbours, shop keepers and generally people just walking by started recognising Valkyrie for who she was and the gossip spread quicker than Valkyrie thought possible. Walking past the flower shop, the owner came out to greet her.

"Sweet Stephanie," he smiled, his eyes lightening when they landed on her. Valkyrie felt her lips thin and a lot of bad feelings well up. "Well, this is a lovely surprise."

"Hello Mr Hagan," Valkyrie murmured slowly, not wanting to show him weakness. "How are you doing?"

"I'm grand, it's all grand. My sister has cancer now if you haven't heard, do you remember that she ran the wool shop down the street? She's closed down now. Very hard for her children," he nodded. "Is this your family then? We all wanted to know how you were after your mother died, you know Stephanie, she was a wonderful woman."

"I lived with my uncle," she said shortly. "And yes, this is my family now that Uncle Gordon is dead. I'm sorry, but we should keep going, we're only having a short visit."

She went to shepherd her family along, but Mr Hagan held up a hand in front of Valkyrie. It might have looked innocent enough, although perhaps a little rude, but Valkyrie was not stupid enough to not see his hand was directly in front of and barely inches away from her breast. "Would you at least come in for a moment? It would make an old man happy to see how much you've grown up."

Valkyrie was not comfortable, but someone was coming down the street, two men walking their dogs together and they were going into the shop and held their arms open to let her and her family in first and she felt herself move forwards into the building without really meaning to. She cursed herself but decided to just let it happen quickly so they could move along. She kept a grip of Nadia's hand.

"Now, how about this," Mr Hagan said brightly, moving to his counter. "Some flowers for you young ladies, I think, something complimentary."

Mr Hagan, forever keeping up his chattering, charming charade, gave herself, Nadia, Tanith and Crystal a flower each that somehow complimented them, and commented to Tanith how beautiful her baby was while being very opening disgusted at Ghastly. Finally, Valkyrie was able to politely say they needed to go, and her family went for the door.

"Just before you go," Mr Hagan said softly from behind Valkyrie. She turned. "Would you like a sweetie, sweetie?"

Valkyrie's jaw clenched, that phrase lingering unpleasantly in her mind. She didn't make any move, and he just smiled mildly and held the jar to Nadia. "Sweetie?"

Valkyrie, being too rough most likely, wrapped an arm around her girlfriend and restricted her from going near the man and rushed them from the room. She was more than unhappy with the idea of talking about what just happened and snapped at them all to not ask. They didn't, but she could see Crystal was more than concerned and looked pale even. For all Valkyrie knew, Hagan had treated Crystal the same way as herself. She hoped not.


	137. We need to talk

**Chapter 137**

"You're back," Solomon greeted when the group walked back into the front door after their day trip to Haggard.

"Yep," Valkyrie smiled, giving him a hug. "Have you had lunch?"

"Of course," Solomon hugged her back. "I'm not incapable you know."

"Yeah, yeah, I know." Valkyrie took her shoes and coat off and hung both hers and Nadia's coats on the hook. "We saw my cousin on the way and I said I'd invite her over for dinner soon."

"Who's that?" Solomon asked.

"Crystal, one of the _Toxic_ _Twins_ ," she smirked. "She's really nice actually. Her sister seems like a dick, but she's cool."

Solomon nodded and they all went towards the parlour. Laila was ready for another feed – had been since almost the second they had set off home and had cried the whole way back. Tanith had just wanted to get home quickly to do it since it was only a ten-minute drive. Valkyrie had safely managed to get them back in seven minutes. She was a good aunt.

Ghastly was sitting slightly more comfortably with his brothers, and his brothers were acting slightly more kindly towards him. He and Tanith had a short, pleasant conversation while they were out which had helped the situation. There were still some tensions, but it was getting better.

"What's on the agenda next?" Valkyrie asked, looking around the room. They all looked at her, Solomon with a little more confusion seeing as how he hadn't been on the trip. "Don't even start."

"Valkyrie…" Tanith said lowly.

"No," she demanded. "I'm not saying a thing."

"Why not?" Nadia asked quietly. Valkyrie looked at her and she could see the worry, and even fear, in her eyes. She hadn't said anything about Valkyrie roughly removing her from the flower shop, although Valkyrie worried under her jacket that there might be a bruise. She'd only pulled her out of fear of Mr Hagan, but she still felt some guilt that she might have really hurt her girlfriend. She was a whole lot stronger than Nadia after all. "You're making me think the worst."

Valkyrie deflated. "Nothing bad happened, I promise. I just really don't like that man, alright? Really."

Nadia was definitely unconvinced. Looking around, her brothers and Tanith were too. Even Solomon was getting alarmed.

"Look, guys, please. Nothing happened. Nothing will happen. I just hate him, he was a mean guy to me. I'm just, you know, remembering how much I hated him as a child. He told me off once and shouted and I always hated him since. That's all."

"That didn't happen," Saracen quietly said, looking at Valkyrie sadly. "You don't need to lie to us Valkyrie. We're here for you. Always."

Feeling more defensive now, and upset he used his powers to call her out, she just gritted her teeth for a moment before sticking to her story. "There's nothing to talk about. Okay?"

The others seemed reluctant to force her into talking and Valkyrie took that opportunity to move on. They got some tea and split off around the house to do their thing. Valkyrie took a phone call from a member of her detective team on a possibly whereabouts of Skulduggery that had been reported. Valkyrie didn't put much weight on it but sent three of her team to go and have a look from afar.

Solomon found her sitting in the snug looking over some things that had been emailed to her by Tipstaff.

They sat quietly as Valkyrie read over the material, their silence going on for an hour until the sun coming through the window had become orange as it set over the trees behind their house.

"They'll be making dinner soon," Valkyrie commented as she sent back her detailed response on the crime wave and how she was sending detectives to deal with it to Corrival.

"Yes," he replied.

"How are you doing Solomon?" She asked. "We've barely spoken since you've come home."

"We've both been busy," he softly said, holding his hand out for Valkyrie's. She held it. "I am feeling much better now. How have you coped with all that has happened recently?"

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "I'm getting through it. I'd have preferred Skulduggery to have come with us to talk and just get all our answers, to get that part of all this mess finished. But other than that, I am coping. Well, I hate the paperwork part. I don't like being Head particularly much."

"Yes, positions of authority tend to have too much paperwork," Solomon agreed. "I used to have to fill out almost twenty pages of details per child I was petitioning to help each time I asked to interview them about their experiences, and trying to get any type of stand to talk on about the children's troubles in our Temple was almost impossible even if I did go through the correct routes. I could hardly talk to them or about them _without_ going through the proper routes."

"I always wanted to ask you more about that work," Valkyrie said.

"I know," Solomon nodded. "I brushed it off when you came to the Temple to study. Of course, it doesn't matter now because they're all dead."

"Not everyone," Valkyrie softly reminded him.

He was silent for a long pause. "I suppose not. But much of them are. It is mostly the victims of the crimes caused by abused children that died. The abusers living in prison and other Temples are the ones that live. I am struggling, now that the Temple has fallen, to accept this. It is more than unfair."

"It is," Valkyrie agreed. "But as you told me the first time – an abused child doesn't act like a normal adult. You can't hold them any more accountable than they already have been. _They_ didn't destroy the Temple after all. The Spiders did. You can't blame them for the victim's deaths, even if they did a crime that deserves to be punished. I'm hardly the greatest advocate for criminals like _them_ but even I understand that."

He nodded. "I know that. But I still feel as if something unjust has happened to those Necromancers in particular. They didn't deserve this."

"They didn't." Valkyrie closed the laptop and put it on the floor. "But it isn't your fault. You should remember that."

"I do. It simply makes me wish I had spent less time with paperwork and chosen to take action faster than I did. Forced other Temples to put pressure on the Irish Necromancers. Our ability to nurture children has been laughably bad since practically the start of the war. We should have corrected the issue as soon as possible, saved dozens of people pain and others from believing causing pain was their only option."

"Perhaps. But you did lots of work to fix it."

"Yes, I did," he nodded. "But getting others to focus on the problem was so incredibly difficult I took a break at one point. No one wanted to know, and since the first generation seemed to act 'normally' for the first several years they ignored the problems with the second generation of children we brought in. And then we allowed parents to look after their child for the first five years, and then grouped them only for day times, but by the time the child was ten, there were systematic separation techniques used to separate the children. Getting the Temple to even recognise that was always a challenge, even trying to tell the parents was a struggle. I had to take time off from working on it at times. I feel like I could have achieved more, now, if I had focused more pointedly on teaching Necromancers of the problem."

"You could always do that now," Valkyrie suggested. "I bet there are places all over the world that could do with someone like you helping children get proper upbringings."

Solomon nodded quietly, likely considering her words. Valkyrie suspected, though, that he wouldn't want to leave Ireland. She knew that he'd lived with minimal travel in Ireland for centuries. She doubted he'd start now, and her reference was aimed at mage communities in other areas, as he knew.

"You still get to see Laila grow up though," Valkyrie smiled, trying to lighten his mood. "She'll be really lucky to have to teach her and help look after her with the rest of us."

He smiled slightly also. "Yes, I will enjoy that. I've enjoyed seeing you grow, also. And will continue to, I hope."

"Of course you will," Valkyrie grinned. "You get to live with me for the rest of our lives."

He laughed and slung an arm over her shoulder for a hug. "You're a good girl, Valkyrie. I am lucky to know you. A lot of people look up to you now, almost as many who hate you."

"Thanks," she rolled her eyes.

He chuckled. "That's more than alright. You're going to make a lot of change. Perhaps, through you, I can also."

"You can without me, you know. You could make mandatory laws for all mage communities on child protection and education. It would stop people like Necromancers making drastic decisions from happening again. I mean, taking orphans was quite reputable so with some education, I bet you could teach a lot of people on how this entire _operation_ _,_ for lack of a better word, happened. It could be preventative, and positive for all Necromancers. And I bet Corrival would be happy to back that."

Solomon nodded with more conviction this time. "I don't think I'd mind that."

"I'm glad," Valkyrie smiled.

"And what is your goal?" He asked her brightly. "You have so much going on. Tracking down Skulduggery, organising detectives, working as a Dead Man, training, your education, spending time with your girlfriend, your godchild, plans to renovate the house, the Spiders causing trouble, the crime wave, foreign countries trying to get into the Sanctuary. What are you focusing on?"

"Honestly?" Valkyrie said after a deep breath. "Nadia, family and dealing with Skulduggery. The rest will have to be focused on by someone else until I can do it. I have to finish these things before I can start on the others."

"Hmm," he wondered. "I had thought you'd have wanted to focus more on the Spiders."

Valkyrie looked at him for a moment. "I do. But they will only come out when they want too, plus it's a larger job. I'll be better off focusing and finishing the smaller things so we can open up a large number of people to work on the Spiders. I mean, the whole education thing is obviously on the backburner, but I can pick that up later. My home needs to be solid, and the bonds of our family need to be tightened. How can I rely on Ghastly as my brother while I'm still at odds with him about Laila and Tanith? For all of us, it could get in the way of a mission. And with Nadia, if I can't tell her what I think and us be on the same page about everything then we're not setting the example of what I want out of my family, even if they're not or don't continue to be in relationships. A family has to communicate. And at any rate, I'm very serious about Nadia. When we change this house, there's going to be a new dynamic, and if we don't go into it strong, it might not work. And if me and Nadia, the heads of house in a respect, aren't respected as having the final word, it also can't work. I don't really want to have the final word on other people's problems, you know, I mean more like if rules aren't followed then it won't work. Do I just sound like an asshole?"

"Almost all groups of people need a leader to function properly. Previously, Skulduggery took that role in the house, with Dexter having a large say due to his tactical thinking, as well as Ghastly for his rationality. Skulduggery is gone. Ghastly is now considered undependable because of his recent actions. And Dexter, although still tactical, has been emotionally changed by what's happened. I'm certain he can come back from it, but it makes the house dynamics change. Having lived in Temple's my whole life, I'm used to seeing changes make impacts on large groups of seemingly independent people. In fact, I expect you will look more at Anton, Dexter when he is in a better place, and Nadia for the main advice. You are strong enough to do this, them not being around you all of the time would not be a problem."

"So I'm going in the right direction?"

"Valkyrie, sweetheart," he said, turning to look at her fully. "There is no right way forward other than the path you take. I trust your decision. You won't always be right, certainly not for everyone, but I follow wherever you take me. If that's making this family strong, I just want to be by your side."

Valkyrie smiled, her heart clenching with how much she loved him. "Thank you Solomon," she whispered and she wrapped him in a hug. "It's funny actually. Other than my mother, you're one of the best, most responsible parents I've ever had."

He chuckled. "I could never outshine your uncle."

"Yeeeah, Gordon isn't all that responsible if you hadn't noticed. You have him beat on that front," she grinned.

He hummed and pulled her in for another, tighter hug. "Thank you. You've given me more than I thought possible. I promise you, whatever happens with this upcoming war, or with Skulduggery, or any changes to the house dynamics, I will always support you."

Valkyrie kissed his cheek. "You'd be a good dad."

He kissed her back. "I expect to have some say in those house rules you mentioned."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "I'm tempted to say no but being from the Temple and having lived with so many people you probably know best how to help. So yeah, I guess you can. First rule: The Idiots can't make rules."

He grinned, that dimple making its appearance. "Agreed. I'll help Nadia with making a detailed list while you're working. I know she's the one truly in charge anyway."

She rolled her eyes but didn't disagree. "Thanks. I like house stuff but I have way too much going on!" She laughed.

"Just don't forget Nadia's school friends are coming tomorrow at midday."

Valkyrie grimaced. "I'll try to remember."

Solomon laughed. They spent some time talking until they eventually got onto the topic of Skulduggery again. Valkyrie noticed Solomon look unhappy and worried she'd upset him when he randomly got his phone out and handed it to her.

"I think," he told her quietly, "that you might have more of a chance with talking to Mr Pleasant using this. We spoke this morning. Briefly. He's agreed to talk to you."


	138. Until next time

**Chapter 138**

The phone rang. It felt like an hour for Skulduggery to pick up, and Valkyrie honestly didn't think that he would, so when it clicked and the line opened, her heart stuttered.

"Solomon?" Skulduggery quietly said down the line.

Valkyrie swallowed the lump in her throat. "Skulduggery," she croaked out. "It's me."

There was silence for a long time. "Valkyrie."

"Yes." They didn't say anything and Valkyrie licked her lips. "Where are you?"

"I can't say right now."

"What are you doing?"

"Hiding."

"Are you okay?"

"I am," he said slowly, almost surprised. "I am healthy that is. I have all my bones."

"And a hat?"

"Yes, I have a hat," he said, some amusement dripping into his tone.

"Good, good," she nodded. "We need to talk Skulduggery."

"I know," he quietly admitted. "And I have things to tell you. Perhaps you should start."

Valkyrie took a few deep breaths, the silence of the empty room practically deafening. "I just want to know why you did it. I know you saw me."

"I told you, Valkyrie. I saw you and I tried to stop it. But Craven was faster. I can't tell you anything else."

"Why did you help them?"

"I thought I had no other choice. I really am sorry," he said, his smooth voice quiet. "I'm not in a good place Valkyrie. I thought it was my only choice. It was _my_ choice, and I know that it's mine to live up too. But that's my only reasoning behind what I did. I'm sorry."

She wasn't happy, and she didn't agree with him, but she nodded. "Then why did you make Nadia go to the Spiders?"

He was silent for some moments. "I don't know. I honestly don't know. Something in me felt I had to. Even though I didn't want to."

"Is that your only answer?"

"It's the only answer I have."

"Are you sorry?"

"That I sent Nadia into a place I was certain was sure death? Yes. I didn't want to send her. I couldn't even bring myself to tell someone directly. I ran and hid and didn't help even in the slightest to liberate Solomon, let alone help Nadia herself. And I wasn't wholly truthful with what I told Corrival or our brothers before I sent Nadia either."

"What did you tell them?"

"I told them ideas and plans, things I overheard," he told her, his voice becoming rougher with guilt. "Some of it was true, such as the treatment of Solomon and myself, and of who I saw. But I lied about their plans to move. I didn't know where they were going. Though I know they have moved location, and I haven't since worked out where they've gone."

"Okay," she said. She'd have to unpick that with Corrival later. "Can you tell me what it is you found out in the Spider's den then?"

"I can," he said, his voice stronger. "I learnt more on Craven than I knew previously. He is set solely on killing Solomon. He hates him, has a strong vendetta against him. He also hates you, Valkyrie. He wants to pull your life apart from the seams and kill you. He wasn't specific on a plan, but he talked about it a lot. I believe this is why The Torment is keeping him in the fold. The Torment likely wants to use Craven to kill you and Solomon in order to remove enemies, and also to use your deaths to pull the Dead Men further apart. But I doubt they want to waste their own people on risking death trying to kill you both as you are surrounded by Dead Men and the Sanctuary, as well as being dangerous in your own rights. As much as I dislike them, they are not stupid."

"Understood. What else did you learn?"

"I saw Spiders. At least a hundred different mages, all of which I think were Spiders, young Spiders, Spiders in training, from all over the world. I don't know where they're coming from. I never saw the same mage twice other than Craven, the thief Stolen, The Torment and Mist. You met Mist in the Necromancer Temple. She was the woman with The Torment."

"I remember her."

"You should. She seems to be the second in command of the Spiders. I also saw the Wild Brother's, or I did before they took me to the Spiders. I didn't see any of the other places they took me before that, except for Bliss' mansion."

"Yes. You saw the transcripts between Stolen and Bliss. From China."

"I did," he said, utterly unsurprised. It wasn't unexpected that Skulduggery had predicted China having another copy of those files, even if China had been confident in him not knowing so. Or perhaps he was pretending. It was harder to know over the phone. "I think I know how he works."

"Tell me."

"Stolen is South African, I believe. He isn't a Spider but doesn't seem to just be hired help either, although I'm sure he is being paid. It may be that he just wants chaos, he is scared of the Spiders, or that he is attempting to get something out of the winning of the Spiders."

"What could that be?"

"For a thief, I'm expecting either profit within whatever new world the Spiders want to create, or he'd be given a position of authority. Since I also suspect he is an assassin, perhaps he would train more, become The Torment's go-to man for this type of work. Maybe he's been promised help in finding and killing certain people. Top picks on killing mortals."

"I imagine so," Valkyrie agreed. "What about his magic then?"

"He's like China. He uses Signals."

"Oh," Valkyrie frowned. "I didn't think he'd be that."

"Tanith can climb walls," Skulduggery argued. "She picked that believing she would live her whole life as an assassin. Like Tanith, Stolen doesn't have an offensive magic, nor a defensive magic. It's an aid on top of his training to carry out his job."

"So he might have been born into being an assassin."

"Yes. Or, he could have turned after training separately. But I find that unlikely. His intelligence and his ability to invent is what has kept him under the radar. Either he has always been in training or killing professionally, or he's so naturally good at it that he never _got_ training. I am not certain which could be worst. But I still believe it is most likely that he received training."

"I believe you," Valkyrie told him. Was it wrong to believe Skulduggery after he just admitted to lying, as well as him doing so many wrong things? "He made his own Cloaking Sphere?"

"He did. I didn't get a good look at it. He seems to have a lot of gadgets and tools that help him, but I wouldn't say he's a genius. He's not on par with China, for example, or the Monster Hunters with his inventing. He's crude, only knows the minimal of what he needs. I think he is young, certainly after the wartime. I expect he's nearer to Tanith's age, no less than fifty to be in on the Spider's mission so deeply."

"Okay. Do you know what he was sent to get from the Sanctuary?" Valkyrie questioned.

"A box. It's called 'Toute la capacité de puissance', which translates as 'All Power Capacity'. It is believed the full name has been forgotten over time. Essentially it is a Necromancer object, or rather, it is an item of significance to Necromancers. It can only be opened by one, supposedly. As far as I know, Elder Crow did not touch it because she didn't want to become involved in the problem of siding with the Sanctuary or Temple on the issue. Instead, a deal was made that the Sanctuary would not experiment on it and keep it safe. I don't know entirely what is in it, other than the fact that there is something inside which is the real interest."

"So it's Necromancer related. Meaning that's our answer to why they have Craven, right?"

"And why they did their best to kill all the other Necromancers in Ireland. As well as get themselves a few days in the Temple while we couldn't fight them to take whatever information the Temple has on it. With Craven's help, and possibly having tortured it out of the High Priest before he was killed, it's fair to assume they know more about it than we do."

"Okay. God, this is getting confusing."

"You must remember who is on their side, Valkyrie," he told her gently. "Craven, who we now believe is going to be used for opening and using whatever 'Toute la capacité de puissance' is. Noirette Paine, who tortured St. Clare in the Temple some months ago now, also possibly useful in testing this object, or at the least he is someone you never want to meet. I didn't see him in the Spiders hideout but that's not to say he wasn't there. The Wild Brothers, I know there are five inner members, although I know nothing about them. I believe they are re-recruiting their outer members from when they were killed and arrested in Bliss' mansion. I'd then go through whatever material you can find on any Spiders we cannot confirm are dead and just assume they are alive."

"I'd honestly forgotten about Paine."

"I should probably tell you off," he told her lightly, "but there has been a lot going on. And also, I expect I have lost the right to talk to you like that."

"You have, yes," she told him softly. "Is there anything else related to the Spiders or other cases you can tell me about?"

"Connected to the Spiders, no. I don't know any more about anyone with the Spiders, other than confirming that they do, in fact, want to destroy the world as it is. But we already knew that. The only other information is more of gossip, and that is that many young Spiders, mostly girls, are attempting to become the Queen of Spiders. It's not going to work."

"The Torment is traditional."

"He is. That is all I know, however," he said, taking a deep, unnecessary breath. "You have a lot of work ahead of you."

"I do. I think I'll be leaving the Sanctuary," she told him. "I don't want to be a detective like this. I don't enjoy the workload as Head. I'd rather have cases referred to the Dead Men and for me to work on them like that."

"You want to be an Arbiter," he told her. "Someone who picks and chooses, like a bounty hunter, with the ability to travel and do what they want. They don't get paid and don't get regulated. There isn't many left now, officially."

"I just want to get this finished," she said firmly. "I don't care what people call it, I just want to get rid of the Spiders' before there's a war and to be with my family. A part of that includes you, you know."

He was quiet for a long time and Valkyrie almost thought he was gone or wasn't ever going to answer when he finally did.

"I've decided to leave."

Valkyrie couldn't answer immediately. "What does that mean?"

"It means that you're right. I need help, Valkyrie. I need time to work this all out."

"You can do that here. We would help you."

"You could, but it wouldn't be what I need," he softly whispered down the line. "I need professional help. I need a Sensitive. I need to spend time alone to figure out what happened and what I need. I don't want to return and hurt you, or Nadia or Tanith and Ghastly's child. Nobody deserves that."

Valkyrie bit her lip and felt unwanted tears well up. "Where are you going?"

"A place in Africa. I've heard of it before, have suspects and victims occasionally get sent there for help and treatment. They're some of the best at helping with this type of thing."

"What type of thing? I don't think I understand."

"Valkyrie, since I met my brothers three hundred years ago, I've been constantly fighting and working. I have only had a handful of days off in all that time, but I always have a part of my mind on my work. I've always had that drive. And now, suddenly, I've killed and injured hundreds of people because I couldn't think past my own demons. My motivation is gone. My drive to make things better is gone. I need time to work through this."

"Oh," she said, the first tear falling.

"You must understand, I'm not going for fun or a holiday," he told her. "I will be back to help with the Spiders and to live with you and our brothers as my family, so long as I am welcome when that time comes. But I can't do that right now."

"Can I see you first?"

"Valkyrie," he said slowly, drawing her name out. "I've already left."

"Oh," she repeated quietly. Why was this affecting her so much?

"I'm sorry Valkyrie. And I'm sorry to Nadia, especially. And to Tanith and Ghastly for not meeting their baby yet. Tell them I said congratulations, alright?"

"I will."

"And please apologise to our family for how I've acted. I've – well, I've been an awful person."

"Kind of," she forced out.

He chuckled without humour. "I have. And I need you to tell Solomon I'm sorry. I didn't want this for him."

"Why can't you tell them all yourself?"

"This is easier," he said.

"Bullshit. You can't take the easy option out!"

"I know I shouldn't, but I don't know if I'll even leave if I speak with them."

"You already left."

"You know what I mean." Valkyrie was silent. "You deserved better too Valkyrie. I've been an awful guardian to you. I should have done… a lot more for you."

Valkyrie was quiet. She didn't know what to say.

"I'll be in contact, alright? I don't know when." Valkyrie couldn't make herself say anything as tears freely and silently dripped down her cheeks. She was biting her lip hard. "Until next time."

He hung up.


	139. Ghastly, Nadia's friends and house ideas

**Chapter 139**

Valkyrie silently sat, watching her family talk in quiet tones about the information Skulduggery gave her. They were in an office, in the Sanctuary, in Roarhaven - a dark, gloomy office that Valkyrie particularly hated. Her Skulduggery finding team was on the other side of the room on a table silently mulling over the story she'd told, likely angry with her for not trying to bring him in. Meritorious and Corrival had left to talk about their next plan of action. She didn't know if they wanted to pursue Skulduggery and bring him in or if they were going to let him go, but she had a strong suspicion they'd allow him to leave.

Solomon was quiet, holding Laila and not looking at anyone. The knowledge that Skulduggery had cut their relationship in half and left was affecting him, although he'd said at the time that he knew it was coming. Tanith had been angry with him and wanted to track him down, so did Ghastly and all of her Sanctuary team, but Erskine and Anton had been supportive of him going to receive help. Really, she thought the others did too, but they were also upset and angry and that was hard to let go of.

Valkyrie, Saracen and Dexter had been quiet. She didn't know what her brothers wanted, but they had nodded and smiled at her. It didn't seem that they had an opinion more so that they were supporting Valkyrie. She knew whatever she wanted to do, they'd follow. Nadia, quiet on her other side and holding onto her arm tightly, was doing the same. If she didn't feel so shit about everything, she'd be grateful.

Corrival and Meritorious came in and gave their verdict almost an hour after leaving to talk about it privately. They were letting Skulduggery leave for the treatment facility, so long as it was confirmed he went there. They had already sent someone to check and would get in contact with them if he never arrived, in which case they would be tasked to pursue him. But as of that moment, Valkyrie, her family and team were dismissed.

"What a shit day," Amanda, the only female of Valkyrie's Skulduggery hunting team, said.

Valkyrie grunted.

"If it helps, I think you did the right thing."

Valkyrie looked at her as her brothers spoke between themselves. Only Nadia seemed to be listening in. "I thought you wanted him in."

"I did. But the goal was the get him treatment for the torture, right?" Amanda pointed out. "He's getting that."

"If he even goes," Tuppence whined.

"Shut up," Amanda rolled her eyes. "It's not like we did anything to find him."

"You helped a lot," Valkyrie said automatically. "Everyone did. But he was more cautious than I thought he'd be considering how... damaged he is. And I got distracted looking at other cases. It exactly didn't work in our favour."

"Perhaps. But we got what we wanted," Amanda said, finally smiling. "It was good working with you."

"You too. You'll all be going back to regular work by the way. Unless we hear Skulduggery hasn't turned up, this team is disbanded."

Amanda, Tuppence and Grant took their leave with nods and smiles at Valkyrie. They weren't all happy, Valkyrie could see that, but they were polite and didn't give her trouble which Valkyrie appreciated. She also knew that Amanda and Grant had done all the paperwork and taken all the phone calls and read every letter sent to the Sanctuary to do with the case. She decided to herself to do something for the two of them for their help. Could she get them a raise?

Nathanael and Kinsey stuck around a little longer to talk with her brothers, but they too left once Valkyrie promised to call them first if they were going on a world-hopping hunt after Skulduggery. Valkyrie sincerely hoped it wouldn't come to that.

All she had to do now was quit.

.*****.

Ghastly came over that evening and they had a family meal that actually went well – Tanith even enjoyed her first proper meal since she was six months pregnant and got to sit at the table and eat and laugh without feeling ill while Ghastly got to let his dinner go cold as he bottle fed his baby. It was cute to be fair, and Ghastly didn't mind at all by the way he was smiling at Laila.

Together, they watched a television program and after they all had ice cream and tea before going to bed. Ghastly offered, stupidly, to take Laila for the night and, smirking evilly, Tanith batted her eyelids and gave him the baby and told him to get on with it. He, having never looked after his child alone before, looked excited and ready to do it. Valkyrie had to admire how much he loved the girl, but he had not spent enough time with her and was not prepared to do a full night. Even Valkyrie struggled with just a few hours alone and she knew how to change a nappy and what Laila's cries meant. Ghastly didn't.

Still, the family grinned and left him to it. This was both revenge and a wakeup call for poor Ghastly.

Morning proved them right. All of them were well rested and Tanith had woken up early and went on a short walk around the house for exercise – she couldn't do much yet but was improving – before going to Ghastly and taking Laila. Tanith had reported to them that Ghastly had been pale, looked as if he had cried and had stains on his clothes, and had been very quiet when he handed Laila off before passing out on the sofa.

Maybe it was mean, but they laughed. Tanith was gleeful and had also told them that she had gotten a phone call that morning over going to her first baby care class that day. She was going to take Ghastly.

Valkyrie was happy for them, but even more so she was happy for Laila. Yeah, her father had been an idiot, but she knew that was mostly because he was delusional about his responsibilities more so than uncaring or unwilling - if he was the latter he never would have been so good with Valkyrie growing up.

She and the family cleaned the house all over, setting up a large room at the back for later that day for when Nadia's friends arrived, and Ghastly woke up at midday with just enough time to clean himself, change and eat before he drove with Tanith and Laila to the class.

With them gone, Valkyrie and Nadia had spent some time alone, talking about who was coming mostly, before they left for the airport.

"They're landing now," Nadia told her from where they were sat in arrivals.

"Just a few hours left then," Valkyrie stretched.

"Don't whine. We'll get food after this," Nadia demanded. "They're hungry."

Valkyrie smiled and put a hand on Nadia's leg. "Calm down, baby. You're getting stressed."

She huffed. "I'm not stressed."

"I think you are," Valkyrie teased.

"You are not helping," Nadia gritted out.

"Well at least you're admitting it," Valkyrie said cheekily before catching Nadia in a kiss. They both heard the three old ladies gasp and begin muttering angrily, making them giggle. They kissed again and again until the women huffed loudly and strutted away, muttering about children these days. Grinning to each other, they pulled apart.

"Mission accomplished," Valkyrie grinned.

Nadia rolled her eyes. "Annoying old bats isn't meant to be fun."

"I meant that I made you happy."

Nadia laughed. "Shut up, you. Come on then, have you memorised my friend's names yet?"

"I think so. Bedrooms of ten are stupid by the way."

"I know. You've said it, like, twenty times."

"Yeah, well, it's true. You've told me all the ins and outs too. Rebecca was one of the girls, but she's not coming, and you've told everyone why and the others are gushing all over you and saying they love you. Of the other eight there's Charlotte from America, Fleet from Australia and Prema is from Sri Lanka. Those three knew each other growing up because their mothers grew up together. Lian is half Chinese, half French. She's one of those mages that knows all languages, right?"

"That's her magic, yes," Nadia confirmed.

"Yeah. And then there's Tara, Vasuda and Zainab who were all born and raised in India."

"Yes."

"But they didn't know each other before coming to this school. And lastly there's Dhiya–"

"Dh _ee_ a!" Naida corrected her. "God, you can't shake her hand and say, 'hello D _i_ a!'"

"Sorry, sorry! I meant Dhiya. With an _ee_ sound. I am trying."

"I know. I'm sorry, I just want this to go well."

"It's okay," Valkyrie forgave. "Did I get them all though?"

"Yes. Oh, I got a text," Nadia said and checked her phone. "They're almost through security! I'm so excited Valkyrie!"

Valkyrie tried to calm her down but it was no use and Nadia shot up from her seat when the girls came through the door and they all jumped and squealed together.

"I missed you so much!" They all kept repeating.

Valkyrie stood, not entirely sure what to do other than smile and look pretty and hope they would like her. After getting in the way of at least thirty people, the girls all began moving through the hall as one large mass towards Valkyrie.

"Valkyrie!" Nadia said excitedly, like she had just remembered her existence. Valkyrie refrained from rolling her eyes at her girlfriend. "Guys, this is my girlfriend Valkyrie. Val, this is Charlotte–" a tan, slightly larger girl with light brown hair, soft eyes and a pretty smile "–Prema–" a dark-skinned beauty with a few shallow pockmarks on her cheeks "–Dhiya–" a small lipped, long-nosed, incredibly overexcited girl with a neon orange headscarf "–Fleet–" a blonde, blue-eyed tall girl who looked strangely like a mix of Valkyrie, Dexter and Tanith in all the best ways "–Tara–" the ends of her hair were dyed blue "–Zainab–" who was impossibly pale, accentuated with her dark, perfectly drawn eyebrows, and also wearing a headscarf but in a different fashion to Dhiya "–Lian–" who was the perfect mix of her parents, with Asian, impossibly smooth skin, light green eyes, dark curly hair with what Valkyrie thought could be red highlights, and narrow cheekbones "–and this is Vasuda." Vasuda was the shortest, and very broad shouldered. She had an arm around Nadia and Valkyrie could immediately sense that Vasuda did _not_ like her.

The girls waved and said their hello's one by one, except for Vasuda who, using the hand that wasn't around Nadia's waist, shook Valkyrie's hand. Valkyrie made sure to clench the girl's hand just a little more than she should have and some of the nasty look went away to be replaced with caution. What did this girl think she could do to Valkyrie? Steal Nadia away? Valkyrie didn't like how she was holding Nadia, but she was more than confident in her relationship and since Nadia was blissfully unaware of any of this, Valkyrie looked the girl in the eye and smirked.

Vasuda didn't look so confident anymore. Good.

"How was your trip?" Valkyrie asked pleasantly, drawing her attention away from Vasuda like nothing happened.

"It was excellent!" Dhiya excitedly said. "We went first class!"

"It was a good trip," Fleet agreed in a calmer way.

"The food was awful," Vasuda complained.

"We're going to get food now," Nadia said quickly. "I've made reservations at this Italian restaurant not far from Valkyrie's house. We ordered cars, they'll take your luggage home."

The girls, including Vasuda, looked suitably impressed with this discussion and complimented Nadia on the surely expensive choice but Nadia just directed the compliments to Valkyrie. The girls giggled and some of them pretended to swoon to mock Nadia, but she took it with good graces and Valkyrie could only grin as Vasuda got more upset that Valkyrie was being nice.

They were split between two smaller cars for the trip to the restaurant, which had been done to accommodate the eight suitcases. The trip there was full of happy talking between Nadia and the girls in their car, so Valkyrie was free to be quiet and listen in from the passenger seat next to the driver. At their destination, the drivers opened doors and they continued into the building, the two groups merging into one large, gossiping mass.

"Good afternoon," a smiling waitress greeted Valkyrie. The group travelled slower behind. "Do you have a renovation?"

"Yes, name Cain?"

"Ah, yes, you booked in this morning," the waitress said, looking down her list to mark off their arrival.

"My girlfriend did, yes. I hope they're not too loud," Valkyrie said just as the girls walked into the front entrance laughing loudly over something. The waitress just shook her head in a 'that's alright' way and led them through to their table at the back.

The group was slightly quieter as they took their seats, Vasuda was still next to Nadia as Valkyrie expected, with Dhiya on Nadia's other side and the others just mixing around the table. Valkyrie got a seat opposite Nadia which was better than she had expected.

"Do you young ladies know what you'd like to drink?" The waitress asked when they'd settled.

"Could we please," Valkyrie started before anyone else got a word in, "get some jugs of water with ice and lemon for the table?"

"Of course," she replied, writing that down.

"And then I'd love some cherry lemonade," Valkyrie finished and gestured to Nadia. They went around the table ordering drinks, and the waitress made quick work of getting them all out to the table as conversations began again. Valkyrie ordered some bread for the table, and they all ordered off of the short lunch menu, Valkyrie and Nadia choosing the same goat's cheese, roast vegetable pie.

"So, Valkyrie," Prema said from beside her. Valkyrie looked at her with a smile, trying to make friends. "Tell me what living with the Dead Men is like!"

Valkyrie laughed. "It's great. My brothers are wonderful people, most of the time, and we get on very well. Dexter and Anton are great cooks, Saracen can always help find the stuff we drop behind the sofa. We get on really well."

"I heard a Necromancer live with you," Vasuda cut in. The girls, including Nadia, looked at her as if she'd been rude but then they looked at Valkyrie curiously.

"Yes, Solomon Wreath live with us too. He is, or was, Skulduggery's boyfriend. They've split up and Skulduggery is receiving psychiatric help at the moment. Solomon has done a lot of work with children in the Temple and, since the Temple is gone and I was formerly his apprentice, we decided he could stay with us. We get on really well. He's like a father to me."

Charlotte nodded sympathetically. "I heard that you'd lost a lot of family before. I'm glad you get to have Solomon as your father."

The girls agreed and Valkyrie felt she had taken a step towards friendship with them.

"What's it like living with Dexter Vex?" Fleet grinned.

Valkyrie snorted a laugh along with the rest of the table. "He's funny and very sweet," she said, knowing Fleet didn't care about that one bit. "As I said, he's a good cook and loves food. Him and Saracen are dating right now."

Fleet's grin widened when she mentioned Saracen. She asked what he was like.

"He's great but likes to mess with us. Sometimes he'll talk like he _knows_ things, you know, but he doesn't at all and we go searching around the house for whatever we were looking for and he laughs at us when we confront him about it. He thinks it's hilarious."

Nadia rolled her eyes. "You know that's not what she wants to know."

Valkyrie grinned at Nadia. "Yeah, but this is funnier. Anyway, they're at home, so Fleet has lots of time to drool over them later. I'll make sure to introduce you."

Fleet was more than satisfied with that and didn't care less that the others laughed at her. Valkyrie turned the questions around, asking them about what their lives were like, but it kept being sent back to her as they were only interested in what it was like to work as a detective, and what she had to do to get so strong, and ask if it was true that Ghastly had a daughter. She answered them all as honestly and usually in as few words as possible so it wouldn't seem like she was hogging the conversation. Still, they seemed happy with what she did say and Valkyrie saw Nadia get more comfortable as it continued. The food came out in good time and conversation stopped for that, and there were mostly mutterings of good food for a while. Nadia was drawn into a conversation about what some friends had done over summer as well as ask her what she planned to do with the school year starting in two weeks, but Nadia didn't answer what she was doing, just smiled and continued eating.

Valkyrie paid for their meal when they were all done and ready, and they took the cars to Valkyrie's house. The girls were all complimentary of the mansion, although they all agreed it was foreboding which led to an easy discussion about renovations.

Inside the house, the suitcases had been taken up to the room the girls were staying in and they all went up to there first. The girls were all jet lagged but insisted they'd be fine and talked instead about what Nadia intended to do with the house and if they'd have a proper parlour room, if Nadia would have an office, and what about a library, and some nonsense about a cat room. Valkyrie whispered for Nadia to come down when they were settled for drinks and left them to catch up.

Downstairs, Valkyrie stretched, her back clicking.

"How is it?" Solomon asked, buttering some bread at the kitchen counter.

"Good, I think," Valkyrie told him, sitting at the bar. "They're all interested in how life is living with the Dead Men and they didn't really talk to me about Skulduggery. I told them about you living here and they actually seem happy that you are, because I said you're like a father to me."

Solomon smiled fondly at her and abandoned his sandwich in favour of a hug. "You're a good girl."

"I know," she grinned, giving him a kiss on the cheek. They separated. "Do you know when Tanith and Ghastly are back?"

"Not for another hour I think."

"It's getting late."

"It's a long drive," he told her. "And a three hour and a half course."

"Well, it's almost five," Valkyrie said. "The girls are making plans to change the house. Apparently they think there's going to be a cat room. What does that even mean?"

"It's a room in which there are platforms around the walls, bridges between the walls, sometimes cat flaps into other rooms, and toys, food and beds for pet felines," Solomon told her, going back to his sandwich. "I imagine Nadia will want one."

Valkyrie huffed. "She can't get a cat."

"She can."

"She can't. I want a dog."

"Well, she did help you recover. She even talked to me when I was at Kenspeckle's. So, she probably deserves it," Solomon told her, looking over with a smirk.

Valkyrie glared. "That's not fair."

He laughed and walked out of the kitchen.

Valkyrie just huffed and sulked before finding Erskine and informing him that he'd be working on house plans a lot later and that he would have to make notes. He had smiled knowingly and got out his notebook which he had been writing down ideas and inspiration in over the last month in which they had been thinking about changing things. Valkyrie never saw him without it these days.

"What are you guys doing then?" Valkyrie asked, closing the bedroom door behind her.

"Waiting for your girlfriend and your girlfriends' girlfriends to start looking for us," Dexter grinned. "I mean, it's only a matter of time."

"I'd say you're up yourself, but you're unfortunately right," Valkyrie said, jumping on the bed with the other three. "What ideas have you and Nadia even come up with?"

"The outside is set," he told her. "She said it was along the lines of what you told her, and it's pretty modern. Anton said we can't decide on the kitchen until he's here, and he's working all the time so that hasn't happened. But we're doubling the space. In total, there's going to be less rooms downstairs, but there's going to be more room per room. We've had a think about floor planning upstairs, but we've been arguing about it."

"What? Why?"

"We can't decide if we should make an addition," he whined. "We don't have the room for a library at the moment if we want ballrooms, and we want ballrooms. _And_ if we want a formal dining room for parties and an informal dining room for every day attached to the kitchen, we can't fit expanding the garages. Having an extension with a big library would fix that and it would mean we don't need an office corridor like we were planning before because we can have desks in there, so we technically save space."

"You want a three-story expansion and you think it saves space?"

"Well it does in a way," Saracen chimed in. "If this is going to be the last big, real do-over of the house, we may as well make it right. And for the number of apartments plus guest rooms we need, we'll be using all three of the upper floors. The larger basement we never go in can be food storage and for weapons since it'll have concrete all around. Alongside a larger kitchen, larger laundry room, two dining rooms and the large meeting room at the front of the house which will also be made larger, there is no more room."

Valkyrie pouted. "Why are you making sense? This costs money you know."

Saracen snorted. "We spoke to Gordon about it while you were out. I don't think you'll be in too much trouble if we add a tiny extension, so long as we give him a proper room with a sofa for visits. His rule."

"How tiny is the expansion?"

"Three stories and about the size of the larger ballroom," Dexter said. Valkyrie looked at him like he was insane. "Except it's not that big. It's bigger."

"How many fucking books do you want?!"

Dexter laughed. "It's a mansion, Valkyrie! And anyway, there's so many of us in this house we need the space! I mean, Ghastly will need a shop here to have enough time to be with Laila, we need a kids area for Laila to have more room which may eventually be an apartment of her to live here too, and Tanith has already text Erskine saying she wants to home school Laila!"

"Oh my God, how is this all going to fit?"

"By expanding for the library!" Saracen laughed. "It'll double as office space. Plus we'll be using all three of the upper floors rather than just the one we've been limiting ourselves to for years."

"But we were going to put offices in the apartments."

"We thought that was stupid," Erskine said offhandedly. "No one will use them, except maybe Ghastly, and he'd only use it for sewing. We thought we'd give him a staircase in his rooms so he could have a sewing room under his proper rooms."

"And where's that going to go?"

"In the house, obvious," Erskine said back. Valkyrie glared at him but he just grinned. "Come on, trust us Val! We know what we're doing."

"I'm sure you do, but I'm worried you're going to take on too much and it'll be a mess," Valkyrie said.

"Would you like to see the plans?" Valkyrie nodded and he got up and brought over a giant binder almost the size of her and flipped it over to 'Ground Floor'. She stared at it, trying to make out if she should laugh or cry. The left had the ballrooms as it currently did but behind them at the back of the house was no kitchen, back door, storage or laundry, it was a large area that seemed to be dedicated to being a hallway. When she asked, Erskine explained it would be an orangery, a room filled with plants, sofas and pretty things to make it both a useful space _and_ a corridor. It could lead to the outside entertainment area, the library expansion on the left and the giant new kitchen on the right. It would be practical for them - especially if they put herbs in there - plus it would look good for their parties if they wanted people to be able to get to the outside and library from the ballrooms and the formal dining room without them seeing all the behind the scenes cooking.

Valkyrie loved the idea because it seemed extravagant and she loved the concept of an orangery.

She looked over at the library. It was like her rectangular house had another square attached, overlapping slightly at the corners. Valkyrie wasn't even sure what to say about it as it was just so crazy to add on so much more space to her literal mansion and just looked around further.

The large kitchen was open plan with the informal dining room and at the end of the dining room was a door leading to a large room that could be used as a 'child room'. That meant it was for Tanith to decide if she wanted it to be a playroom or school room or anything else she came up with. That was the back section of the house. The area between the stairs at the front and the kitchen dining area at the back – the middle of the house – included four rooms. The formal dining room which was really big. A large toilet room, the largest downstairs and intended to be used when they had a big party. Gordon's room. And finally, a laundry room that was three times its previous size.

The stairs, as well, were different. Right now it was one very large staircase in the middle of the entry room. They planned on taking that down and making two curved staircases on either side of the entry to make a real balcony and make the split down the house right in the centre rather than with two corridors as it currently was. It was much more space efficient for downstairs and certainly would be grander and more elegant rather than obnoxiously. The balcony took up a bit of space but since they were spreading out the house better now, it wasn't that bad and looked amazing.

The right of the house was more familiar. There would still be garages, this time with an extra two doubles. This reduced the space they had left inside the house but would be much more fun to have those garages. There would no longer be a snug, or the current most used downstairs toilet. Instead, they'd extend the meeting room so that there would be doors leading to it in the parlour, which was otherwise the same shape and space. Valkyrie could already see herself using the parlour and meeting room regularly. The informal living room and old dining room was being turned into a television room and normal family sitting area. The parlour was going to get doors on all sides and be kept as a ' _do not touch under threat of death_ ' area. Erskine was threatening them with white sofas.

She left out a breath. "This is a lot of new stuff."

"Yeah, but I think it's better," Erskine said, a little doubt coming into his voice now.

"No, I think it's more practical," she told him. "It cuts off the formal rooms from access so we can't get into them so much, and it'll suit our needs better. But it's a lot of work."

"I know," he nodded, glad to have her approval. "You haven't even seen the apartments yet."

Valkyrie groaned but smiled. To be fair, they weren't bad. They had taken into account all the different family member's needs. Corrival's rooms were nearest the front of the building where he'd be happiest and they were modest as he'd want, plus them being smaller worked nicely since he had his own entire mansion to go to if he wanted some space whilst still giving him a permanent place in their family home.

Tanith's apartment was opposite his room and they were much larger and had some extra rooms for guests such as her brother. Ghastly's sewing area was on the first floor also, although somewhat small. Saracen had a rather small apartment of his own too, but it seems to be mostly unplanned and as he said he didn't plan on using it. The last apartment was much, much larger, taking over almost half of the first floor ground space by itself. That was for her and Nadia.

"This is too big!" She said immediately.

"You and Nadia should have the space," Dexter told her more seriously. "You have personal access to the library and there's a secret door in your apartment with a spiral staircase going down to the living room, exiting behind a fake bookcase – I thought you'd like that. You share a real office that you two will actually use, you get two guest bedrooms and you both have walk-in wardrobes."

"That bathroom is insanely huge."

Dexter shrugged. "Nadia wanted a walk-in shower."

"How far does she want to walk? I could go for a freaking hike in there! It's massive!"

"Valkyrie, you own a mansion. Act like it," Saracen admonished.

Valkyrie's mouth snapped shut. How was she meant to respond to that? She changed the subject. "Where are the guest rooms?"

"Normal guest rooms are off to the side above the ballrooms. It just worked with the space to do that. And on the other two floors," Erskine turned the page to the second and third floor side by side illustrations, "the rest of us fit."

Sure enough, he showed her the apartments for Dexter, Solomon, Skulduggery, Erskine and Ghastly. Ghastly's was slightly smaller than the others to make up for his sewing room below, and Solomon's was also small as per his request. Skulduggery's was fairly large, with a large walk-in wardrobe area. Valkyrie was almost surprised he had an apartment but knew it was because they couldn't bear to imagine life without Skulduggery. Valkyrie tried not to think about it. Other than that, there were some out of the way things such as a cinema room, secret weapon rooms and some other spaces not yet decided.

"It looks good," she told them.

"We thought so too," Erskine grinned. "Anton still wants to look it over for 'practicality', whatever that means. We're also undecided on a few things so they could all change. I really want to fit in a pool and a gym."

"Practicality is probably a good idea," she said.

"Yeah, probably. But I like it as it is too. It's splendiferous."

Valkyrie laughed as her phone buzzed and she checked it. "Come on then. Nadia demands our presence."


	140. Jealousy

**Warning NSFW content**

* * *

**Chapter 140**

" _Good_ evening ladies," Dexter smiled as he strutted into the parlour.

Valkyrie followed behind, shaking her head. He was only messing, she knew, but at the same time, it was sort of embarrassing. Maybe that was the point, Valkyrie pondered.

"Hi Dexter," Nadia responded. She was smirking slightly, looking at her friends, especially Fleet, who seemed as if she might combust. "How was your morning?"

"It was lovely thank you," he said, throwing an arm around Saracen in the most casual way. Fleet knees shook. "We've been going over house plans with Valkyrie. She claimed you don't need a large wardrobe."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "It's the size of a bedroom."

"It's perfect," Nadia said snootily.

"It's ridiculous."

"But the point is, she's given us the go ahead!" Dexter grinned and Fleet squealed.

Valkyrie had to roll her eyes. "Okay, that's enough. Stop torturing her."

Dexter laughed, which immediately made Fleet giggle, let Saracen go and stuck his hands in his pockets. "Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you."

"Oh my God," Valkyrie muttered, sitting on the sofa with a huff.

Charlotte sat neatly next to Valkyrie. "It's alright. She's always like this."

Nadia snorted a laugh. "Yeah, an embarrassment."

The girls laughed and teased Fleet, but she took it all with a laugh and even made some jokes back until they were all comfortable, even the men who had sat around with them. They spoke for a while on the plans the girls had, which included an early night because they were all tired from their travels and wanted to acclimatize to the country quickly, and that they planned on going to Dublin, having 'at least one meal out a day' and a few other activities over the next four days they were there. For the week they were staying, today only counted as a travel day, then there were the four days they talked about and on the sixth day they were travelling home. It would be a tough week for Valkyrie because she was already so used to curling up in bed with Nadia, but she was also glad Nadia got to have time with her friends. At any rate, she had to finish her own plans while all that was going on, so she wouldn't be a part of much of those activities.

"Should we order in then?" Dexter asked, snapping Valkyrie from her thoughts.

The girls quickly agreed and Erskine was quick to throw the menus they had on the table. Valkyrie sent a text to Tanith and Solomon and a few minutes later – the girls were distracted with arguing about a takeaway claiming to serve both Chinese and Cantonese and questioning if it _could_ be authentically both while serving what seemed to be only typical Chinese takeaway – the two walked in with little Laila.

"I am starving," Tanith stated and almost threw herself onto the ground to look over the menus. "What are we thinking of?"

The girls looked up from their argument and all immediately awed at the child. Valkyrie, who had quickly stolen her godchild, faced the baby to look at them.

"She's so cute!" Charlotte squealed. Being seated next to Valkyrie, she was the closest and got to stroke Laila's cheek. "I love her."

Valkyrie laughed. "Yeah, she's pretty cute. And I think we're having some of everything, Tanith. They can't decide."

"We can," Nadia said.

"No, you can't. It's okay to order from more than one place you know."

"No, it's rude," Nadia argued.

"No, it's not. Just get the Indian and the Chinese. It's not that hard."

Tanith chimed in that she wanted the Chinese and, although it took about an hour, Valkyrie was finally able to phone and order to the three takeaways the various things they wanted. Tanith was able to report about her trip with Ghastly too. It had been good, if a little awkward, and they had been congratulated for going to the class together even though they weren't together. Then Ghastly had been told off for not doing enough before getting some sympathy for his night alone which had helped his case it seemed. Tanith had got to learn some new ways to feed and burp Laila that could help with her reflux, and they worked out a little routine to help both Tanith's confidence as a mother and also Ghastly's bond as a father with his daughter. It was an achievement in Valkyrie's eyes and she was happy to see how enthusiastic Tanith was to learn more. It was far from the crying mess she'd been a few days ago and that was what mattered the most.

In fact, Tanith and Valkyrie hid from the group and waited it out in the hall for the food. The girls were too loud for them, and Laila seemed happier in the quiet also. When it arrived forty-five minutes later, all three carriers came at once and it was taken through to the parlour.

"Finally!" Erskine cheered over the girls. "I am so hungry."

Valkyrie practically threw it on the coffee table and it was attacked as if by savages. When the rush died down, Valkyrie and Nadia shared a smile and filled their plates.

Not long after the food came, the decision of what film to watch that night came. Valkyrie stayed out of that but it was an easy choice it seemed. They chose a romantic comedy. Valkyrie rolled her eyes and the Idiots cheered and very quickly Valkyrie was being pulled by an overly excited Nadia to their bedroom to change into their pyjamas.

"I'm so happy!" Nadia squealed, jumping onto Valkyrie.

Valkyrie picked her up and went to the dresser. "Are you sure you need more sugar?"

"Stop being pessimistic," Nadia grinned. "Aren't you enjoying this?"

"I am," Valkyrie admitted, kissing Nadia on the lips. "You taste like sweet and sour sauce."

"It's what I ate," Nadia rolled her eyes. "I'll brush my teeth. What are you wearing?"

"Clothes."

"Don't be irritating," Nadia warned and Valkyrie grinned cheekily at her. She pulled out a long-sleeved top and trouser set and got the approval. Quickly, she changed and turned to see Nadia in shorts also and a small, thin, low cut top without any sort of padding.

Now, Valkyrie didn't believe in telling her girlfriend what to wear. In fact, she liked what Nadia was wearing and Tanith had ingrained nipple power into her since she was twelve so that would never been an issue for her. But she had a suspicion that one certain other girl might also like Nadia in that top and that made Valkyrie hesitate.

"What is it?" Nadia asked, suddenly unsure.

Valkyrie cursed internally. "Nothing baby. You look good."

"You look upset."

"I'm not, don't worry." Nadia didn't stop looking worried. "Look, I just think that your pyjamas are a tinsy tiny bit, you know… revealing."

"What? How?" Nadia asked, looking down. "I wear these all the time."

Valkyrie had to check herself again because, if she thought about it, Nadia probably had. In India it was probably really hot and pyjamas like that were probably common, especially by a girl that grew up in cold little Ireland. So that meant all the girls wore them and Valkyrie was just going to sound like a dick if she continued with her narrative.

"I'm sorry," Valkyrie said, shaking her head and smiling. "You look great, alright? And I love you."

Nadia hesitated but then decided to believe her and kissed Valkyrie instead. "You don't have to wear that either you know."

"Around you, maybe. But I don't want to give your friends nightmares."

Nadia was confused for a moment and then suddenly remembered the scars on Valkyrie's wrists, ankles, thighs and collar bone, as well as the mess of her stomach, and closed her mouth. Instead, she kissed Valkyrie deeply until Valkyrie had forgotten all about the girls and was pushing Nadia back towards the bed. They fell onto it and Valkyrie was kissing Nadia feverously while Nadia grinded against her abdomen. Nadia kept her head a little better and giggled into Valkyrie shoulder, or she did until Valkyrie sucked on her neck and she began to moan.

They were interrupted by a knock on the door.

"My ladies!" Saracen's voice boomed from the other side. "It fills me with regret to inform you that you have guests waiting."

Nadia went bright red and Valkyrie called out an "Okay, we're coming," before looking Nadia in the eye and twisting them so Nadia sat on her lap. "I love you."

"I love you too Val," Nadia said quietly.

"Whispering doesn't stop Saracen from knowing," Valkyrie grinned.

"Yeah, but I can pretend," Nadia said, cracking a smile and hiding her face in Valkyrie's neck. "I feel like he walked in on us or something. Oh my God, Val."

Valkyrie just laughed. She wasn't embarrassed, and she knew Saracen wasn't. She assumed that by the time she was four hundred the simple idea of someone having sex, or just kissing for that matter, wouldn't embarrass her either. "We should go and see your friends though. They might start without us."

Of course, as soon as she and Nadia walked into the room at the back that was filled with mattresses, pillows and blankets all over, Dexter, Saracen, Erskine and Tanith all smirked at Valkyrie. She stuck her tongue out at them. The others didn't catch this exchange at all and gave Nadia her share of the sweeties and chocolates they had.

They ended up watching two movies in the end before the girls decided it was bedtime. Her family went off to bed, and within ten minutes, Valkyrie heard the soft breathing of all nine girls.

It was unexpected of course, but Valkyrie was grateful for the quiet at least. She rolled over in her corner of the room so she was facing Nadia and smiled gently before closing her eyes and falling asleep.

**.*****.**

Valkyrie was woken the next morning by her phone buzzing on her belly where it had ended up under her body in the night. No one else heard and after establishing it was only half six in the morning, Valkyrie very carefully and quietly left the room.

Running on seven hours of sleep felt good, and quite unusual to Valkyrie. She usually got half that or overslept out of exhaustion. She shook her head at herself, trying to shake all forms of badness from her mind and simply be happy at this moment now rather than what happened before. She had a lot to do that day and waking up early after a surprisingly good sleep was a blessing. She went straight to her bedroom and after deciding what to wear – a t-shirt, light jacket and jeans – she took a quick shower, got her hair dry with the drier, missed having magic to dry her hair, told herself off for feeling bad about little things again and got dressed. A quick breakfast, a cup of coffee and she was on her bike to Roarhaven.

She parked out the very front of the building and got down to find Tipstaff at the front of the building.

"Detective Cain," he smiled at her. "What do I owe for the pleasure of seeing you so early in the morning?"

"Coffee and Corrival texting me about my department again," she told him, leaning against the wall as he did something with some papers. "Why are you up so early?"

"I sleep when the Elders sleep," he told her.

"So, never," she nodded. He gave her a smile. "Do you know where my Pa is right now?"

"You'll find Elder Deuce in his office, he has had his morning tea, but I should warn you he is not in a good mood."

"I'll tell him off for you," she said and went off to Corrival. He was indeed in his office and was indeed in a bad mood.

"Why can't they shut up?" He said as a way of greeting. "Damn children, the lot of them."

"I find that offensive," Valkyrie stated and sat down on the other side of his desk. "However, I have found a solution."

He watched her, hand resting on his teacup. He looked like he knew she was going to say something bad. "What?"

"I'm resigning."

He took a long time to answer, perfectly still. "Resigning?"

"Yes, sir. I no longer wish to have my position as Head, nor as a Detective of this Sanctuary. I am resigning all powers and responsibility. I merely wish to remain working alongside the Dead Men against national, and international, threats."

Very slowly, Corrival took a drink of his tea and set it back down, staring at Valkyrie the whole time. Then he spent a moment observing her before continuing. "This is your final decision?"

"Yes. I want to appoint Amelia in my stead, who has been on the team for seventy years, been constantly loyal and, when on my team to find Skulduggery, she was one of the few that did not act wrongly when I was absent from work. She is also well known and well-liked by the department which will hopefully ease some of the unrest and complaints," Valkyrie told him in a steady voice. "I am happy to complete any outstanding paperwork before the transition can take place."

Corrival looked at her, unimpressed, and pressed a button on his phone. It beeped. Nothing else happened and Valkyrie and Corrival waited in complete silence until, five minutes later, Meritorious came in. He was also sombre and stared at Valkyrie as he went around the desk and took a seat beside Corrival. "What has happened?" He asked.

"She's resigning."

"Resigning?" Meritorious asked flatly, stating at her with more scrutiny.

"You two have the same expression, did you know that?" She observed. "Honestly, I don't think this is a bad choice. I don't want to put in the hours I need to, and I haven't done so. I haven't kept on top of paperwork. I've barely spent more than two hours total with any of the staff and I haven't paid more than a few hours attention to what's happening in the country as a whole. Amelia is a good choice for Head, and I'd still be able to take some cases, but not for a few years, certainly not until after the Spiders are dealt with. I'll still be working with the Dead Men of course."

"You are the Dead Men," Meritorious stated boldly. "No one cares for any of them any more except for you, unless they're a criminal that doesn't want to get caught. The public enjoys seeing a young face, they want to hear of your success and work, not of you resigning."

"Well, the public will have to suck it up," she informed him. "I am resigning whether you, Corrival, the Sanctuary or any person in the world cares. I want to spend time with my goddaughter, to work on my relationship and to have friends. I want to see my family for more than a few hours a week! I get that keeping the public happy is important but so is what I want and that's that."

Corrival sighed. "That may be, but we have other Sanctuary's on our doorstep–"

"And I have a plan for that," Valkyrie said, cutting him off. "Send the Dead Men to those countries. We'll help them so you can satisfy them for some time, and then when they forget about us and come back to you, so will we and by then I expect the Spiders will be quite ready as well and with any hope everything will happen smoothly with fixing the Spiders and the other Sanctuaries quite nicely."

"Bullcrap," Corrival snapped, eyebrows drawn together. "The Spiders will come out when the Dead Men are gone."

"On the contrary, they want the kill the Dead Men in very specific, wonderful ways, they will only come out for us."

"They haven't just come out for Dead Men before and you know it," Meritorious snapped.

"Haven't they? They attacked the Necromancy Temple where me and Solomon was, and what are me and Solomon? Great ways to draw the Dead Men out as an easy shot. And the Sanctuary, most of us where here, and at the very least, it was a terrorist move to kill as many people as possible. Plus, having minimal connections to the Sanctuary may help the chances of it happening again."

They both looked at each other with disbelieving looks and back at her.

"Look, you can think what you want, but that's my wonderfully overly hopeful idea," she told them, standing up. "My resignation is immediately and I think it's for the best. Have a good day."

She walked out of that office with her head high and heart pumping erratically.

She'd done it. She was no longer a Sanctuary employee.

**.*****.**

After a short, neck-breaking journey home, Valkyrie stopped off at the supermarket to pick up some freshly baked croissants and some more milk, because a house filled with fifteen milk-drinking people could only need more milk. Sixteen including Laila of course, but Valkyrie couldn't count her since she only drank boob milk.

She took a more leisurely ride back to her house and went to the kitchen where Anton was – he was another milk drinker to the list, Valkyrie hadn't realised he'd be home – and they set out the croissants to be warmed for breakfast when the girls awoke. It was about to turn nine now.

Valkyrie went upstairs to find them and knocked gently on the door. She didn't want to assume anything like last night again. The girls spent a year getting changed in the same room so they could be getting changed right then after all. There was a groaned "come in" and Valkyrie did that.

All the girls seemed to be awake and beady-eyed. Nadia smiled up at Valkyrie from her place on the floor, breasts practically spilling out of her top, and Valkyrie smiled down at her. Valkyrie caught Vasuda running her eyes up Nadia's body and tried very hard to not glare in front of her girlfriend. Charlotte, Prema and Dhiya were sat up and applying makeup to their faces in the low light coming in through gaps in the curtains. Valkyrie flicked the lights on and they muttered their thanks between patting foundation into their skin, applying mascara and vigorously brushing powders over cheeks. They were all hair loose, barely clothed and very tired.

"Did any of you actually get any sleep last night?" Valkyrie asked, helping Nadia to sit up.

"Yeah," Fleet moaned from her faceplanted position between two mattresses. "But I'm still tired."

"You said about going to Dublin and going to the cinema didn't you?" Valkyrie asked. "It's nine o'clock so you still have time. I got some croissants for breakfast, but there are fruit and cereal and toast and stuff."

"Oh my God I fucking love croissants," Fleet exclaimed, pushing herself up. "Thank you, Valkyrie."

"It's fine," Valkyrie said, trying to hide a smile.

It took half an hour for all nine girls to get ready, and when they were all as presentable as they were the day before, they were finally allowed to go downstairs. Nadia and Valkyrie had gone to their room for Nadia to get ready before re-joining them. Anton was in the kitchen still and everyone, including Ghastly, was in the kitchen eating or at the table doing the same. When he saw them come in, he greeted them politely. "Welcome," he said simply and put the croissants in the oven to warm.

There was a spattering of "Hello Mr Shudder" and Valkyrie realised they had probably all taken the Midnight Hotel at one point or another being as they all knew about magic from birth. Ghastly still got stared at a little, but he was focused on Laila and didn't care.

"Good morning," Valkyrie said to her family, sitting beside Tanith at the table. "Sleep well?"

"Yeah, Laila was good," Tanith smiled. She had bags under her eyes but there was a spark to her that hadn't been present in a long time. "She ate every few hours like she should, and Anton fed her the last two night feeds by bottle so I got a lot of sleep actually."

"Aww, Anton would be an adorable dad," Valkyrie realised. The picture of her gigantic brother with an itty bitty baby in his arms, staring down lovingly and feeding it just made her all happy inside. It was such a cute mental image.

"Do not get any ideas about matchmaking," Tanith warned.

"What? I'm not matchmaking you and Anton," Valkyrie defended. "I just think it would be cute if he had a baby of his own."

Tanith nodded. "It would be cute. But I'm not dating anyone ever again. I am done."

Valkyrie smirked. "Yeah, yeah. I don't believe you."

"I mean it!"

"Oh, I'm sure you do," Valkyrie teased. "But I also think that you will date again. Just maybe not the Dead Men."

"Can't be trusted," Dexter grinned and winked at Tanith.

Tanith rolled her eyes. "That won't work on me. I'm immune."

"What won't?" Dexter asked innocently.

They began bickering and Valkyrie kissed Nadia's cheek as she sat down at the table. She ate two croissants with jam which Valkyrie was happy about because Nadia was starting to gain a bit of that weight back and it looked really good on her. And all-butter croissants were pretty good at helping weight gain so Valkyrie was glad to see her eating them.

Valkyrie listened into what the others were talking about, which was mainly little things. Soon enough, Valkyrie had called a taxi and the ten girls got in the back and they went off to the city for their day out.

Valkyrie took them over to the nicest shopping centre she knew of and they went over the shops, talking in two groups about different things. Valkyrie stuck with Nadia, who was shadowed at all times by Vasuda. Valkyrie herself was shadowed by Tara who wanted to know all about what working in a Sanctuary was like. She answered her honestly and did her best to be polite but she did get a little annoyed after two hours of wandering around and suddenly having her conversations cut by Tara asking a question.

It was Lian and Zainab that first suggested lunch and they soon found themselves in a Japanese restaurant of all places that Valkyrie had to assume was new because she had never seen it before, and they all ordered food. Valkyrie and Nadia sat across from each other and while Valkyrie spoke with Dhiya – or listened to her – about something to do with her family's work, Nadia talked in low voices and laughed with Vasuda. Valkyrie and Vasuda caught each other's eye and there was a whole conversating in their silent gaze. It lasted only a moment but Valkyrie knew that Vasuda was there for one reason and one reason only. To break up her relationship and take Nadia for herself.

Valkyrie wasn't scared. In fact, it amused her that Vasuda had so much confidence she thought she could steal such a loyal and steadfast person from a place she wanted to be. Of course, she still planned on keeping Nadia's attention on how much she wanted Valkyrie over anyone else. It was only fair and it could surely be counted as her right as Nadia's current love interest.

Lunch was amazing and it sparked conversation about their evening plans.

"I think we should go to the movies tonight," Charlotte told them reasonably. "There's a lot of movies showing."

Phones were whipped out and there was a collective gasp and giggling around the table. Valkyrie raised an eyebrow at Nadia. Her face was a mix of excitement, trepidation and a little embarrassment. "What is it?" Valkyrie asked.

"They're showing Fifty Shades of Grey," Nadia said before blushing and giggling into her hand.

"Oh my God," Valkyrie muttered.

There was nothing she could do. It was inevitable. She plodded along behind the girls who laughed and giggled and went shopping. The shopping was fun to be fair, they thought of Valkyrie as a personal mission to find a new wardrobe for, and it must have been pre-planned because Nadia orchestrated her friends quickly to look over the different types of clothing.

They came up with ideas for clothes and Valkyrie just had to pick. They came up with 'cute feminine', which was not Valkyrie's style, and they gave her the option of 'stereotypical lesbian' which Valkyrie also turned down though not as harshly because button shirts did look good on her. Nadia helped a lot and they narrowed it down to some very nice skinny jeans which she really liked. It was in the designer area which was unfortunate for her bank, but not many places did trousers in the length and fit she liked. And they were amazing. Plus they fit better than her other clothes.

Tops were harder to find because she was very picky. She got some plain, fitted, casual button-down shirts in dark colours to start, and then she found some thin jackets she liked which helped her find the coats that she liked, which lead to the tops section and she finally found one that she liked. It was dark blue, wide neck so it was almost off the shoulder on both sides but not quite and very simple except for the band of satiny material around the neckline. The girls liked it on her and they found a few more like it and very suddenly she had seven pairs of jeans, ten tops and shirts, three summer jackets, and five coats. Shoes were painful to try on because of her awkward foot shape. She had big feet because she was tall, but they were also very thin so finding what she considered to be clown shoes was very hard.

She shouldn't have underestimated the girls though. Even Vasuda was enjoying picking out shoes, and they got her some wedge heels – she hated stilettos and had ruled them out in every circumstance – in both brown and black, she had some nice sandals, some flats and some boots she loved. It took hours, but in total, they found her eleven pairs of shoes, which was more than excessive, but she couldn't put them all back after how long it took. The girls seemed to think it was critically important she have a new wardrobe because she was turning seventeen in a few days and having a mature look was important.

Valkyrie didn't argue. She bought it all and they took a taxi home with their thousands of euros of clothes and shoes between them. At home, they got ready for the cinema trip. Valkyrie was exhausted and almost collapsed on Nadia when they closed the bedroom door but she was insanely happy and pushed Valkyrie to get dressed into her favourite picks.

Valkyrie was left to wear a dressier top they found, a burgundy red colour and very tight and long sleeved with a necklace she'd owned for a few years that her family had bought her. Her bottom half had her new black ripped jeans and she had open-toe wedge heels for shoes that made her two inches taller. A little bit of makeup later and she looked like she was going on a date rather than out to the movies with her girlfriend's friends. Then again, that might be the point for Nadia.

Nadia had gotten into a dress in the meantime, a white dress with a floral design over it with pink and purple flowers and birds that ended halfway down her thigh. The dress had thick straps over the shoulders but there was a panel cut out above the boobs that showed off her cleavage nicely, and with a bra that pushed them up impossibly high, there was no mistaking the area Nadia wished people would focus on. And by 'people', Nadia wanted _Valkyrie_ to focus on them - she did so diligently.

"You look amazing," Valkyrie breathed and kissed Nadia.

Nadia grinned. "Thanks. You look great too you know. These clothes make you look so good."

Valkyrie smiled, knowing she was right. She looked amazing. "But not as good as you."

They kissed until they had to reapply their lipstick and then repeated the process until Valkyrie wanted to push Nadia back on the bed like the day before. They were interrupted this time by Nadia's phone being called by her impatient friends. They made themselves presentable and went down to meet the other eight girls. They all looked amazing and it was easy to see the mix of cultures. Charlotte was in a tight champagne dress that flattered her golden skin and curves, Fleet wore an emerald shirt that complimented her eyes and dark blue jeans and boots. Lian wore a traditional Chinese outfit, though Valkyrie didn't know the name of the dress, and she looked stunning in it. Dhiya wore a sari made of red and deep orange with tiny gold beads with a matching headscarf in the same style she had worn previously. She stood tall and look incredible.

Tara had chosen a long, blue maxi dress with a shiny belt around her middle and had some insanely bright eye makeup. It wasn't to Valkyrie's taste, but she had her head up like she was a princess and her confidence was certainly attractive. Zainab had chosen a more modest look in a mostly black dress and headscarf, though she had some hand sewn silver thread over one arm that seemed intricate and made her look more mysterious. Prema had also chosen to wear trousers, but she wore more of a casual women's suit in her dress trousers, heals, shirt and tie. And finally, Vasuda wore a dress, purple all over and so tight Valkyrie was certain she had a corset on under the dress. It stopped right below her arse and was obviously meant to be inciting, made worse by the fact it was Nadia's favourite colour. She wore a string of pearls around her neck that glistened in the light.

Charlotte took over the pleasantries and showered everyone with compliments which made it easy to direct the conversation away from Nadia and Vasuda interacting on any level. Valkyrie could feel a bubble of territorialism inside that made her wrap an arm around Nadia and refuse to let go. She wouldn't let Vasuda near her. Nadia was hers. End of.

Dexter saved her from making an embarrassment of herself. He dashed into the room and had them all take pictures and got a few of just Valkyrie and Nadia which obviously annoyed Vasuda much to Valkyrie amusement. Then it swapped and just Nadia and her friends had a picture and Vasuda wasted no time in holding Nadia a little more roughly than Valkyrie enjoyed for the photo. She could see the moment of shock on Nadia's face and then her pass it off as them all being very tightly packed together and she smiled for the camera. She was still oblivious to Vasuda's attempts then.

Valkyrie at least got to kiss Nadia afterwards.

They took taxi's again to the movie theatre and Valkyrie produced her fake licence to get in, as did the other's, bar Lian and Zainab who had real licenses as they were already eighteen. They got popcorn and pick-a-mixes and drinks. Then it was time for the movie.

Unfortunately, Valkyrie got held behind so she and Nadia got split up. Cursing herself, Valkyrie saw Nadia at the very end of the row with only Vasuda next to her. They were sharing their sweets and popcorn together already, as friends would Valkyrie assumed, but she knew Vasuda was trying to flirt so it wasn't so funny to her. All the other girls were sat down and there was no way she could move them all to sit with Nadia although she really wished she could. She sat on the other end next to some man and ate her popcorn despondently.

The plot of the movie was somewhat disturbing to Valkyrie, but she watched it for what it was. The point, and the only point people seemed to care about to her, was to watch for the sex. Maybe it would mean more if Valkyrie felt anything at all for men. At the very least, she tried to distract herself with, she could confirm she wasn't bisexual. Just into girls. She took some deep breaths and tried to stop turning to look at Nadia and Vasuda.

She managed well up until the actual sex parts started and then she gritted her teeth. It was impossible. She went from finding Vasuda an annoying girl messing with her to suddenly being incredibly, irrevocably, uncontrollably jealous. She wasn't jealous of anything to do with Nadia, she was just territorial and loved her, but for Vasuda? All she saw the movie as was Vasuda's imagination of what she wanted to do to Nadia. The girl, Ana, would be Nadia, and the Grey guy was Vasuda. And once that started she just felt the wreathing, swirling pit of jealously open up. She hadn't even done anything but Valkyrie couldn't stop that hole from opening wide once it had started.

She closed her eyes and used meditation for the rest of the movie. It was hard to ignore the moans and grunts and cries, but she had to control herself. She just kept repeating 'she hasn't done anything' in her head and kept her breathing steady until finally, blessedly, the credits started rolling.

Valkyrie shot out of her seat and looked at the girls to leave. They were all giggling and looking at each other with little smirks. Nadia and Vasuda had their heads together laughing over something and the pit opened wide again. She glared daggers at Vasuda's back. Feeling she was doing something wrong because this pit had nothing to do with Nadia, Valkyrie turned her back and walked away, going to the bathroom before anyone else had left the room.

She locked herself in a bathroom stall and sat on the lid of the toilet, head in hands. She was being so stupid, but it was hard to not be when she had sat through a porno movie with her girlfriend and girlfriends secret admirer huddled together in the corner with no one to supervise.

 _It's not Nadia's fault_ , she kept thinking. She wouldn't turn into a control freak that didn't like Nadia out of her sight, Nadia was free to be friends with who she wanted. But the angry, jealous pit was free to think of Vasuda. What a conniving thing to do, cornering Nadia against the wall so that she'd be free to spend time with her in a pornographic movie! Valkyrie vowed to not let anything like that happen again. She had to stick to Nadia like glue when they went into buildings so that she could sit with Nadia. It cut Vasuda off from cornering her girlfriend again.

Taking a deep breath and going to the toilet, Valkyrie cleared her mind and washed her hands. She heard the other girls around now, talking between the stalls, and made sure her makeup was in place before going out of the bathroom. Nadia, Fleet and Prema were there and Nadia greeted Valkyrie with a kiss and a big grin. Valkyrie smiled at Nadia and teasingly asked her if she enjoyed the movie which just got a blush and small yes out of her. Valkyrie laughed and spoke with Fleet and Prema about the characters while they waited. Valkyrie kept an arm around Nadia and didn't so much as look at Vasuda. She couldn't let her know she was getting into Valkyrie's head.

The trip home was full of giggling and the girls slowly broaching the topic of the actual movie. It was Fleet that asked Valkyrie what she thought, to which she shrugged and said that it was a bit weird.

"Weird how?" Lian asked. She was grinning far too much and had enjoyed the movie far too much.

"I don't know," Valkyrie tried to wave off, but it didn't work.

"Other than the whole control-ly thing, did you like it?" Tara tried.

"Well, not really," she tried again.

"What? Not even the – the you know, bit where he, you know?" Lian asked, eyes wide.

Valkyrie wasn't sure which part Lian was referring to but she still knew the answer. "Nope."

It was Vasuda that rolled her eyes. "I think you're missing the point."

Valkyrie felt her eyes narrow. "What do you mean?" She asked, happy to hear her voice sound measured and calm.

"Not you," she said too nicely. "The rest of you guys. She's obviously unattracted to men."

They looked at Valkyrie with obvious curiosity. Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "Yes, that's right."

There was some _ooh_ 's and Valkyrie was happy they stopped questioning her but Vasuda's comment, of course, went straight into the list of 'why I hate Vasuda' because it wasn't for her to out Valkyrie. Not that Valkyrie cared because she genuinely didn't mind if people knew she didn't like men but at the same time, her hate for Vasuda was already so great that it just added fuel to the fire. She could have said anything and it would have added to it.

Back home again, they all ran off and got ready for bed, giving Valkyrie her time alone with Nadia once more.

"Nadia," Valkyrie said as soon as she closed the door. Nadia turned and looked at her. "I love you."

Nadia smirked and sauntered up to Valkyrie. "I love you too," she whispered and pushed Valkyrie back as hard as she could into the door, rubbing their bodies together and kissing her fiercely.

Valkyrie groaned into Nadia's mouth and let her do what she wanted. After only a minute of kissing, Nadia pulled Valkyrie's top off of her, and a moment later she'd pulled her own dress off and they were back to kissing. The feel of Nadia's skin against her own was heavenly and she freed herself from Nadia only to pick the shorter girl up and put her on the desk to kiss her better. Bras were thrown off and shoes kicked away. They had hands all over each other's bodies while their tongues danced, all thoughts of anything but the feel and taste of each other disappearing completely.

Before long, Nadia was pulling at Valkyrie trousers, trying to undo the button on them and Valkyrie's heart jumped with excitement, picking her back up and going to the bed. Nadia kicked her underwear off the moment she was sat down and broke her kiss with Valkyrie only to undo her girlfriend's trousers and pull them down, underwear and all.

Breathing hard, Valkyrie kicked them off and crawled over Nadia, their bodies flush and breasts rubbing together, shooting sparks through both their bodies. She could feel how wet she'd gotten and wanted more than anything to feel Nadia. Travelling slowly down her body, Valkyrie kissed every part of Nadia, her neck, her collar, her breasts and nipples, her ribs and belly, her fingers trailing alongside and feeling all the goosebumps along Nadia's skin. The high-pitched moans that followed the kisses gave Valkyrie confidence.

Heart beating erratically, Valkyrie looked her over for just a moment before kissing Nadia's stomach and taking her time going down one thigh and up the other back to her goal. It only took the smallest nudge of her hand for Nadia to open her legs and Valkyrie, for the first time, got to actually see Nadia. Nadia moaned and Valkyrie looked up at her. Both their faces were flushed and without any words, Valkyrie slowly trailed her hand up Nadia's thigh, still looking her in the face, and brushed over her clit.

Nadia hissed loudly and Valkyrie revelled at the feel of Nadia's soft, pink skin. She tried to remember what Nadia liked, but it felt so different from this position and she was more interested in watching Nadia's expressions of pleasure. She wet her lips and used both hands to tease Nadia, pulling her lips apart and seeing how wet her pussy was, watching the muscles of her thighs jump in anticipation when she touched them.

Slowly, she leant down and kissed along Nadia's inner thigh until she was finally in front of Nadia's pussy. She breathed in the heady smell of her girlfriend and, tentatively, kissed her lips.

The whines and moans Nadia made encouraged her more, and Valkyrie gently licked along the edges of Nadia's clit, teasing and tasting until Nadia's hand gripped her hair and her hips pulled up unto her face. Trying not to grin, Valkyrie played with Nadia's clit with her tongue, rubbing and moving it, eliciting sounds from Nadia she'd never heard before. She sucked her clit into her mouth and Nadia became louder, and almost whined when Valkyrie moved back.

Flicking her hair out of her face, Valkyrie went back in and pushed her tongue into Nadia's pussy, lapping her up and loving every sound she made. She used one arm to keep Nadia's hips down and the other to play gently with her clit, the hand in her hair pushing her down further. Only when Valkyrie started to hear Nadia's breathing become shallower and quicker did she change position and pressed her tongue to the clit while her fingers took over pushing in and out of Nadia, making Nadia cry out in pleasure, repeating only Valkyrie's name and swearing a lot. Nadia was soaking wet and Valkyrie only focused on how good Nadia felt around her fingers once more, flicking and thrusting them to get the best reactions, focusing heavily on messing with her clit which got the best moans and cries out of her girlfriend.

So much more quickly than Valkyrie wanted, she felt Nadia start to pant and the words stopped and she just focused on the overwhelming pleasure of Valkyrie ministrations. Her legs tightened around Valkyrie's head, which made Valkyrie feel even wetter for no reason she could explain, and the hands in her hair clenched and pulled her down like her life depended on it. Valkyrie felt the walls of Nadia's pussy constrict and she quickly flicked her tongue on her clit, feeling as Nadia came on her hand and mouth. Her whole body shook and shuddered.

Valkyrie pulled out her hand to lick her pussy, listening to Nadia groan her name and roll her hips against her mouth.

More languidly now, Valkyrie licked her until she stopped shaking and kissed all around her swollen lips, not bothering to stop until she was pulled up to lie on top of Nadia. She kept her messy hands from touching her beautiful girlfriend and smiled down at her.

"Hi," she whispered, and Nadia giggled breathlessly.

"That was," she whispered, "fucking incredible."

"I know," Valkyrie whispered. "You're amazing."

Nadia kissed her and, on her hands and elbows hovering above, she rubbed her thighs together. Being so wet was almost frustrating, almost irritating. She needed a release or to calm down.

Nadia noticed immediately and didn't waste any time in reaching down their bodies and very quickly inserting two fingers into Valkyrie.

Valkyrie's whole body shook with sudden pleasure and she groaned into Nadia's mouth. She could hear how wet she was as Nadia thrust her fingers slowly back and forth and it took everything in Valkyrie not to rock back into her hand.

Nadia snaked out from under Valkyrie and right when Valkyrie was going to flip onto her back, she felt Nadia stop her. Valkyrie felt more than exposed, and turned on, by her position on the bed, but all thoughts about being somewhat embarrassed evaporated when she felt Nadia lick from her clip up to her pussy and put her tongue into her wet hole. Her thumb played with Valkyrie's clit and Valkyrie thought she'd cum right then. It really was impossible not to rock back into her as she felt her whole body tingle with pleasure and the fiery heat of Nadia's mouth do things to her she didn't know possible. She tried to be quiet, gritting her teeth and moaning into the bedsheets but it was hard when Nadia just _flicked_ her tongue like that she felt herself press back and mouth open wide.

It felt so good to Valkyrie and with just a few minutes of Nadia licking, stroking and fingering Valkyrie, she came with a small, muffled cry.

Barely controlling her breathing, Valkyrie flipped over and caught Nadia as she licked her lips and grinned with pride at Valkyrie's stunned face. "Oh my God," was all she could say, and Nadia laughed and fell forwards into her and they rested, messy and exhausted on the bed.

Valkyrie held Nadia close, forgetting about her cum covered hands and stroking Nadia's back. They laid there for far too long and it was only when Nadia groaned and sat up, sitting on Valkyrie belly, that they realised how much they needed showers.

"We smell," Valkyrie realised.

"Yeah, that happens," Nadia commented.

"Oh, you're an expert now?" Valkyrie grinned, teasing her and getting up, pulling Nadia with her.

She rolled her eyes. "Shush. Or I won't do that to you again."

Valkyrie stopped and looked at her. "How dare you threaten me like that."

Nadia laughed and they both took a moment to wipe the rest of their makeup off before carefully looking around the corner of their bedroom door and running to the bathroom together. Their shared shower was innocent except for their shared smiles and a few lingering touches and kisses, and then they were done Nadia dried them both with her magic and they got into their pyjamas. Valkyrie couldn't care less what Nadia wore now. After seeing such intimate parts of Nadia, nothing would ever be too little again, and she liked it.

Nadia's friends were happily distracted from them being missing for an hour and a half as they were downstairs with the rest of Valkyrie's family. Valkyrie did wonder for a moment if they had come down to avoid listening to their activities, but then shook the thought away. The Three Idiots at the very least would have let on if they knew anything.

The rest of the night was spent talking, playing board games and enjoying themselves, no cares at all.


	141. Cliff Diving

**Chapter 141**

That night was harder than the last as Valkyrie desperately wanted to hold her girlfriend, but there was no chance of that happening so long as Nadia's friends were there. They still had two more nights with them visiting, which was the first thought in her head when she woke that morning.

She groaned to the sound of the girls getting ready and scrunched her eyes in protest. A moment later she felt a hand on her stomach and opened one eye to see Nadia smiling down at her. She smiled back and rolled into Nadia's body, hugging her.

"Eww," Lian said flatly from her position in front of a mirror. Nadia threw a pillow at her and ruined her friends make up.

There was a small scuffle which led to Valkyrie abandoning Nadia and going to her own room because it was far too loud in there. She took her time getting ready and got downstairs after the others. She and Nadia kissed and then it was onto business.

"I want to go to the beach today," Dhiya was telling the others. "Erskine said it was the last good day of the year!"

Valkyrie nodded. "Have you ever been cliff diving?"

The girls looked at her like she was crazy. "What?" Dhiya asked.

"Cliff diving. Me and my friends did it all the time when we were kids. I grew up on the coast. And if it's going to be good weather, we might as well."

It took a little while to convince them, but after they realised there was going to be a sandy beach only a little way up the coast and Dexter got enthusiastic and agreed to go also, it was a breeze. They got themselves ready once more, Valkyrie instructed the girls on how to dress – not in small bikinis – and they covered up, they got in the car.

Valkyrie and Dexter drove two separate cars down to Haggard but drove past it to an area about ten minutes away to have the sandy beach nearby. They parked, got out towels and went down to the beach.

"It's lovely today," Nadia commented from Valkyrie's side.

Valkyrie smiled at her. "It's alright. Are you ready to jump from a cliff?"

"Nope."

"You're going to do it."

"Nope."

"Yes, you are."

"Nope."

"Repeating the same word isn't going to help you. It's still happening," Valkyrie informed her. "Also, that bikini was an awful decision."

"I like my bikini and again, I'm not jumping so it doesn't matter what I'm wearing. Do you not like it?"

"Let me check." She stared at Nadia's boobs and Nadia started laughing. "I like it."

"Stop it!" Nadia laughed. "You're so embarrassing."

"You love it," Valkyrie grinned, hugging Nadia. "But seriously, you're going to lose that bikini the moment you hit the water."

Nadia just rolled her eyes and pushed her away to help her friends with the blankets. Dexter appeared next to her on the rock a little way from the others.

"So," he grinned.

"What?" She asked, eyes narrowing.

"Nothing, nothing," he said, not hiding his giant grin in the least. "I just happened to notice that you and Nadia are especially touchy feely today."

"Mm-hm," Valkyrie hummed, looking out to sea.

"And you were like that yesterday evening too."

"Yep."

"After having an hour alone. All alone. With no one around."

"Yep. We spend time together, you know," Valkyrie nodded.

"What type of time together?" He grinned, practically jumping.

"Oh my God Dexter, what are you trying to ask?" Valkyrie asked, not wanting to hear what he wanted to know whatsoever.

"Did you and Nadia do the deed?" He asked excitedly.

"'Do the deed'?" She asked. "What, are you twelve now?"

"Valkyrie. You have been with Nadia for nearly four years. It's in my right as brother to know all the juicy gossip!" He said. "I want to know."

"Yeah, but 'do the deed'? Seriously?"

"Fine. Did you and Nadia fuck? Is that better?"

"No, it's not. You've gone to the complete other side of the spectrum," she told him, frowning.

"Well, you're the one being awkward! It's a yes-no question!"

"We're not playing twenty-one questions Dexter. I don't have to answer if you're being annoying about it."

"Baby, look. I bet with Saracen that I could find out if you and Nadia had sex by midday. If I lose, it will mean bad things for me. Please, just tell me."

She crossed her arms and faced him. "What did you bet?"

His face dropped and he crossed his arms too. Behind them, the girls were giggling about something. "Something big."

"Tell me and I will consider telling you what happened last night. In detail," Valkyrie offered, raising an eyebrow.

He took a deep breath. "If you tell me, he has to do everything I say for a whole weekend. No ifs, buts, or questions. If I don't find out, I have to be _his_ slave. Now tell me."

Valkyrie smirked. "I'll think about it." With that, she got down from the rock, leaving Dexter to grumpily follow her to the girls. "Come on then. Who's going first?"

" _ME_!" Fleet screeched, jumping up. "Charlotte, come too!"

Charlotte bit her lip but nervously stood up, looking at Valkyrie nervously. She gave her a sweet smile to help her feel better and gave Nadia a look.

"No way!" Nadia said. "I'm not ready to jump from a cliff."

"You know how to control the air and sea to keep yourself safe. Why is this a problem?" Valkyrie asked.

Nadia shrugged and smiled. "I mostly just like seeing you get annoyed. Have fun!"

Valkyrie rolled her eyes but let it go, rounding up as many people as possible and becoming cold inside when she realised that Zainab, Prema, Nadia and Vasuda were the only ones staying behind, and Nadia was in a lovely little bikini and small shorts. And Vasuda was giving her a smirk.

Taking a deep breath, Valkyrie thought of the night before, gave Nadia a smile and walked off.

It physically hurt to do it, but she would control herself. This time.

It took a little while getting to the top of the cliff, and Dexter and Fleet talked the whole way. Fleet was still blushing like the schoolgirl she was, but she spoke about her multi-cultural experiences in Australia confidently and Dexter told her about Mage history with the Australian aboriginal people. Valkyrie and Charlotte talked about the towns they grew up in, and then they were at the top.

"Right!" She called, rounding them up. "Here's what we're going to do. Over there is the high jump, and over there is the shorter jump. If you're scared, go to the short jump, if you're not, go to the big one. If you can't swim, don't you dare jump! And I mean that. Do you all know how to swim?" They all nodded. "Good. Still, make sure you're ready to manipulate the water, it is a really good day for jumping but the sea is still stronger than you. Understand?"

"Can I jump with someone?" Charlotte asked quickly.

"Of course. Get in pairs, first jump rules!"

They paired off, Valkyrie going with Charlotte, Dexter with Fleet and Tara, and Dhiya with Lian. Fleet claimed to be a good swimmer, but she was practically attached to Dexter by this point so he had two partners.

"Alright Charlotte," Valkyrie said softly, trying to calm the girl down. "Here's what we'll do. I'm going to jump with you but we're not holding hands, alright? Cross your arms over your chest. It's actually easier to give a run-up to the cliff, so as soon as you jump, cross your ankles and hold your breath. If you want, you can hold your nose but keep your arms tight, okay?"

Charlotte nodded, testing out holding her nose and nodding. Valkyrie smiled encouragingly and pulled her over to the run-up line. It took a little while to talk her into it, especially as she was worried about the sea smashing her body against the cliff and Valkyrie's lack of elemental abilities to save her from that, but in the end, she nodded bravely and they stood together.

"Three… two… one!" The two of them ran at the cliff and Charlotte threw herself from the cliff, Valkyrie right behind her – she'd slowed down, expecting Charlotte to stop – and dropped down into the water far below. The rush was just like when she was a child, and her lack of magic made it all the more fun as when she dove into the frosty waters below. She had to use her own strength to pull herself up and swim around the cliff towards the beach, giving her that burning exhilaration in her muscles. Charlotte was speeding ahead, using her magic rather than swimming.

Charlotte and the four other girls on the beach were laughing with each other when Valkyrie pulled herself out of the water and walked over, throwing herself onto the towel next to Nadia. "That was awesome!" Valkyrie grinned.

"It was amazing! Nadia, you have to do it!" Charlotte enthused, kneeling on the sand. "It's really cold, but it's worth it."

"I don't want to get cold!" Nadia complained.

"You don't have to go, we'll stay warm together," Vasuda grinned, playing along with Nadia's dramatic monologue and pulled Nadia into a hug. Nadia hugged her back, suspecting nothing, but Valkyrie watched Vasuda holding Nadia around her sensitive belly and around her shoulders, keeping her arms pinned to her body. It looked a whole lot different than an innocent hug. But Valkyrie couldn't do anything because Nadia thought it was a game and if she broke it up it would look as if Valkyrie was jealous or didn't trust Nadia.

Instead, Valkyrie plastered a too big smile on her face as Dexter, Fleet and Tara ran out of the sea.

"It's fucking freezing!" Tara was shouting, running onto the towels and rolling around to dry herself. Fleet was just staring at Dexter's bare torso like she very much wanted to lick it, and Dexter was pretending he didn't know she was doing that. In fact, Dexter was looking at Nadia and Vasuda and after glancing at Valkyrie's face, she was sure he'd caught onto Vasuda as well.

"Well, how are you doing? Nadia, ready to jump yet?" Dexter asked, grinning widely.

Nadia looked at him around Vasuda's hair. "No!"

He nodded and sat down opposite Nadia, getting the other girls to gather around, although Vasuda didn't let Nadia go. In fact, she looked like she was holding her closer and Valkyrie felt the pit starting to open up again.

Dexter, amazingly, spend some time talking with the girls and managed to get them to all come and jump from the cliff. By the time he convinced them, that pit was open and writhing dangerously, making Valkyrie's mood God awful, and when she saw them stand to go to the cliff, she jogged on ahead so no one would see how angry she was. By the time she was at the top, she felt a little better.

She looked behind her and saw Nadia was walking ahead and trying to catch up to her. She stopped and waited.

"Are you alright?" Nadia asked, concerned.

"Yeah, I'm grand, I'm grand," Valkyrie said, not looking her in the eye. "Will you jump with me?"

"I promised Vasu I'd jump with her," Nadia said, holding Valkyrie's hand.

"'Vasu'?" Valkyrie asked before she could stop herself.

"Yeah?" Nadia said, frowning. "That's her name. Val, what's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong, alright? Come on," she said, turning and going up the hill. She counted in her head, desperately trying to regain her calm even as Nadia followed behind her. She felt bad because she could feel Nadia was suffering for her bad mood instead of the person she was actually mad at, but it was hard to act like nothing had happened.

At the top, they silently waited for the others to meet them and split off to jump. Vasuda and Nadia went first, holding hands and squealing all the way down. Valkyrie took deep breaths.

A hand appeared on her shoulder and she looked behind her to see Dexter once more. He gave her a serious look and Valkyrie could only look away. She ended up jumping with Prema this time around, and didn't waste time in walking straight back up the hill when she got out the water, her fake smile in place. It took some time for them to follow her up, and they all jumped once more, Vasuda loudly talking over everyone and getting Nadia to jump with her again. Nadia was laughing so much she had to almost be pulled along by Vasuda but she didn't seem to care at all. After jumping herself with Dhiya on the big jump, Valkyrie grabbed a towel for herself and dried off as the others went running back up the hill.

Sitting in the car, Valkyrie took deep breaths and told herself how stupid she was.


	142. Fights, drunken games and a step too far

**Chapter 142**

The group went home for lunch and Valkyrie excused herself for a shower. Nadia was looking over at her worriedly but Valkyrie just didn't have it in her to do anything. Vasuda was no longer sitting with her as Dhiya and Zainab were talking with her about horses, which they all loved apparently, but it still stung that Nadia had spent so much time with Vasuda. It wasn't her fault, of course, she just saw her as a friend.

Instead of using her own shower, Valkyrie grabbed her clothes from earlier in the day and went to Tanith's rooms.

"Val?" Tanith asked when she walked in without knocking. "What's wrong?"

Valkyrie dropped her clothes to the floor, walked over to her sister's bed and threw herself onto it.

"That bad, huh? I thought you and Nadia's friends were all buddy-buddy," Tanith said, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm upset," she murmured into the bedsheet.

"Sorry, didn't get that."

"I'm upset because Nadia's friend Vasuda is a _bitch_!"

"Shut up!" Tanith snapped and they both listened intently for thirty seconds. When little Laila hadn't made a sound from her attached bedroom they continued. "Why is she a bitch?"

"She likes Nadia," Valkyrie muttered pathetically. "And Nadia doesn't even see it. She thinks Vasuda is her friend and being nice to her and stuff but she's actually trying to flirt with her and she's being all touchy-feely and Nadia is letting her because she thinks it's just what she's like because she's acted like that for ages and it's making me really mad."

"Yeah, that can happen," Tanith said sitting on the bed next to her. "What's your plan then?"

"I don't have one. I'm just getting mad and sucking it up."

"Really?" Tanith asked. Her tone was both shock and confusion. "That doesn't sound like you."

"Tanith, the only ideas on what to do is staying close to Nadia and controlling her every move and interaction. That sounds like a control-ly, shitty person thing to do, so I'm avoiding the situation entirely."

" _Or_ , you could just tell Nadia your concerns like a big girl and the two of you can work it out. Even if Nadia doesn't believe you, she'll be more aware of what's happening and realise your right or she'll smack you up the back of the head and explain that she's like this with everyone because they were best friends at school. Some people are just that touchy, like Erskine," Tanith explained.

Valkyrie grimaced. "I promise it's not like that. It's this look she gives me, she's very obviously doing it to annoy me. I don't want to make Nadia not spend time with her friend but honestly, I wish I could."

Tanith rolled her eyes. "Just tell Nadia why your upset. I doubt she hasn't noticed."

She grimaced again. "She has."

"See? You're just going to piss her off not saying anything," Tanith warned.

Valkyrie sighed and got up. "I'm using your shower."

"Sure. But I shaved in there earlier so you might want to give it a rinse down," she called after her.

"You're disgusting."

"And proud."

Valkyrie used her shower time to think over Tanith's option and concluded she was right. After getting dressed and wringing her hair as dry as possible, she went to her room and found Nadia dressed and brushing through her perfectly dry, washed hair.

"Hi," Valkyrie said softly when she shut the door behind her. "I'm sorry I've been a dick."

"You haven't," Nadia said immediately. "But you have been upset."

"I have," Valkyrie sighed and went over to her. "Can we talk about Vasuda?"

Nadia frowned. "What? Why?"

"I don't like her."

Nadia paused, put down the brush and turned on the vanity stall to face Valkyrie. " _Why_?"

"She likes you."

"She likes me?"

"Yes. She _fancies_ you, or whatever they call it."

"She fancies me? Valkyrie, I've known Vasuda since I joined that stupid school. She's a bit blunt, I know, but she was always alright with me and after we all became friends she was on my side about the whole Rebecca thing after Emily and was really supportive. She stuck by me when Rebecca spread rumours about me at school, and bear in mind some of my other friends doubted me for a time, all while she didn't. She made people see I wasn't in the wrong when she didn't have to. She's a good person."

"A good person that's been trying to flirt with you since she got here."

"She has not," Nadia denied and went back to brushing her hair. "You're being ridiculous."

"I'm not! Dexter sees it too, he was getting mad at me for getting mad at her earlier because I was taking it out on you rather than Vasuda like I should have!"

"Don't you dare get mad at my friends because you're seeing things that aren't even there!" Nadia demanded. Valkyrie swallowed back her retort. "You know, you were right. You are being a dick."

Valkyrie crossed her arms and closed her eyes, taking deep breaths and trying desperately to deescalate the situation. "Look, I don't want to fight about this. But I know I'm right. Vasuda is trying to flirt with you, and she's been all over you since the start. She sits next to you, she always talks with you, she hugs and touches you whenever she can, she even _sleeps_ closer to you than me. The only time she isn't doing those things is when your other friends are talking to her or I have my arm over you at that moment. I'm not saying you can't be friends or spend time with her, I just think you should be aware because it's upsetting me, okay?"

She left quickly so Nadia couldn't get mad at her – also she had other things on the tip of her tongue and didn't want to say something she'd regret – and went downstairs to the kitchen where her brothers were making lunches. Dexter raised an eyebrow at her but didn't say anything, for which she was grateful. Instead, she grabbed the blender, which was full of some red smoothie, and poured herself a glass.

She ate with Nadia's friends but interacting with them felt forced and when Nadia came down and joined them, she felt tense and left them to go out that afternoon by themselves. She didn't want to be a part of their group so long as Nadia was unhappy with her, especially since it would just get awkward if the others noticed they were acting tense.

While they were gone, Valkyrie tried clearing her head by doing chores. She went through her wardrobe and got rid of ninety percent of her clothes because almost none of it fit anyone and hung up her new things, are well as organised the hangers in a way she knew Nadia would like. She went through her drawers and got rid of a lot of those things too, trying to keep in line with the style of clothing she'd picked out for herself, which she did actually really like. Then she picked up the bits and pieces on the floor and got a load of laundry on downstairs. She went for a long run around the woods at the back of the property, chopped up some wood for no reason other than to get some frustration out, and then went inside only for Dexter to attack her and tell her it was training time.

They sparred outside in the now cold air on the grass for almost an hour, Valkyrie missing practically every punch, being too slow to defend at every turn and otherwise just doing a miserable job whilst making herself madder _because_ she was doing a miserable job. Dexter shouted at her and Erskine and Saracen goaded her into fighting back. Out of the few attacks she did get in, she was ruthlessly violent, going for points she was never allowed to go for, trying to incapacitate Dexter rather than spar. He didn't tell her to stop.

Anton was the one that called it off when Valkyrie had finally punched Dexter in the neck, slapped him over the ear, got him on the floor and punched him in the chest so hard he'd been too winded and shocked to defend his face from being punched three times by her. Erskine had tackled her to the ground and Saracen had checked Dexter for broken ribs. He'd been fine.

"You need to get a hold of yourself," was all Anton told her before grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her inside. He dragged her all the way upstairs to the shared girls' bathroom and crossed his arms, forcing her to draw a bath and throw in a healing stone, leaving the door cracked and waiting outside for her to bathe. She felt like a child, an uncontrollable child that needed parent supervision, and she moodily took her bath, feeling the ache of her whole body. She hadn't trained in a long time, much less to that extent, and it had worn her out. As she sat there naked, she felt the guilt and regret creep in. She cried silently in the bath, her tears mingling with the frothy water.

After her bath, she wrapped in a towel and Anton came straight in as soon as she was covered and demanded she go to her bedroom. She did and he closed the door behind her.

He couldn't have done anything else to make her feel worse.

She got into some comfortable clothes and tied her hair into a braid before leaving her room and going to Dexter's. Anton was on the sofa, and Dexter, Saracen and Erskine were on the bed. Dexter had obviously also had a soak but also had two ice packs on his chest.

She didn't say anything, just rushed over into Dexter's arms and cried.

.*****.

It was almost dinner time when Nadia and Tanith came around the corner of the bedroom and sat on the sofa on either side of Anton. Valkyrie, Erskine, Saracen and Dexter were all lying down along the length of the bed like sardines and were probably pretty pathetic looking, but none of them particularly cared.

"What are you doing?" Nadia asked them quietly.

"Feeling shit," Valkyrie answered honestly. Dexter moved his hand and let it drop on her face. "Ow," she said without emotion.

"Don't be stupid," he told her.

"I'm not. It's true," she told him, pushing the hand away.

Nadia sighed. "Look, I'm sorry your mad Val, but I still don't see it."

Valkyrie shrugged. "Fine."

"No, it's not, because you're still mad. I don't want that."

She just shrugged again.

"Well, we're getting ready to go out for dinner. I'd like it if you came. We're going to a sushi restaurant and I thought you guys would like to come too," Nadia told them. "It's a really fancy place. I thought it would be fun."

Valkyrie sighed, already knowing she'd come. "Sure," she said, sitting up. "Come on guys. _You're_ coming too."

There was an immediate protest in the form of groaning and grunting while Valkyrie yanked them off the bed. They did agree once they were stood up, and Valkyrie, Nadia and Tanith went to their rooms to get ready. Nadia and Tanith had picked out their outfits and went to Tanith's room, leaving Valkyrie to stew in her bedroom, which ended up being a good idea because she felt more rejuvenated and awake after having some time alone.

She found a dress she hadn't worn in years, but it was too small and had escaped her throw out from earlier. After putting that in the pile to go, she looked over her smart trousers and top options but didn't 'feel' any of them. She looked through her skirts but none of them felt right with her tops. She was about to give up and start having a tantrum when she caught sight of a bit of purple fabric at the back of the wardrobe. It was behind where she usually had her bulky coats and jacket and she couldn't believe she had missed it before. She pulled it out and found the dress she'd been given the previous Christmas from Solomon and Skulduggery, alongside the customary books and other gifts. She barely even remembered getting it, but now she saw it she remembered why it was at the back behind everything else.

It was a mid-thigh length dress in a deep purple, the skirt tight and elegant, the top also tight but modest. The neckline hinted at something more whilst keeping it all to the imagination. It had a built-in slip and when she tried it on, it tucked her waist in at the sides just enough to give her definition without making it so she couldn't breathe. The orange sash around the middle was a bold but a fun detail the dress needed to pull it together. Without it, the dress was plain and almost boring.

As soon as she tied that around her, she looked more youthful as opposed to childish – the dress was fun and classy, just like something Solomon and Skulduggery would pick out. She fiddled around with how to wear the tie before putting around the front, off centre and in a simple knot. She got her new nude heels and put those on, and then got on with some makeup. She went for a smoky eye and dark lips, contour to make her seem darker and more mysterious, before finishing with going through the stuff Tanith had abandoned in her bathroom and found some fake lashes. After threatening to burn everything to the ground, she got them on, found some jewellery and got her pretty silver and nude clutch together. She threw on one of her new creamy trench coats over it. The dress was bright and fun, but the full look was classy, elegant and – she just felt that the woman inside her she was on the brink of becoming was shining through tonight.

She knew she looked good, which was only made better when she was last down the stairs and the others looked up at her. Her family smiled, knowing she was upset still but pulling a brave face, and Nadia's eyes glowed with happiness because she was quite obviously using the event to forget they had argued earlier. The best part was all the smiles and compliments from Valkyrie's friends which let her simper and flatter them so she looked so very nice. It pointed out so nicely how Vasuda didn't say a word to Valkyrie and looked somewhat put out that she'd even turned up. Valkyrie didn't check to see if Nadia picked up on it, just led them out the house. She wasn't a petty bitch, but that didn't mean she had to try to make Vesuda look bad.

They had cars pick them up and take them to the fancy sushi restaurant, which did look incredibly expensive and nice, and were taken to their table by an immaculately dressed man with the best eyeliner Valkyrie had ever seen. He handed them menus and let them choose.

Valkyrie remained quiet. She was sat with Anton on her left, Charlotte on her right and on the other side, Tanith was opposite Anton with Laila next to her in her car seat, Nadia was opposite Valkyrie and Vasuda was opposite Charlotte. Next to Nadia.

Valkyrie didn't comment or even look at her, trying to be reserved and polite and not look like she wanted to stab Vasuda's throat, and instead picked what starter and main she wanted. China would be proud of the subtle show she made of it all. They all chose to go on the pre-picked group meal plan which meant they would all get to share food. They ordered enough for them all, which included Solomon, Saracen, Tanith, Anton, Valkyrie, Nadia, Dexter, Erskine and Nadia's eight friends. That meant sixteen individuals. They all chose an alcohol drink, except Tanith who breastfed of course, which did surprise Valkyrie but it was Anton who quietly told her that they were happy for the girls and Valkyrie to have a small glass of wine while they were out because they were all almost adults and they trusted the girls to control themselves. Plus, he told her, they had already bought a bunch of alcohol and planned to drink it later so they may as well all enjoy a nice meal now since they were allowing excessive drinking at the house anyway.

That was news to Valkyrie but she kept up her façade of blank politeness and chose to have a glass of prosecco – China had told Valkyrie to always ask for prosecco if she didn't know anything else to choose as it was the safest for someone like her, whatever that meant. They all spoke in quiet tone about different things along the table. Nadia tried to talk with Valkyrie several times and Valkyrie responded every time, talking about the restaurant, what they were doing later, about the book Gordon was almost done writing and wanted them to all proofread. Each and every time, Vasuda would chime in, often using Charlotte to make it seem like it was a group conversation rather than an interruption, and Valkyrie was absolutely certain Nadia could see some of what Valkyrie had been telling her by the time the food came.

The dinner was, of course, amazing. Valkyrie rarely had sushi so it was a nice change and she didn't even flinch, growl or snap when Vasuda fed Nadia a piece of sashimi. She just smiled at her girlfriend and saw a little bit of awkwardness in her eyes. She noticed Vasuda finish her glass of wine quickly and when she was meant to be going to the bathroom, order bottles for the table. By the time she was back, there were three bottles of wine on the table. Vasuda poured until her glass was at the top.

Valkyrie just smiled at her girlfriend, still being quiet and right.

Things escalated slowly, but the food was great. Charlotte seemed to have clocked on to Nadia and Valkyrie having had a tiff, and more importantly, she had caught on to Vasuda being the problem. She pulled Vasuda's attention away when she could and they talked about a trip to Rome they had planned and gossiped about people at school which Valkyrie knew Charlotte didn't care about but it worked.

By the end of the meal, Nadia looked harassed and Valkyrie was pleased with herself. Vasuda, Fleet, Prema, Lian, Erskine and Saracen were on the border between tipsy and drunk, and it was time to go home. After footing a hefty and disgusting bill which was mostly just the price of the very expensive wine Vasuda had ordered them, their cars drove them home. Back there, Nadia pulled Valkyrie aside.

"Fine! Fine! I see it, okay?!" She furiously whispered. "Now stop being so damn annoying about it."

Valkyrie grinned widely. "I'm sorry, I think the words you're looking for is, 'Oh Valkyrie, I'm sorry I claimed you were a dick for seeing something so obvious, please, accept my apology.'"

Nadia glared at her. "Val, I am trying to make this better."

"You're doing an awful job of it," Valkyrie said, losing her grin. She stared Nadia in the eye, the wine loosening a tongue a little. "I was really upset you said those things you said to me. I don't like Vasuda. I know she's your friend, but it would have been nice if you had at least pretended like you'd take my concern seriously."

"I'm sorry, baby, I really am. I didn't mean to hurt you," Nadia said, her face dropping. "I just didn't want to think anything bad of my friends."

"To be fair, I like all the others," Valkyrie said. "Charlotte's great, and it's hard not to like Fleet."

"Yeah, they're pretty great," Nadia smiled. "Are we good now? I want to have a drink and spend time with you. Please?"

"Of course. I didn't want to fight about it in the first place," Valkyrie said, pulling Nadia close. "You look great by the way."

"Thanks. Tanith told me I had to wear it." Nadia was in a dress once more, this time a small black number she paired with a long coat for outside. It looked better with the coat, to be fair, although Valkyrie did just have a thing for coats so it may have just been that, but the dress itself was also pretty. Nadia had on more makeup than usual but she'd kept it classy. Valkyrie could tell that Tanith had had a hand in it. She had made Nadia put a little more on show, probably knowing they would be alcohol on hand, to get Vasuda to show her true colours when Nadia's skimpy outfit made her lose control. It had worked.

"Well, I love it," Valkyrie smiled and kissed Nadia. "It shows off your legs."

"Yeah, it's a dress," Nadia teased and kissed her more deeply, gently licking Valkyrie's lips until their tongues were playing once more. They stayed like that, tipsily making out until someone came around the corner.

"Oh," Vasuda said, stopping. She crossed her arms. "We're all getting ready to play some games. Do you want to join us?"

It didn't sound like she wanted Valkyrie there at all and that made her smile. "Sure, we'll come now."

With Nadia under her arm and unable to do anything else, and went to the snug where the girls had gathered everything they thought was important. That was, they had moved everything off of the floor except for pillows and a few beanbags and had only wine bottles, a ton of cider and a small amount of beer on the floor. The girls had enough alcohol to get all of the Dead Men _and_ all the Dead Men's friends very drunk. Valkyrie wasn't sure why they had so much. Alongside the alcohol, they had an empty bottle, some cards and a lot of sweet finger food.

"This looks fun," Valkyrie grinned. "Is that actually a bottle for Spin the Bottle? That seems cliché."

"Yep," Fleet grinned. "You and Nadia are welcome to not play, or you can. You're choice."

Nadia and Valkyrie looked at each other, but neither let on what they were feeling about the situation. "How about we play that later and decide then," Valkyrie said cautiously, trying to gauge how Nadia felt. Valkyrie was fairly open, at least to little kisses between friends that didn't actually want to date each other. Nothing sexual or romantic, of course. She'd never spoken about it with Nadia though because they'd never been asked to kiss other people before.

Fleet shrugged and nodded. "We can do that. I thought we'd play truth or dare first anyway."

"Yes, Master Fleet," Valkyrie said, taking her shoes off and sitting on a pillow. Nadia did the same and sat next to her, and on her other side, Tara sat down. Vasuda, for once, was further away from them. Drinks were passed around and Valkyrie and Nadia giggled with each other and chose to share a bottle between them. They popped it open and drank straight from the bottle, taking it in turns and already probably getting into it too quickly. Valkyrie had been allowed a little to drink before with her family, but not as much as this with such free choice over what she could drink, and she had more to go. It was exciting and liberating, and she could see from Nadia's face this was not her first time drinking like this.

"We're playing truth or dare!" Fleet shouted over their laughs and small talk. The girls, including Valkyrie, sat forwards and got ready. "This is how it works. We go around in a circle. Let's say I start. I can choose anyone to ask them truth or dare. The person to my left, in this case Prema, gets to ask someone of her choice next, but it cannot be the same person or exactly the same question. For the people asked! You can pick truth or dare, but no more than two truths before you _have_ to pick a dare! You can pick only one and if you refuse to do or answer what was asked, your forfeit is decided by the group. For all dares, you cannot choose to have someone kiss another person or take off clothes, but forfeits _can_ be that, so you better be sure what you choose because we all know we're going to make you do one of those two things. Everyone understand?"

Everyone did and Fleet began. "Okay. Charlotte." Charlotte groaned. "Truth or dare?"

She thought about it a moment and then said "Truth."

"Predictable. When did you lose your virginity?" Fleet grinned.

Valkyrie grinned and shook her head, but Charlotte took a drink from her cider bottle and answered. "I haven't."

Next was Prema, who asked Lian, who picked dare. Everyone grinned and sat forwards while Lain picked what she wanted. "I dare you… to text that creepy guy that you want to suck his dick!"

"Oh my God," Lian muttered as the rest of them laughed and asked if she'd do it. After a moment she reached into her bag, exclaimed "Fuck it!" and texted a guy that she wanted to suck his dick. They all looked at the phone and after she was cleared for doing it, it was Dhiya's turn to choose.

"Valkyrie!" Dhiya immediately said, turning to her. "Truth or dare?"

This needed strategy, Valkyrie could tell. If she picked dare, which was her first instinct, Dhiya was pretty over-excitable and would likely make her do something stupid, like prank call the Sanctuary or something like Lian had to do. She could only imagine the type of truth she'd have to answer, but it felt safer while she worked out what people wanted from everyone else. "Truth," she said.

There was some 'aww'ing and Valkyrie knew they were going to try and throw her in it. Even Nadia acted disappointed.

"Tell me…" Dhiya said allowed as she thought. "Have you ever kissed a man?"

"No, but I did have a boy kiss me on the cheek when I was, like, seven. I punched him in the face and got suspended for two days," she told her, feeling like that was an easy one.

Tara got to go next and picked on Zainab, which resulted in her getting dared to down the whole content of her glass of wine. It was pretty high and Zainab did it. After coughing and holding her throat, probably feeling it burn horribly, she got laughed at and announced she'd be sticking to water for a while.

Valkyrie got to choose someone after that. She looked over the group and after a bit of quick debate in her head, turned to Nadia. "Nadia. Truth or dare."

She smiled, half nervous, half giddy, and declared "Truth!" over the sound of the others egging her on.

"When was the first time you touched yourself over me!" Valkyrie said quick and the others exploded laughing and pushing Nadia to say.

Nadia blushed darkly and laughed also, barely able to get a word out before putting up a hand. Everyone went quiet and Nadia looked at the floor, trying to smother a grin. "After your family reunion party. We kissed and danced all night and I went home and… did it."

There was some begging for details but Nadia didn't have to say so they had to move on. It was Nadia's turn to pick. "Fleet, truth or dare?"

"Dare!" She almost shouted, gripping her bottle excitedly.

"Go tell Dexter what you think of him," Nadia said smoothly, sipping their bottle.

Fleet obviously hadn't expected that and looked as if she wanted to back out. She kept asking, what if he isn't alone, how am I meant to do that, this isn't fair, but Valkyrie was the one to pull her up, wrap an arm around her and pick her up. The others opened doors and they took her into the kitchen where Tanith, Dexter and Erskine were all drinking coffee. Valkyrie put Fleet down in front of Dexter and ran from the room and the girls listened in through the door pretending to give them 'privacy'.

"Err," Fleet said. Valkyrie could see she was both blushing and pale. "Umm…"

"Don't be shy," Dexter said, sipping his coffee and looking at her intensely over his mug. Tanith was already trying to hide her laughs.

"Errr," she said again, her voice a higher pitch. "I, err, I think you're really hot and I think you're great and I like your hair and you're great fun to talk to."

Fleet turned and left the room, her face bright red and the picture of mortification. Valkyrie and the others giggled quietly and ran ahead, keeping it in until they were in the snug and they let it all loose.

"That was awful!" Fleet said, getting back into her seat.

"It was great. Good one Nadia," Valkyrie laughed and high-fived her girlfriend.

When they had found peace again, it was Zainab's turn. She picked Vasuda, who picked truth, and was asked what the craziest thing she'd ever done was. She said it was the time she had snuck out of her parent's house to have sex with her boyfriend at sixteen. Next was Lian who chose Dhiya, who chose dare, and they had her text a sexual message to a boy Dhiya didn't like but was interested in her. It only took ten seconds for a dick-pic to come through.

After they 'eww'ed and pretended to gag and all the customary things that came with that, it was Vasuda's turn. It took a few moments of her looking at the ceiling to think before she looked at Nadia. "Nadia. Truth or dare."

Valkyrie made no reaction other than to look at Nadia and sip from the bottle. "Truth," she said.

"Last one!" Fleet interjected.

"Nadia, tell me," Vasuda said slowly, thinking, "is there anyone you have a secret crush on?"

Valkyrie had to hide a smirk.

"I'm dating Valkyrie?" Nadia said.

"I mean as well as her," Vasuda clarified.

"Yeah, a crush is different from fancying someone," Tara said, rolling her eyes. "And from _loving_ someone too. It's, like, you can love your husband or wife and have a celebrity crush, right? This is the same thing."

"Oh," Nadia nodded and thought about it. "Honestly, I don't watch telly, I don't know. I thought Mr Pyre was hot though."

"Not good enough!" Vasuda told her before anyone could agree or disagree. "Tell us a better one."

"I don't know. I mean, the movie from yesterday was hot, but I don't have a crush on anyone," Nadia said. Valkyrie put a hand on her back comfortingly.

"It's okay if you just like me," Valkyrie told her.

"Thanks, baby, I'm so grateful for all your support," Nadia smiled, giving her a kiss.

The others laughed and they moved on without a scene. Charlotte was next to choose and she went for Prema who picked dare. After a few moments, Charlotte dared her to send a message to an ex-boyfriend of hers and tell him to go suck a dick. Feeling like there was a pattern but also completely into it, Valkyrie watched as Prema very happily send a text to her ex-boyfriend telling him to eat a dick. About the same moment, the annoying guy Dhiya had dick-pic from gave them a follow-up and they all winced as Dhiya opened the message. It was a picture of his large, spotty face with his tongue out and eyes half-lidded. They all told her to put her phone away and she did.

It was back to the start and Fleet chose Tara, the only one not picked until then. She chose truth, Fleet immediately asked her what her dirtiest sexual fantasy was.

"Seriously, Fleet?" Tara asked. "That's nasty."

"That's the point," Fleet grinned.

"You turn into a weirdo when you drink, I hope you know that," Tara told Fleet. "It's of a group of men all wanting me. There."

"More details," Fleet grinned.

"Not a chance. Prema's turn."

Prema turned on Fleet. "Truth or dare?"

"Dare, of course," Fleet replied cockily, like she wasn't still horrified from what her last dare had led to.

"I dare you to send a picture of your feet to Dexter," she said, face straight.

Valkyrie lost it and began booming out laughter, just imagining his face, and offered to provide the number. Fleet glared and refused.

"I can't do that, I did a bad one last time. That's not fair," Fleet tried.

"You literally made the rules!" Prema laughed. "Are you forfeiting?"

"Oh my god, please don't, I can imagine his face!" Valkyrie laughed, barely able to control herself.

Fleet glared at her. "Yes, I'm forfeiting. That's an unfair dare!"

"It's not and you know it. Fleet, leave the room while we prepare your fate!" Fleet did that, giggling excitedly despite complaining it was all too cruel, and Prema looked back at them with an evil glint in her eyes. "She has to get naked."

"What?" Valkyrie asked.

"Val," Nadia said, holding Valkyrie's arm. "Last time we played this game, Fleet came up with the most insane and personal things for us to admit and do just so we'd forfeit and she could either get us to kiss people or get undressed. We weren't able to get her to forfeit at all. This is our chance!"

Valkyrie shook her head. "I'm not drunk enough for this game, am I?"

"Nope," Prema said. "I move to vote on her getting naked."

"No, that's mean," Valkyrie defended, and everyone looked at her like she was stupid. Even Nadia. Especially Nadia. "What? I just think it's mean. Just make her kiss someone or something."

"Like who? It's not fair on everyone else for her to kiss someone. I'd know, I've seen where that mouths been," Prema shot back.

"Okay, if you know where it's been, you are obviously the one to kiss her," Valkyrie said back sickly sweet.

Prema glared. "All who says Valkyrie has to kiss Fleet, say aye."

All hands around the room went up. Valkyrie's mouth opened in shock. "What? Nadia?"

"You have to kiss the drunk weirdo," she stated, taking a deep breath. "I'm sorry it had to come to this."

"Nadia. This is stupid, you can't–"

Valkyrie was cut off by the girls demanding Fleet come back in and she came back into the room with a giant grin. After some nudging, Valkyrie stood up. "They voted I have to kiss you."

Fleet frowned. "I thought I had to kiss someone? Not the other way around."

"Yeah, well they got mad I said you shouldn't have to take your clothes off. They really want you naked by the way. Just kiss me," Valkyrie demanded, looking at Nadia. Nadia just smirked, leaned back and sipped on the wine bottle like it was a show.

Fleet shrugged, stepped forwards, wrapped an arm around Valkyrie's neck and started kissing her. Valkyrie would have left it at a peck but the girls cheered and Fleet opened her mouth and suddenly their tongues were playing and Valkyrie was a bit confused but also enjoying the strange taste of orange chocolate and strawberry wine on Fleet's tongue. When she got a catcall from Nadia, she deepened the kiss herself, putting a hand on Fleet's waist and dancing her fingers around, pulling away with a bite tugging on Fleet's lower lip. Fleet was bright red, and Valkyrie was too. She just turned quickly and sat herself next to Nadia.

Fleet stumbled for a moment, got laughed at, and sat down fanning herself. Instead of being embarrassed, shocked, amused or literally anything Valkyrie thought Nadia would be, she was grinning proudly. Valkyrie shook her head, not sure how to feel. She at least wouldn't be contradicting any of the girls forfeit ideas from now on – plus Fleet was hot and that kiss had gotten her a bit bothered, which was never a problem when her girlfriend was also getting bothered by it.

The next few rounds were tame in comparison, including Valkyrie asking about Zainab's biggest kink which Valkyrie had thought was a good question – it was something unrepeatable – and then it was Nadia's turn. After her great round last time, they all looked at her eagerly.

"Valkyrie," she started, and Valkyrie felt her hopes die. "Truth or dare, sweetheart."

Valkyrie groaned and cursed herself because she knew, either way, Nadia would destroy her, and picked dare for the heck of it.

"Good choice. I dare you," Nadia began with a grin, "to send a picture of your boobs to your boss."

"Ha, jokes on you, I quit my job!" Valkyrie grinned triumphantly.

"Oh, what's that?" Nadia said, looking around the room. "Valkyrie can't complete her dare? Guess we'll go for an _automatic forfeit_!"

Valkyrie's mouth opened in horror and got shoved, pushed and manhandled out of the room. At the end of the corridor, Tanith, Dexter and Erskine were standing with fresh mugs and smiling.

"Alright, Val?" Tanith asked.

"Nadia dared me to do something I literally couldn't do and they twisted my words so it looks like I forfeited. Now I have to do anything they say. I've already had to kiss Fleet and I didn't even lose that time!" Valkyrie complained.

"Why did she forfeit?" Dexter asked.

"They dared her to send a picture of her feet to you and she thought that was worse than telling you her feelings. Then I said we _shouldn't_ make her get naked, so I had to kiss her as punishment," Valkyrie explained. "I think they're going to make me get naked."

Dexter nodded. "Sounds like a cool game. Can I play?"

"Several people in this room are minors and you are not. That is not okay to even joke about," Valkyrie reminded him. "Next time for sure. Fleet might wet herself."

"Sounds good to me," he grinned with a wink.

"Can I play? As a woman, I am much less susceptible to the law," Tanith smirked.

"Again, still not okay, but I feel this will be happening in the future, and I want to be there please. Now, if you'll excuse me, they are calling me in to meet my doom," Valkyrie said and entered the room again. She looked at Nadia.

"We've decided that the only right thing to do is give you a choice," Nadia said diplomatically, taking a swing from the bottle. "Since it wasn't your fault you had to forfeit, you can choose – kiss someone of your choice on the mouth outside of this room, whom would be your sibling so I wouldn't recommend it, or take off an item of clothing. It will be placed in the middle of the room to be collected at a later time if you earn it back – bear in mind you are literally wearing just underwear and a dress."

Valkyrie looked around at the girls, turned and left the room. They all gasped and followed her out, staring after her as she matched up to Tanith, grabbed her face, smooshed their lips together quickly and let her go. "I'm so sorry," she told her sister and marched back into the room.

The other just laughed at her, including Tanith who could be heard roaring with laughter even after the door was closed. Zainab had to go next and Valkyrie could see she wanted to ask follow-ups to Valkyrie but couldn't. Instead, she asked Charlotte who had done two truth's previously and so had to pick dare. She was dared to send a picture of herself to a guy of choice in her phone, so long as it wasn't family, which ended up being Charlotte's brothers best friend much to her horror, but she was powerless to stop it as she feared the forfeit so much. Lian dared Tara to steal a bottle from the kitchen she'd seen earlier, a bottle of whiskey Valkyrie knew she'd be in trouble for later, and actually managed it without getting spotted.

Eventually, they played two or three full goes around with almost every single person picking dare and having to take a shot. Once at the point they felt the game had degraded into who could get each other the drunkest the fastest, they concluded it was time for a quick spin the bottle tournament.

"What's that?" Valkyrie asked, and was actually happily surprised. What she had thought was a deck of cards was actually a deck of challenges. They would spin the bottle as a group and whoever it landed on, no matter what, had to do the challenge they picked up from the deck of cards. They would take it in turns spinning because, if it was a challenge for another person, they'd use the spinner. For example, Nadia told her, the first time she had ever spun the bottle it had landed on Prema, and Prema had been challenged to lick the spinners armpit. Bad for the two of them. Valkyrie nodded, sort of happy she didn't have to kiss people but also more worried.

"Valkyrie you start!" Fleet said.

Being certainly drunk now, Valkyrie spun the bottle and it span and span and landed on Prema. Fleet giggled madly and read out, "Feed each other."

Everyone smiled and nodded at the easy first go, and Prema and Valkyrie got to have a piece of chocolate each which was good. Nadia spun next and it landed on Tara who was dared to do a handstand. Being so drunk, Valkyrie was immediately fearful for her carpets, but it ended up being alright as Tara did a half-assed handstand and sat back down safely.

Both Zainab and Lian spun the bottle, each time landing on each other and getting fairly rubbish challenges, and then it was Vasuda's turn. Obviously, it landed on Nadia.

Grinning, Fleet grabbed the card and then gasped and said quickly, "Vasuda has to lick Nadia's belly."

Valkyrie's body went cold and her face went blank. All happiness left her body. "No," she said. "Get another card."

"It's the rules," Fleet said drunkenly.

"New card," Valkyrie repeated. Nadia just bit her lip and said nothing. "Just pick a new one and do that."

Fleet shrugged and went to do it but Vasuda put her hand up. "The rules are, as well all agreed to almost a year ago, if the victim doesn't do the challenge, the only forfeit is to kiss the other person."

Valkyrie felt like punching her right then and there. She was sure Nadia said something, but she and Vasuda were glaring at each other.

"It's the rules," Vasuda told her.

"It's not happening," Valkyrie countered.

"You wouldn't be mad if it was someone else," Vasuda claimed correctly. Valkyrie would have enjoyed the show just as Nadia enjoyed her and Fleet kissing, but again, that was with someone who wasn't emotionally involved. Emotions changed everything. "Follow the game rules. You're ruining it for the rest of us."

Perhaps it was the alcohol, or maybe it was just a bad, drunken attempt at stopping a fight, but Fleet spoke over them and said it was the rules. All the other girls agreed and brought up times they did things they hadn't wanted to, and only after that asked what Nadia wanted. Valkyrie could tell she felt backed into a corner, but Valkyrie's own drunkenness saw Nadia's begrudged willingness to do the challenge. There was no way that was happening.

"Nope! I forfeit for Nadia, it's not happening!" Valkyrie said loudly and quickly, standing up. "Pick something horrible, now!"

The girls started arguing about whether or not it was okay to forfeit for someone else and what they would even pick as Vasuda got up as well. In the end, they decided that they could only let the challenge fall to Valkyrie. Vasuda would have to lick Valkyrie's belly.

"What?!" They both yelled.

The girls seemed stumped until, thankfully, a much more sober-than-the-rest-of-them Charlotte grabbed the card, put it on the back of the pile and took the next one. "Nadia, you have to eskimo kiss Vasuda."

Valkyrie almost fought that one too but Nadia pulled her down and went over to Vasuda. It went well, too well, as Nadia leaned in and gently rubbed her nose over Vasuda's.

And then Vasuda leaned in, grabbed Nadia's head and pressed their lips together.


	143. Bye-bye

**Chapter 143**

There was a moment of shock and then Nadia made a noise, not one of pleasure or humour, but of 'I-can't-get-away-help' and Valkyrie had had enough. She jumped up, stumbling a little, grabbed one of Vasuda's hands, pulling it away from Nadia. Except, she had a grip on Nadia's hair and when Valkyrie did that, it pulled on Nadia's head. Nadia's cry of pain got the others to start telling Vasuda to stop and she gave up trying to kiss Nadia.

"Get off of me!" Nadia immediately cried when her mouth was free to use again.

Vasuda's face darkened and she tried to lean in and force Nadia to kiss her again, but Valkyrie was still quick enough, and probably stupid enough, to grab Vasuda by the throat and pushed her back. It worked as she let Nadia's hair go, but she also flailed and fell to the ground in a heap and gagged violently. Valkyrie supposed she had used more force than necessary, as she was a very strong, tall young woman and Vasuda was a small, weak little piglet.

Nadia burst out crying and Valkyrie turned in time for Nadia to throw herself onto Valkyrie and sob on her shoulder.

"I should have believed you!" She kept saying, as well as "I'm sorry!" and "Why did she do that?" Valkyrie just tried to calm her down, rubbing her back and telling her it wasn't her fault that Vasuda was a disgusting idiot.

Charlotte, Dhiya and Prema were rubbing Nadia's back and telling her it was alright, trying to comfort her, while the others either looked away out of embarrassment for what Vasuda had done or outright glared at Vasuda. No one said anything to her and she had stopped gagging and was just quiet now. Valkyrie didn't care and after a few minutes trying to calm Nadia down unsuccessfully, she decided it was all to do with Vasuda being in close proximity and told the others they were going and just left with Nadia. She didn't know that the others planned on doing but she did not care at that point, especially as the last half hour of drinking had hit her system all at once and she knew for a fact she was stumbling and slurring her words and was really not sober in any way.

She kept her head enough to go into the kitchen where Tanith, Erskine and Dexter were once more and sat heavily in a chair, Nadia following onto her lap heavily and still crying uncontrollably.

"What's happening?" Dexter immediately asked, putting his mug down and rushing over.

"Vasuda practically assaulted Nadia!" Valkyrie immediately said, then felt very lightheaded and swayed a bit before continuing. "Nadia was challenged to eckemo kiss Vasuda, so she did, and then Vasuda grabbed Nadia and kissed her and Nadia couldn't get away and got hurt and Vasuda pulled her hair and now she's _crying_."

"What happened to Vasuda?" Dexter asked.

"I grabbed her by the throat and probably hurt her. She fell over and was just sitting there when we left," Valkyrie said, trying to say everything as not-drunkly as she could. "I hate her stupid face."

Dexter sighed and rubbed Nadia on the back. "Nadia? Honey, will you calm down and talk to us?"

Valkyrie was almost surprised by his change in tone but put it down to her being too drunk to understand how to talk – sober-her would have thought that was stupid but drunk-her didn't know how to form proper thoughts anymore – and it actually worked. Nadia very quickly started to breath better and stopped crying so badly and within five minutes of Dexter talking softly to her, Nadia was still upset but much better. She even sat in her own seat.

"Come on, talk to us," Erskine said, sitting down too and trying a smile. "Tell us what's got you so upset. Other than being kissed."

"She kissed me," Nadia just said sadly.

"And why has that upset you so much?" Tanith asked, stroking Nadia's hair.

"She hurt me."

"How?"

"She hurt my hair and my head and my face."

"Your face?" Erskine asked.

"She put her face on my face really hard," Nadia said, her words starting to slur as badly as Valkyrie's. "And it was just like what _Emily_ did."

"Who's Emily?" Tanith asked with a frown.

"She's who Nadia dated at school," Valkyrie tried to whisper, but actually just very breathily said in a louder voice. "She was a bitch and not nice."

"Yeah," Nadia agreed, looking up at Tanith with big eyes. "She was a dick."

Tanith just nodded. "And she hurt you?"

"Yeah, she made me kiss her too," Nadia said, looking at the table. "I thought Valkyrie was wrong but she was right. I feel stupid and like I've drunk too much and I want to go to bed."

Valkyrie nodded definitely far too much. Dexter and Erskine half carried, half marched the two of them to their bedroom upstairs. The three helped them out of their clothes and into big old tops Valkyrie had taken from Anton, Erskine and Dexter over the years. She had no idea which used to be whose anymore. They were loose on their bodies which helped with the amount of liquid in their bellies. Her brothers and sister than helped them take off makeup and spoke softly to get them to tell them their symptoms, none of them caring at all about the girl's nakedness nor the fact they looked like overgrown toddlers in just big shirts and no pants.

Valkyrie was a lot worse off than Nadia and had drunk almost five large shots of whiskey, over half of the wine bottle in the snug, two glasses of wine at the restaurant and one bottle of cider. She recalled Dexter telling her off for mixing her drinks and him, Tanith and Erskine claiming they had to teach her how to drink when she threw up into the bin Tanith was already holding up to her face without Valkyrie ever realising.

After drinking a lot of water and being almost thrown into bed, Valkyrie and Nadia passed out within seconds of each other.

.*****.

Morning came way too early and with a banging headache and stomach-ache. Valkyrie had only woken up because Nadia had woken and dropped her glass of water on the floor and swore.

Groaning, Valkyrie drank half her own water, took the medicine which was on the side and gave her glass to Nadia who was looking at her with pleading, big eyes. The memories of last night came to her quickly and she was sure she remembered almost everything, even if it wasn't word for word. The amount of alcohol she had to drink was awful, she knew. No wonder she threw up before bed. Wincing, Valkyrie remembered that some of the other girls had drunk even more than her and were a lot smaller, so she assumed it was going to be bad for them. Then again, she was a pretty new drinker, the others had done this before.

Plus, although she was in pain, she was able to think more rationally about Vasuda.

She tried to ignore those thoughts in favour of helping Nadia. They needed to clean themselves, so they quickly went to their shared bathroom, moving quickly so they wouldn't have to put anything else on under their oversized shirts, and they got showered and then sat in a seriously hot bath for almost half an hour just pruning and feeling warm and happy with all the bubbles.

They got out and decided they needed a pampering despite both of them had headaches, and they stayed in the steaming bathroom with nose pour strips on and did each other's nails, and then put on moisturising masks because they were dehydrated and Nadia was convinced it would help, and whilst it did its thing they put mousses and oils into their hairs to make it seriously soft and then braided each other's hair. They left the room almost two hours after they entered it, got themselves in some comfortable clothes and finally decided they couldn't put off going downstairs any longer because they were starting to feel sick from not eating.

The girls were down there, all eight of them, plus all of Valkyrie's family including Ghastly and Laila who were spending valuable time together once more. It always lifted Valkyrie's spirits to see them spend time together, so she got to smile at least a bit. Valkyrie didn't so much as look at the other girls at all as she sat down at the table and served herself and Nadia a plate of English cooked breakfast. Their plates consisted primarily of hash browns.

"Fun morning?" Tanith asked, looking at their nails.

"Yeah, it was alright," Valkyrie said, and then silence reigned once more. It was a little awkward but Valkyrie ploughed through. No one left the table even when they had finished as they waited for her. Solomon and Anton were standing since there weren't enough seats, waiting also. She was sure it was giving the girls some anxiety, but Valkyrie could see they were worried and being protective, wanting to see what Valkyrie chose to do considering what Vasuda had done. Of course, it would help if Valkyrie even knew what to do with her.

She started by clearing her throat and looking at the girl, who looked back. She was obviously unwell, although they probably all were to at least some degree, and had eaten very little. She stared at Valkyrie with a mix of emotions, the main being nervousness.

"Vasuda," Valkyrie started, leaning back in her chair. " _What_ the _fuck_ were you thinking?"

Vasuda swallowed before answering. "I wasn't. I had too much to drink. I'm sorry."

"Sorry for what? Drinking too much? Sorry to _me_ for drinking too much? I think you've gotten onto the wrong end of the stick if you think that's what's got everyone upset with you," Valkyrie told her flatly. She barely felt any emotions towards the girl other than a vague dislike – it was almost surprising but Valkyrie felt she had used up all her ability to deal with the girl. From the moment she landed in Ireland Valkyrie had felt everything she was meant to, and now she just wanted it finished so she could quietly live with Nadia and her family and train and fight people like a normal girl.

"No," Vasuda said quickly, her eyes narrowing for just a millisecond, enough for Valkyrie's detective eyes to see the anger and hate behind her mask. "I'm sorry to Nadia that I kissed her when I shouldn't. I'm sorry, Nadia. Can you forgive me?"

Some of the girls glanced at Nadia, but mostly the judgement was on Valkyrie it seemed. Valkyrie shook her head. "Nadia can forgive you in her own time. You can't ask for it in front of people and expect her to answer back, that's pressuring her."

"Well, it's true," Vasuda said back more hotly. "I do hope she forgives me because I'm sorry."

Valkyrie just shrugs. A thought occurred to her and she smiled at Vasuda. "So. What are your plans for getting home today?"

The others seemed alarmed, but they stayed quiet and relaxed slowly as they realised Valkyrie only meant for Vasuda to leave. She wasn't sure how Nadia would appreciate Valkyrie's decision, but she had already made her mind up that Vasuda wasn't staying.

Vasuda looked at her plate and back up again a few times, realising she had actually dug a hole she couldn't get out of. "I'll phone my parents," she said slowly, and Valkyrie nodded.

"Sounds good. A taxi will be here in," she looked at the clock on her phone, "three hours for you. More than enough time to book a plane, pack and say your goodbyes. You should probably get into it though, they're, like, five and a half hours ahead of us in India."

Vasuda didn't need much encouragement to leave the dining room to go talk to her parents. Valkyrie wasn't sure what story she'd give them but it didn't matter. There were some questions to Nadia after that all asking how she was and if the two of them were well, and the couple asked about Nadia's friends in return. Being as they all didn't feel the greatest after going way overboard the night before on drinks, they decided to have a nice, relaxing day indoors.

Her family in tow, they set up movies and talked all day, not seeing Vasuda at all until the taxi at the front gate beeped its horn and Vasuda looked into the parlour where not one of them turned to look at her and she left the house with her suitcase, having to go all the way up the drive to get to her car. No one mentioned it or talked about it at all.

Laila got loved on a ton by all the girls, and although Tanith had started to get really healthy again and was breastfeeding almost exclusively now, she let the girls feed her through the day with some breastmilk she had pumped and stored for later. Ghastly didn't seem to mind as he had had Laila last night and was tired. Tanith left to pump more milk – she had been given a lot of encouragement by the baby caring course she was on and was very strict about it while also not putting too much pressure on herself – and other than fussing over babies, the girls watched movies and ate Anton's food and had a good time with Valkyrie's family.

Dexter and Saracen stuck close to Nadia, though Valkyrie didn't know why and none of them gave any indication as to why. Valkyrie assumed they were just being protective.

As evening came around, the girls got really into talking about house plans. Most of the detail went into Valkyrie and Nadia's personal rooms, primarily what the bedroom would look like. Erskine got them to talk about other details he needed and Valkyrie just sat back and enjoyed being with her family, getting a hug from Solomon also as they sat quietly together. She really enjoyed that.

They slept in the room at the back of the house with Nadia's now seven friends for their last night, and in the morning it was all panic for them as they tried to work out whose makeup was whose and tried to pack everything away. Valkyrie and Nadia sat around and tried to be patient, and when they were ready for the final time, they got into rented cars once more and were driven to the airport.

Hugs went all around and Fleet kissed both Valkyrie and Dexter on the cheek for the fun of it and they all got a laugh out of it, and Valkyrie and Nadia held hands as the seven tearily left for their departing plane.

"Ready to go home?" Valkyrie asked Nadia softly.

"Yeah," Nadia smiled, the bags under her eyes accentuating quite how ready she was. "I'm going to sleep for a week."


	144. The 'M' word

**Chapter 144**

Two weeks went by in which Valkyrie officially finished in her job as a Sanctuary Detective and on the day of her seventeenth birthday, she was officially instated as a Dead Man in the eyes of the Sanctuary. Her family said it was all just fanfare because she was already a Dead Man, but Nadia's eyes shined brightly when she wore her fancy suit uniform. The Sanctuary had secretly gotten together all the medals and awards they had been trying to give her and her brothers for a while and threw the metal at them while they were doing the _short_ speech, so there was that as well. It was embarrassing and unnecessary but also sort of thrilling to wear badges of honour, two medals and all sorts of traditional Mage medals for all the things she'd done in such a small time.

Still, she threw them off into the special bag Ghastly had gotten her as soon as she got back and into the very back of the cupboard they went.

Her birthday was relaxed and calm and nothing happened, except all the little milestones for little Laila. The weeks after her birthday went by quickly and soon it was in mid-November, making Laila a month and a half. In that time, they only got three calls for small jobs for the Dead Men so they were ready when the next one came in.

"Hey, Val," Fletcher said from outside her bedroom door.

Valkyrie looked over at him from her position in bed reading, her face the picture of surprise. She forgot he even lived with her sometimes. "Oh, hi, Fletcher. I, er, wasn't expecting you. How are you?"

"I'm alright," he nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets. His hair was even longer than the last time she had seen him. "You?"

"Grand, grand, I'm grand, yeah," she nodded back, putting the book down. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"Oh, yeah, I just wanted to ask about these house plans you had. Anton told me you were doing up the place and I would have to go–"

"Oh, God, yeah!" Valkyrie suddenly remembered. "We're redecorating the place. Well, doing a full remodel actually. I forgot I had to tell you, sorry."

"It's fine," he shrugged again.

"I assume you'll move to Australia," Valkyrie continued. "Since Myra lives there, I mean. I'd offer for you to stay in the guest area while it's made, but obviously they're going to destroy everything so there isn't a guest area, so you'll have to leave. I think we aren't starting for a while yet."

"Anton said it would be in a few weeks," Fletcher told her.

"A few weeks?!" Valkyrie gasped. She hadn't known that. "He didn't tell me. Oh my God, I don't even know where _I'm_ going."

Fletcher laughed and seemed to relax a bit, making Valkyrie guilty that she hadn't spoken to him earlier. It must have been stressful finding out he was being kicked out of his home soon. "Yeah, that's what he said. And yeah, I'll move to Australia I guess, I like the heat."

"And you can still get to work here," she smiled.

"Yep," he said, popping the _p_ and bouncing on his heels nervously. "Myra's looking forward to it. She was saying about getting an apartment together and stuff."

"Sounds like you two are pretty serious," Valkyrie commented.

"Yeah, I really like her, you know?" He said, running a hand over his stupid hair. "I think she was a bit, you know, taken aback by the sudden need to move but she's alright with it. She said that we should do something together, like, dinner or something. I realised we didn't say happy birthday so we figured we'd take you to dinner."

"Oh, that would be lovely," Valkyrie said, smiling now. "It's alright, I had a small birthday this year. The big one's next year."

"Yeah, eighteen next year. Nadia's almost eighteen, right?" Valkyrie nodded. "Wow, you two have been together forever. You really like her too, huh?"

"Yeah, four years now. I love her a lot," she admitted quietly, smiling. "Once we've finished the house, and we've sorted this whole Spider business I, err… I want to ask her to marry me."

"What?" Fletcher said, eyes budging out of his head. "Wow Val! That's, like, a really big step."

"I know, I know, it's just been on my mind for a while," she said quickly. "And anyway, there's no way I'd do it before the house and Spiders were dealt with too. I'd like for Laila to be older and for Nadia have a good relationship with her family again, and for Skulduggery to be back from therapy too. I wouldn't do it before then. I need that back first. I wouldn't have said but other than Nadia you're the only one my age and I don't want my family to try and tell me I'm rushing into things, you know?"

"Yeah, no, I get that," he nodded. Valkyrie invited him in and he sat on the end of the bed. "Do you have a ring?"

"No, but I do have something else," she smiled secretly and pulled out an old, hidden trinket from her bedside table drawer. "This is a Dragon Diamond. I accidentally acquired it."

"I've never seen one before," Fletcher said, looking at it with interest.

"They're really rare. This one is bonded to me because I touched it first. Or rather, I'm the first since the original owners died, so I'm the new owner. Make sense? It's an item mages used to have within the richest circles to give to others they loved. I was told it would, like, glow or something if the person I gave it to was in love with me back. It's not an engagement ring and I wouldn't use it for that, but it's pretty good still. I hope it'll be one of these fancy things that makes Nadia's family realise I'm serious and maybe they'll be a bit more approving. They seem to like the more traditional, old ways."

"Yeah, I'd say so," Fletcher nodded. "Good luck to find it by accident."

"Yeah, it was. I was with some other detectives and were really mad because I got it in a puzzle they couldn't do," she said and then put it safely away again, glad to get that off her chest. "Anyway. How have you been?"

"Working, mostly," he told her. "Myra has exams so she mostly stays in Australia. Actually, I thought we'd go for lunch today 'cause Myra's lecturer gave her a half day and she doesn't have any other time for weeks."

"Oh, yeah, that's fine," Valkyrie said, grabbing her phone and texting Nadia the plan, who was in Tanith's room helping with Laila so Tanith could do laundry. "Nadia will be ready soon."

It took a little bit, but not long later they were presentable enough for lunch and Fletcher teleported them out to Venice, to a little shop with massive pizza's, amazing pasta and giant ice creams. Valkyrie held out Nadia's chair and then sat herself, getting an eye roll from Fletcher for the unnecessary niceties. She stuck her tongue out at him when Nadia and Myra were talking about how good it was to see each other again, getting a smirk back.

They ordered food and when their drinks had come, they started talking.

"How is uni then?" Valkyrie asked Myra.

"Oh, it's good," she said sweetly, her large eyes gentle and calm. "I'm doing a baking course as well at the moment. It's really fun."

"Sounds it."

"And Fletcher loves all the treats I bring home," she smiled and Fletcher nodded. "So, how has your work been? I heard you quit your job?"

"Yeah, I wanted more time at home, and I'll be needed with helping to track down the Spiders and such later," she said, nodded like people did when they didn't know what to say, because that's how she felt.

"Did they find someone good to replace you?" Myra asked as their lunches were put on the table.

"Yeah, a woman called Amelia somethingorother," Valkyrie said, digging into her mushroom risotto. "I forget her whole name, but she's really good. Elder Deuce wasn't very impressed I left though."

Myra nodded and Fletcher asked Nadia about her family and how she was, and they spoke a little about how Fletcher had been through similar things after his mother died and he had been cut off from a lot of his family before he had even left. It was sad, but also nice because Nadia seemed a lot more comfortable talking after that. She assumed it was because of how intense things had been with the Spiders and the time Fletcher had saved Nadia that it made Nadia uncomfortable, but Fletcher was calm and collected, and Myra mostly spent her time asking about how the Dead Men were doing and about the plans for the house now they were changing it. It was a pleasant meal.

They went home after a drink, Valkyrie insisting on paying at least half, and then they were home once more. It was incredible how disorienting teleporting could be. It felt like she hadn't left in the first place.

And on cue for their arrival home, Valkyrie's phone started ringing. She picked it up, seeing it was Crystal's number.

"Hi, Crystal," Valkyrie said conversely. "How are you?"

"Stephanie," she said quietly down the line. "I – I need to talk to you."

Valkyrie frowned, feeling on edge. "What's happened? What's wrong?"

"Mr Hagan's shop was burnt down," Crystal said, her voice shaking. "I saw your friend – Tanith and someone else. They did it, Stephanie. I – I think I saw them doing magic."


	145. Some explaining

**Chapter 145**

Valkyrie sat in the car by the pier waiting for Crystal to arrive. She was alone and seething mad. Nadia had disappeared quickly when Valkyrie said she needed some time alone, which was when she phoned her sister and started screaming about the idiotic thing she had done and that she'd been seen by her mortal cousin.

That was when Valkyrie had learnt that Nadia had known Tanith was going to be 'teaching Hagan a lesson'.

Valkyrie hadn't bothered to find Nadia and be mad at her. She'd just hung up the phone, got in the car, and told Crystal to meet her.

She was snapped out of her thoughts by Crystal opening the car door and sitting down. She didn't say anything or look at Valkyrie. Valkyrie drove back to Grimwood Manor.

"Come in," she said when she was parked in the garage. Crystal nodded silently and got out the car, following Valkyrie in. She took her to the snug which was now clean and back to what it was before the party. "What did you see?"

Crystal shook her head. "I don't know. I – I just saw your friend Tanith standing on the side of a wall, and someone else was throwing fire from their hands. I didn't know what to do. It looked like magic! I was going to call the police but then I saw Tanith so I called you…"

"Thank you," Valkyrie said sincerely. "It wouldn't have done any good if you had told the police what you saw."

"What do you mean?" Crystal whispered, eyes big and scared, but also incredibly curious.

Valkyrie had to smile. "They were doing magic Crystal. You were right."

"What?" Crystal said after a long pause.

"They did magic. We can all do magic. I wouldn't be surprised if you could do magic," Valkyrie told her very calmly. In her head, she was going the math. Crystal was not much older than her. She had time to learn and be a sorcerer if she wanted. And very, very suddenly, Valkyrie desperately wanted her cousin to join her in the magical community.

"They did? I could do that?"

"I mean, if you want to. Tanith's power, I guess you could call it, is walking on walls. That other person you saw? They're what we call an Elemental. The magic world is split, for the most part, in two – you can be an Elemental or an Adept. Elementals have the ability to manipulate the elements, that being water, air, fire and earth, just like that man you saw with the fire. The Adepts are pretty free to have essentially any magic they want, but it tends to be small. Like, Tanith can only walk on surfaces, but an Elemental could potentially, theoretically, have as much unlimited ability to manipulate the elements as they want, so long as they train and practice. There are magics people are born with, and branches that change people on a really deep level, but in general those are the big two. Does that make sense?"

"I guess?" She said.

"Good. I learnt to do both because I'm young and can do that. But when you get to about the age we are now, you have a Surge, where you pick just one magic and stick with it for life."

"So you can throw fire too?"

"I could, but I chose to be an Adept," Valkyrie said, not wanting to talk about the whole ordeal that led to her having weird, white power throwing abilities. "So is Tanith, Anton, Dexter and Saracen. We all have different powers from each other. The others, that being Erskine, Skulduggery and Ghastly, are Elementals. Oh, and my friend Solomon is an Adept, on a large branch called Necromancy. And Nadia knows everything still, she hasn't had her Surge."

"But she's older than you?" Crystal asked, trying very hard to take it all in.

"Yes, but things don't always go by who's oldest, you know?" Valkyrie smiled. "Tanith was seventeen when she had her Surge, but I know Dexter was almost twenty-one when he had his, and I was sixteen. It's not really set in stone when it will happen."

She nodded. "And you said I could learn?"

Valkyrie grinned. "Absolutely! I mean, there is a chance you won't be able to do it, but we can try and see, right?"

"Yeah," Crystal grinned. "I can't believe you've known about all this for so long! And you can do it too!"

"Of course," Valkyrie said. "Gordon knew the whole time, you know. He didn't tell me until he died and my brothers were made my guardians and they told me. He had raised me to be their apprentice when I was older but he died and they took me on earlier than expected."

"That's really cool."

"I know. And now I get to show you magic!" Valkyrie said, her excitement making her laugh. "We need to show you how to do Elemental magic first. It's the easiest to begin with and simple to get a good grasp of. Come on!"

Valkyrie got up and her cousin followed her out of the snug and around to the kitchen where her family now was. Tanith, Erskine and Nadia were sat at the table looking at her guiltily and frowned when they saw her happily pulling Crystal behind her.

"Family, this is Crystal, newly educated to the fact magic exists. Crystal, meet your new tutors. Since they decided to go to a mortal town and burn down a building without having any feasible reason for doing so, they will be teaching you all you need to know about magic as quickly as they can so you can choose a cool magic before you Surge."

Crystal nodded, but it seemed the confidence and excitement that came with being told you were suddenly going to learn magic had made her loose-lipped. "I mean, Mr Hagan wasn't very nice to be fair…"

Valkyrie gave her a look and she shut up.

"No, no," Tanith said sweetly. "Please, tell us more."

Crystal looked at Valkyrie and didn't say anything.

"Crystal didn't mean anything by that," Valkyrie told them in a cold voice, stopping all conversation. "I will talk about this later with you, but not yet. First, we need to get Crystal up to speed on names and rules."

"Right," Nadia nodded, trying to get away from Valkyrie's annoyance at her and the other two. "Crystal, a mage's name is really important. The name you're born with is your Chosen name because someone else chose it for you. That name is dangerous because people, other mages, can use it to control you."

"What?" Crystal said, eyes wide again. "How?"

"It takes your free will away and makes you do things you don't want to," Nadia told her softly, getting her to sit with her at the small kitchen table. Valkyrie sat next to her. "For instance: Crystal, give me that mug."

Without meaning to, Crystal picked up the mug and gave it to Nadia, face paling just a bit.

"See?" Nadia kindly told her. "It's really dangerous. To protect ourselves, we have to seal our Chosen name by taking a Taken name. This name will be something that we choose for ourselves and we feel a connection to. Such as, you know your cousin as Stephanie Edgley, because that's her Chosen name. But I can't control her with that name because she sealed it by having a Taken name – Valkyrie Cain."

"Val-cry?" Crystal said, looking at Valkyrie.

"No, Val-ker-ry. Valkyrie Cain. And before Nadia was Nadia Robin, she was Sakina Keena. Her Chosen last name is her mother's Taken name," Valkyrie explained. "Since we can't pass down family names, we tend to give a parents name to our kids to blend in with non-magic folks. Or families with a lot of magic generations like Tanith's have three or two family names for male and female children and just switch them out for each kid."

"Okay," she nodded. "So I need a new name for myself. And it needs to fit me as a person like Valkyrie and Nadia fit you two?"

"Exactly. I imagine your name will be more like Nadia's though," Valkyrie smiled. "I have a more adventurous name. Valkyrie means chooser of soldiers souls, and everyone always says it sounds ominous and since a lot of people think I'm arrogant, I expect my name hasn't helped my image."

"Okay," Crystal said.

"But Nadia is more average, and so is Tanith, Dexter and Solomon. Erskine is a bit more out there, but he can get away with it with non-magic people if he has to. But Skulduggery and Ghastly are personal and right for those two people but they're obviously not so normal," Valkyrie continued to explain. "I'm with them. So if I ever talk to a non-magic person and tell them my name, I go by Valery. Ghastly avoids those conversations and sticks to only interacting with mages, as does Skulduggery although he has a cool magic trick to help him out for _other_ reasons now."

"Alright, so I need a name for myself that isn't weird," Crystal said.

Tanith cut in. "Actually, I think Valkyrie is being a bit confusing." Valkyrie stuck her tongue out. "What she's trying to say is, when you pick your name, think hard because you're stuck with it. If it's a bit out there like Ghastly or Valkyrie, you'll have to be careful who you talk to or how you present yourself. If you don't, you won't have that worry. But that's not to say that Valkyrie doesn't fit Valkyrie perfectly, and that makes covering it up to certain people worth it every time. The name is a summary of who you are inside. Valkyrie gets judged based on what her name is because that's who she is from outside in. Nadia, for example, often gets ignored and pushed around because her name is soft and people assume she's the same. That's not to say Valkyrie isn't the most loving, gentle person with her friends and family, and it isn't to say Nadia can't hold her own in a tough spot. Does that make sense?"

Crystal nodded thoughtfully. "I want a name that means me even if it's weird, and I'll know if it's okay to have a weird name based on how willing I am to have to hide it regularly."

"In a nutshell," Tanith grinned.

"Do I get a middle name too?"

"Most people don't," Tanith shrugged. "But you can have one if you want. It's your name, you choose. Some people take a single name, rather than a first and last."

Crystal nodded.

"Anyway, choosing a name takes time, I was fifteen when I decided on mine and I didn't tell anyone for a long time. And I bet the others will want to chip in their two cents in too," Tanith said. "No one will make you do anything with your Chosen name from now onwards in this house, so you don't need to panic. Now come on, let's go show you some magic."

**.*****.**

"What happened?" Valkyrie quietly asked Tanith. Crystal, Solomon and Erskine were currently showing Crystal magical theory. Or rather, Solomon was while Erskine was excitedly waiting for Crystal to pick it up so they could fireball fight. They'd tried telling him that wasn't going to happen but he was so excited waiting they just gave up after a while.

Tanith sighed. "We had to do something."

"Really?" Valkyrie asked, keeping her voice low. "Why did you choose to do… this?"

"To be fair, it was meant to be just wrecking his property," Tanith admitted. "But then we looked around and got Corrival to ask around in the Sanctuary for an online check and it was pretty bad Val. I know you don't want to talk about it, which is why we _didn't_ talk about it, but it's obvious something happened. And the online stuff was disturbing. Since our hands are tied for legally punishing him, we thought we'd do something personal."

"It was stupid." Tanith didn't say anything and their silence dragged. "What did you do to Hagan?"

Tanith was quiet for a long moment. "He wasn't meant to be there."

"Tanith–"

"His timetable said he would be closed that day," Tanith whispered quickly. "It's a Wednesday, not a holiday, we assumed he was gone on business. That's why we went today. We broke in the back and had already started the fires when he came out of a hatch in the floor."

Valkyrie took a shallow breath and nodded. She felt her head get light and didn't talk out of fear of letting on her emotions connected to that hatch in the floor.

Tanith looked at her closely but didn't change her expression. Valkyrie was thankful. "We didn't mean to get him in the crossfire, but we also didn't want to risk exposure. Or that's what we're going with."

"Right."

"You weren't even meant to know this happened until you went and visited your cousin in Haggard," Tanith continued.

"Right," Valkyrie said shortly.

"But he'd done some pretty horrid things," Tanith finished.

"So you killed him."

Tanith said nothing.

"Right," Valkyrie said once more and went to walk away.

"Val," Tanith said properly, touching her arm. "This was meant to be us punishing him for our personal fun, not killing him for revenge. Do you understand? A person can't hurt as many people as he has before someone like me comes around. Alright?"

"Yeah," she said, keeping her head down.

"Look at me."

"I don't want to."

Tanith silently let her go but Valkyrie didn't leave.

"I didn't want this to become a _thing_ ," she muttered. "The Elder's are going to go mad when they find out you killed someone."

"They won't," Tanith reassured her. "He died of the fumes of the fire after getting caught in his own shop fire. Firefighters will find him and his stash of _personal belongings_ down the hatch. Even if they suspect someone helped the fires along, there's no connection to us and no one will put any effort into helping someone like him. End of."

Valkyrie repressed a shiver and nodded, walking away as Crystal and Nadia laughed at Erskine's jokes.


	146. American Section: The Beginning

**Chapter 146**

Two days later, Nadia woke Valkyrie up exceptionally early to meet with the renovators and builders that were going to be fixing their old house into something modern. She got ready and joined her brothers as they groggily followed along, and ended up sitting still and tiredly as Nadia, Erskine and Anton figured out the details. Thankfully, those three had a vision in their minds and with the architect and building manager, they decided what was happening and all Valkyrie had to do was sign the papers. Nadia and Erskine warned her that some things were still undecided and they were still choosing exact layouts and that even the illustrations she had seen a week or so ago had been changed by the professional they had hired. But that was okay with her, she trusted them to remake the house.

It did leave two problems of course. What were Fletcher and Myra doing and what were she and her family going?

That was easily solved it turned out. Without telling her, her brothers had been in contact with Corrival and they had all agreed on her initial idea of sending off the Dead Men to other countries as bait towards political peace. And it had worked. The moment Meritorious mentioned the idea to an American ambassador that had visited demanding results, the ambassador had jumped on the chance exceptionally fast and a deal had been struck that the Dead Men would relocate to America for a short time to help with a few cases of extremities as well as have the ability to look at a suspected American Spider group. The Spider part had nothing to do with the American agreement, but it was something to do.

Valkyrie had been surprised that they were moving so swiftly. With the reports from Skulduggery and Solomon that the Spiders were all coming to Ireland, she had simply assumed all the groups were gone except for the Irish dens.

The second problem of Fletcher and Myra was also fixed – Myra had finished her exams and they were ready to move if necessary, plus the two of them could do anything with Fletcher being able to teleport. So they were going to be joining them going to America. It had been, Meritorious said, a part of the deal struck with America.

And that's how the next week was spent. Crystal came over daily as Valkyrie's family was teaching her basic magical theory and helped her learn to use her magic until it was confirmed – Crystal lit a small flame in the palm of her hand.

They had all celebrated the achievement but it wasn't for long. Valkyrie's family had to leave and Crystal was left in Ireland to self-teach herself as much as she could in the months in which they would be gone. She was warned she may be left with being an Elemental out of a lack of time, but Crystal didn't seem to care. She was just glad to have magic and a different kind of life to the one she thought she was stuck with.

**.*****.**

They teleported to Arizona, America.

"How exciting!" Myra squealed from Valkyrie's right side. She'd excitedly attached herself to Valkyrie that morning attempting to chatter about how wonderful it was to go on holiday together and that they were going to be friends for life after this.

Valkyrie just nodded and adjusted all the bags she was carrying. Nadia had refused to put her stuff in storage so Valkyrie had five bags, four and a half of them being Nadia's belongings. There were American Sanctuary workers waiting for them.

"Dead Men," one of them said, a smiling darkly tanned man with black hair and pretty brown eyes. He looked a lot like Dexter, except completely different. Perhaps it was just the energy he gave her. "We were asked to meet you."

"Saile!" Erskine said, dropping his bag and practically jumping the man. The woman who was next to Saile rolled her eyes. Valkyrie knew who she was.

"Hi Aurora," Valkyrie greeted.

"Hi," she said, turning quickly to Tanith. "You had a kid."

"Yep," Tanith nodded, holding little Laila up in her car seat. "She slept through teleporting and everything."

"Oh my gosh," Aurora said quietly, staring at the sleeping baby in awe. "She's so cute."

"Of course," Tanith smiled. "She's not going to stay asleep much longer though, so we might want to get on."

"Oh, sure!" Aurora grinned, stepping back to greet everyone else before they all went to the nice, black minivan and got in. There were just enough seats to house all twelve of them. Erskine's seat was taken by Aurora to drive them, while Erskine and Saile disappeared into a car to follow along at their own pace.

Valkyrie smiled at Nadia and they got in, Valkyrie helping Tanith with the car seat. Once in, it was a weirdly loud trip over to their new house as the men questioned Aurora on all their American mutual friends, and Aurora questioned Tanith and Ghastly on their child. Mostly the questions were on Tanith and what it was like to give birth, to which Tanith sugar-coated the experience quite a lot. She seemed shocked that the parents had chosen Valkyrie as Laila's guardian, saying that she was so young, but Tanith defended Valkyrie easily, saying she was one of the only people she trusted to think of Laila before any other person came to mind. That was why she was her guardian. Of course, they didn't tell Aurora Laila's name, as per mage custom. They hadn't even told Fletcher or Myra, although they may have overheard it at some stage.

The house they arrived at was small but happy. It was originally some form of bunker, Aurora said, but had been changed and renovated so many times for so many different things over the last hundred years it was just a mess. Still, it was cool inside especially compared to the insane heat of the outside, and it was furnished tastefully. The Sanctuary had also gone ahead and made sure they were all taken care of. There was a gym area outside and they had set up a small nursery, and the kitchen was already fully stocked with food. Unfortunately, they were a group of twelve and there were not that many bedrooms.

"Everyone will have to share," Aurora had nodded, sitting on the sofa and sticking her feet on the coffee table.

There was a tiny room downstairs that Anton took before anyone else could, claiming it would mean he'd make breakfast and defend downstairs easier if they let him have it. There was a single, narrow bed and a bedside table within, and no more room to move. It also meant he'd have to go upstairs to the only bath if he wanted to wash, though there was a small toilet downstairs. They let him have it.

Upstairs had just four bedrooms and one bathroom. Luckily, there was a mixture of bed types. In one room there were two single beds, two bedrooms had a double bed and a single, and the last room had two doubles. With three couples with them and a baby, there was a long argument on who should go where.

In the end, they arrived at a liveable situation. Fletcher and Myra went in one double and single, taking the double bed, and got to stay alone because they weren't family and so were allowed the privilege of privacy. The other double with single was taken by Dexter and Saracen with Erskine. The room with two single beds went to Solomon and Ghastly, which allowed Valkyrie and Nadia alongside Tanith to have the room with two double beds. They had a very small bassinet type of cot for one month, two week old Laila in the corner of the room.

All in all, they were happy with the rooms and spent half an hour settling in before they went downstairs to talk. Unfortunately, there were only two sofas to they were mostly on the floor or standing. Nadia just sat on Valkyrie's lap.

"So, what're your plans?" Aurora asked.

"We have a meeting with a contact of mine," Solomon said diplomatically. "I do not know if you are aware, but the Spiders in Ireland are in possession of a Necromancy item that they stole from the Sanctuary. The Temple here has a Necromancer that reached out about this object."

"Yeah, I heard about it," Aurora said, giving Solomon a level look. Her mistrust was unconcealed.

"She was insistent that we meet as soon as possible. She indicated it would be a long meeting," Solomon told the rest of them.

"We also have a meeting at the Sanctuary," Dexter said, and Aurora nodded. "Perhaps we'll have to split up."

"I can go with Solomon," Valkyrie offered.

"You'll have to," Solomon told her. "My contact specifically said she wanted to meet you. She seems to have a theory on what your magic is."

Valkyrie sat up a bit, extremely interested in what her magic could be. The object part was also important, but her magic was more so. To her anyway. Nadia asked if she could go also and Solomon said it would be fine.

"Are the rest of us going to the Sanctuary then?" Ghastly asked.

"Think so," Aurora nodded, standing up. "I guess Erskine and Saile will meet us there. Oh and Renn? You have a meeting with transportation in, like, five minutes."

"What?" Fletcher said standing up. "Where?"

"I don't know, with transportation at the Sanctuary," Aurora shrugged.

"I've never been there!" Fletcher complained.

"Not my problem, kid," Aurora shrugged again, picking up the minivan keys. "Come on, let's go."

**.*****.**

While the boys and Aurora went to the Sanctuary, Tanith, Laila and Myra stayed at the house to relax. Nadia, Solomon and Valkyrie took a walk to the bus stop and after a bus, took a train. When they were off the train, Solomon took them to a side street out of sight and Shadow Walked them to the entrance of a large, white coated building surrounded in pretty white headstones, trees and hydrangea bushes. Valkyrie was immediately surprised.

" _This_ is the Temple?" She gasped.

"Yes," Solomon smiled, looking around also. "This one of the more beautiful Temple's, although the very best has to have been the Romanian Temple some three hundred years ago. It was a grand Temple. Unfortunately, it was destroyed many years ago."

Valkyrie just nodded and a moment later, a woman answered the door. She looked far younger than Valkyrie expected.

"Mr Wreath?" She asked, a smile tugging on her lips. She was wearing the black robe, but underneath it was a simple but pretty deep red dress. She was incredibly beautiful, her skin a healthy olive and plump cheeks, her body curvy and short. Her smile was perfect and made Valkyrie smile without meaning too. Was this what it was like for other people meeting Dexter for the first time? A pinch to her arm took it away and she looked down on Nadia. She was frowning at Valkyrie.

Oops. Valkyrie wiped the smile clean right in time to shake the ladies hand.

"Hello, Miss Cain, my name is Normandie Gwydion, but you can call me Norma. And who is…?"

"This is my girlfriend, Nadia Robin," Valkyrie introduced, wrapping an arm around Nadia. "We were both quite interested in your ideas on my magic. It's been a struggle learning to control it without knowing what it is."

"Yes, yes," Norma nodded, shaking Nadia's hand quickly. "Well, you should come in and I can explain my theories."

They did do that, Norma leading them through the beautiful, bright building to her office upstairs. It turned out that this Temple was partnered with a second. This one focused on the academics and learning and took a lot of work to get into. Norma resided there with her sister, who was a year younger than her and youngest two people in the Temple. The other Temple was much larger and dealt with general teaching, activity and where everyone else could live. As such, there was no Priest at this Temple and they were trusted to continue their work alone. It was obviously a big honour. However, to keep space, Norma's office was also her living area and only a bedroom and very small bathroom connected, so it was more of a homily room they went into than a study.

"Come in, you can sit down," Norma encouraged, and they did that. She made them all coffee and then she sat with them. "So, I think it's best I start by thanking you for coming. I called on short notice but I only just received word of _what_ those Spider terrorists stole from your Irish Sanctuary."

"Yes, although it was meant to be a secret," Valkyrie told her. "We know it is very powerful, or it's rumoured to be, but we don't have any information."

"Yes, well, that is also a secret," Norma told her coyly. "The 'Toute la capacité de puissance', translated as All Power Capacity, hasn't been touched in years but there was a lot of research on it before this. The war against the Irish sparked a lot of debate about the 'Toute la capacité de puissance' and whether it should be opened to use against one side or the other within the Temple. However, after the Temple's were attacked and our numbers were decimated in Europe, the debate stopped as the necromancers became neutral."

"And what did they think the All Power Capacity thing could do?" Valkyrie asked, not attempting to try to say its real name.

"Well, that's the entire theory," Norma smiled. "The most basic idea of the theory is this. Based on research, past papers about the construction of the object as well as notes and letter by its engineers, we believe the object is meant to remove the magic from one person and hold it. It would leave the victim magicless. The theory is that the person whose magic was taken would have it come back to them over time, as it naturally does. However, the most important part of the object is this – we believe the object can be used to put that stolen magic into another person, making them more powerful."

Valkyrie nodded, a deep frown on her face. "So it just transfers it?"

"Essentially, yes. The theory is well respected and accepted. The problem with this is that it's held by a terrorist. He could take the magic of any person and make them powerless, in a literal sense. A mage's main self-defence is their magic. That's why the Dead Men are so impressive, of course, because you are all so capable at fighting."

Valkyrie paled as she imagined the horror of what someone like The Torment could do with powerless mages. "He could destroy the entire Sorcerer community. I mean, even if the magic comes back to us, so many people would be killed in the time it took for it to come back."

"Exactly," Norma nodded. "Usually, this wouldn't be something too exceptionally bad as the object seems to be incapable of holding a large amount of magic, only that of one averagely powered person. Unfortunately, there has been theories and plans on how the object could, potentially, in theory, be made exceptionally more powerful."

"So you're saying the magic-stealing object could be made to take even more magic? Why on earth would someone make plans like that?"

"To see if we could," Norma nodded seriously. "Of course, my main field of study is in the Theory of Pure Magic, but an object like this has come up in several works because an object that takes power goes hand in hand with Pure Magic."

"I don't know what that means," Valkyrie told her.

"That's quite alright. The Pure Magic theory is the idea that magic comes in one form, a pure form, and each person is only capable of using a small amount, which is why we have a Surge to allow us to direct that magic into something usable. The Pure Magic is the same magic in the ground of Cradle countries. It's the most potent magic you could imagine. That is the magic I believe you have, Valkyrie."

Valkyrie took a deep breath and nodded. "And if I get hit with the Power thingy object after they enhance it…"

"It could, if I am correct, take Pure Magic, and Pure Magic is so powerful it would be the equivalent of taking upwards of a thousand mages worth of magic. All someone with possession of this object must do is take you captive and continuously take your magic, wait for it to return, and do it all over again," Norma told her. "Of course, it would depend on how much magic you as a person can hold, how powerful you are, and there is no definite way of testing if you have Pure Magic, so this may be very wrong. The human body may well be too weak to have that type of magic, certainly I doubt any person could hold a lot. The theory on the 'Toute la capacité de puissance' may also be incorrect."

"I'd rather not find out," Valkyrie told her.

"Exactly. Now, I do have another idea, although this one is told off the record so to speak," Norma said, voice lowering and leaning in. "It's an illegal practice and considered a rather exceptional thing to do to one's self. It's called Magic Keeping."

"Norma," Solomon said warningly, his voice hard.

"I know, Mr Wreath, but I feel I have to say it, at least once," she said quickly, pleadingly. "I'm sorry. Magic Keeping is where someone goes through a ritual to stop people from using their magic against them. I do not know if you have been taught this, girls, but magic can be used and joined for a variety of reasons, including that of making a child with two people that otherwise couldn't, to give another person enough magic to do a particular action, or even to create wards of protection. It also means that someone who does this is protected from objects like the 'Toute la capacité de puissance' from taking your magic."

"You're suggesting I have this done to protect myself," Valkyrie concluded.

"Exactly," she quietly said. "It's a risky and difficult procedure, but certainly possible. It's not something I could do–"

"The procedure was created by Doctor Nye," Solomon told her firmly. "You do know who that is?"

"Yeah," Valkyrie said warily. Nadia nodded beside her. "You want me to go to Nye and have my magic protected?"

"I don't want it, necessarily," Norma said quickly, a frown forming on her forehead. "But if my theory is correct, which it may well not be, it would keep your magic from being stolen and creating a super-powerful maniac Spider, yes."

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow. "Seems like I have little choice."

"You do have a choice!" Solomon snapped suddenly. "Even if this wasn't done by Nye, it has extreme risks to your health, your future and if it ever got out what you did every person in this room would be persecuted."

"Then you'll have to be very quiet," Valkyrie told him firmly. "If this is what it takes, it's what it takes. Even if The Torment doesn't get my magic, it may one day get out that I potentially have Pure Magic, and there would be hundreds of people after me for all sorts of reasons. This could be a massive risk if I don't do it."

Solomon shook his head and glared at Norma.

"If it helps, you cannot have the procedure yet, at any rate," Norma nervously said, looking between Valkyrie and Solomon. "You have to have very good control of your magic first. My sister and I would be willing to train you, and we were going to offer anyway! As long as you don't mind us making some personal notes to add to our research on Pure Magic."

Valkyrie nodded. "Some instruction would be useful. Thank you."

Solomon and Nadia crossed their arms unhappily.


	147. Some serious thinking

**Chapter 147**

Heaving in lungful's of breath, Valkyrie threw herself out of the way of a stream of bullets, little black shadow circles thrown at her by Norma and her sister, Helana, who both had all the ease and patience in the world. They were trying to make her use her magic whilst throwing stuff at her, but since she had accidentally used her magic in the correct way when she almost got hit in the head _once_ , they had decided she needed high-pressure situations _all_ the time. She was hating it.

Mostly because it worked. She dove past another stream and threw her magic out of her hand, whipping through the air and smashing the vase into a million pieces. The shadow bullets stopped. Valkyrie panted and stayed on the floor where she had fallen.

"That was great!" Helana squealed excitedly, jumping up and down. "You're getting really good!"

"Thanks," Valkyrie wheezed.

"Aww, come on," Norma smiled, rolling her eyes and offering her a hand. "It's not that bad, is it? We can have coffee and cake after this."

Valkyrie glanced at Nadia and Solomon who were sitting next to each other at the other end of the hall impatiently waiting for Valkyrie to finish training. They were both mad at her, but Valkyrie was sure it was for different reasons. She wasn't certain if Norma had worked out that Nadia just didn't like her, or if she thought Nadia was in a bad mood, but Valkyrie had noticed her girlfriend's evil looks. It would be cute, except Valkyrie was certain she was in for a shouting at when she got home and that was before they all found out about the little ritual she was going to go through.

She shook her head. "I think I need to get going soon actually," she said, standing herself up and not looking at the hand Norma offered her. She put it down. "I've already got a better hand of it though."

Helana nodded. "Definitely! You're a really fast learner."

"Thanks," Valkyrie smiled. Helana was very nice, a lot like Erskine was at times though without the mood swings. "Will I be able to come back to train soon?"

"Sure!" The sisters said at the same time.

Valkyrie got changed and after some goodbyes, left with Solomon and Nadia. She was physically exhausted and could already feel herself becoming emotionally exhausted. This procedure to lock her magic to her soul so no one could steal or control it seemed to be the best, and only, option to keep her and everyone else safe. Sure, she'd have to go to Nye or some other probably unsavoury people, but she was willing to do it. Her brothers had also told her Nye was harmless when threatened, so it wasn't that bad of an obstacle.

She just didn't want to have a fight about it. She wanted to have a lie-down, a big dinner and maybe a movie or just snuggle in bed with Nadia. Though, Nadia didn't seem like _she_ wanted to cuddle when she refused to hold Valkyrie's hand.

They were home quicker than Valkyrie expected, and she excused herself to the bathroom to wash before anything could be said. Tanith, Laila and Myra were there but it was otherwise perfectly silent.

Luckily for her, the bathroom was perfectly clean and fully stocked with all sorts of goodies so all she needed to do was fill the bath with steaming hot water, create some bubbles and get herself in. There were even some vanilla flavoured bath salts. Valkyrie took her sweet, sweet time, letting her muscles relax after her hard work out. She thought carefully about how the session had gone in terms of controlling her magic and was certain she already had a better grip of it but was also tired enough that soon she was just lying there enjoying the heat.

When she heard voices downstairs indicating her brothers, including Erskine and Saile, were back at the house, she pulled the plug, wiped the bubbles from her body and dried herself off, not incredibly worried over if she would need a second bath later because of her wasting time and not properly washing.

She was ready and down just in time for Tanith to stop feeding Laila. She grinned at her godchild and Laila stared at her, only a month and two weeks old but starting to get the grip of copying people's facial expressions. She squealed adorably and kicked her little legs when Valkyrie took her from her mother. She sat on the floor as there were no other spaces and burped the baby as she spoke to her softly. The others had chosen to cook a mix of foods for dinner rather than work out a meal and had decided that Myra, Anton and Dexter would cook since they were most keen to do so. First, though, came the talk.

"Guys, could you give us a little while? We need a family moment," Saracen told Myra, Fletcher and Saila. Aurora had already left for her own home. They did that, going to the kitchen to look over what they could have to snack on, and then all eyes were on Valkyrie.

"This isn't really your choice," she told them quietly, bouncing Laila. She had grown a lot of hair now and Valkyrie smoothed it down.

"You cannot think that we are going to let you simply walk to that _monster_ –" Solomon whispered furiously.

Valkyrie interrupted him. "You don't have to do anything, and I would not simply 'walk', this is a serious thing we're talking about," Valkyrie said, keeping her voice light. They didn't say what they were referring too. Talking about a highly illegal procedure to do with highly dangerous magic potentially involving a highly dangerous war criminal was not a good idea in a house they barely knew with people they didn't want to know about it within its walls. "I would make sure I was safe, and you guys would be around to make sure I was. I know there are long term risks involved but this could be what saves a lot of people. You know that Solomon."

"Of course I do!" He snapped. He took a deep breath and put his head in his hands.

"The side-effects are very serious Valkyrie," Saracen said solemnly. "It will mean you and Nadia never have children of your own."

Valkyrie swallowed thickly and looked at Laila in her arms. Laila looked at her, dribbling on her chin and massive eyes on her. Even trying to think about Tanith's difficult pregnancy and how hard the birth had been, all the gross fluids that had been involved and all the messy nappies since didn't stop her heart from pounding painfully at the idea of never having her own children. She wasn't a little kid thinking about all the too many babies her extended Edgley family had, or that she would be happy with cousins and nieces and nephews. She was almost a grown adult. With the prospect of a family of her own, something only possible biologically because of magic. And if she did this, she would never get to do that.

She nodded anyway. "It's the right thing to do. They could kill millions of people if I don't. Not having children might be the price of it, but I can't not do it." Nadia stood up and walked out of the room silently and Valkyrie let her go, wiping Laila's chin. They were quiet for a long time. "I'm sorry that upsets you all, but I won't let people die because of me."

"Valkyrie," Dexter said sadly, pulling her attention to him. "You really don't have to do this. There are other ways. We could stop the Spiders before anything ever happens after all."

"I know that. But it's the risk that's holding me back. I have to make sure no one can use me to kill other people. I mean, this is on the same wave as revealing your own True Name or something stupid like that. You just don't do it. We already know The Torment want's to destroy the Dead Men and even if we win they're going to make sure they hurt us as much as they can when we take them down, and revealing I have, most likely, Pure Magic is a pretty big thing to us. It's too risky. I have to do this. End of."

They looked at her closely and she looked back, pleading with her eyes for them to listen and agree. It was hard to know what they thought in the end, but they nodded and Anton and Dexter left to help with the food, Laila fell asleep and the television was put on a sports channel. It was like the conversation never happened, yet they were all tense.

Taking a deep breath, Valkyrie knew there was something more to do before dinner time. Carefully, she smiled at Tanith, who smiled back as supportively as an upset sister could, and she went up to their bedroom with Laila. Nadia was lying on the bed furthest from the door. Valkyrie put Laila in the small bassinet at the end of the other bed and went to Nadia, sitting on the edge of the bed and putting a hand on her shoulder.

"Nadia?" She whispered, not wanting to wake her niece. "Will you talk to me?"

Nadia did nothing.

"Baby? I love you, please don't ignore me," Valkyrie tried again. "I know you're upset with my decision but please don't do this."

"I wanted a baby," she sniffled and Valkyrie's heart stuttered. Tears came to her eyes. "We can't have babies now."

"Sweetie, no, there will be ways around this," she whispered, trying to keep the tears out of her voice. She lay down and spooned Nadia. "Think, if I can't have a baby then you could. I'll still have eggs, even if my magic won't let me, you know, carry a baby in my body."

Nadia turned over to face Valkyrie.

"It'll be okay, right?" Valkyrie smiled, a tear falling to the pillow. "We'll turn one of your eggs and turn it into a spermie with magic, and then get on of mine and they'll make it put them together in a test tube and put the embryo into you and we'll still get to have a baby. Or maybe they'll turn my egg into the spermie, I don't know how it works. Then we can have a baby, right?"

Nadia shook her head, sighing heavily. "No Val. I've learnt about this before. It'll destroy everything. _All_ your eggs will be destroyed during the procedure. And because your magic is sealed, you can never make more with your magic, though you are right that it will mean you can't have a baby in your body without your magic rejecting it. The magic works by refusing for anything to leave you, in a way, including passing on your genes. The side effects weren't reported by Nye when it was created and it was a procedure done to a lot of people without them knowing what it did, that's why it's outlawed. It would make you utterly sterile. Even if I was wrong and you still had eggs, women run out of eggs eventually and you won't be able to create more, and we won't want to have kids until after that time, so it won't matter. We'll never have babies Val. I wanted babies."

Valkyrie's heart shattered as Nadia broke down in her arms. She swallowed thickly and held her tightly, not sure how to get around the problem. Magic could do so much, but it was also so restrictive. She cried too, their tears mixing.

An hour must have gone by and they were both still lying there, blotchy-faced and worn out. They had spoken but only to ask how each other was and to reassure the other that they loved them and that the ritual was the only safe way to keep her magic from creating a super-monster. It was decided. But also so, so sad.

There was a knock on their door and then it opened. Valkyrie sat up, wiping her face. Nadia didn't move, still emotionally wreaked with the idea of never having what she wanted. It was Anton and Tanith who came in, smiling gently.

"Hey," Valkyrie croaked.

"Hey," Tanith whispered, sitting on the bed and hugging Valkyrie tightly. "How are you two doing?"

She shrugged and looked at the ground. "Fine, I guess."

"Yeah, I don't believe you," she said and Valkyrie looked at her. She was still smiling.

"What is it?" She frowned.

"Me and Anton were talking and we think we worked something out for you two," she grinned, her eyes sparkling. Even Nadia sat up to hear. "We realised that we weren't thinking about another option that you two could do. A mortal idea."

"What do you mean?" Nadia asked.

Anton continued. "It is taught by mages that we have children in a variety of ways, including turning one woman's eggs into sperm, in the case of same-sex relationships like your own. We can also take large portions of magic and turn them into the appropriate cells for creating children. These two measures are the best, and most widely used, ways of contraception that mages know of, outside of heterosexual contraception methods."

"But there's another one we never use," Tanith continued. "Because we use those two, we don't need anything else."

"Yes," Anton said in his deep, soothingly calm voice. He was even smiling slightly. "Mortals have also come up with alternate ways of having children that mages never have to use. Such as freezing eggs."

Valkyrie gasped so loudly she thought she would wake Laila. She flapped her arms around and stood up in excitement. "I didn't even think of that!"

"We know," Tanith grinned. "That's why we came and told you."

"Oh my god, this is the answer!" Valkyrie squealed and hugged her brother and sister tightly so they'd know how grateful she was. "Nadia, do you know what this means?"

"No, not really," she said, frowning. It took a moment for Valkyrie to remember that, although Nadia had a mostly mortal education, she was not mortal by any means. She didn't know what freezing eggs meant.

"Nadia, mortals can take eggs, and sperm, and freeze them to keep for years so that it can be defrosted later and used in test tubes to create children. We could take my eggs, have them frozen and keep them for as long as we want before we have children for our own later!"

"Really?" Nadia asked, beginning to crying again.

It was a wonderfully happy moment, and they were reconciled within moments with the knowledge that their plans for the future wouldn't be ruined by a stupid Necromancy object and some idiots wanting more power. Her sister and brothers were obviously still frightened at the prospect of her going anywhere near Nye or going through a life altering ritual so young, but they were happy that they had at least sorted out the baby issue before it had caused any real issues.

Laila was woken up in all the excitement but no one cared. They grabbed her and after washing their faces, went down to eat and talk about Sanctuary business.

It was a good thing this was fixed quickly, too. Soon after dinner, she went to sleep. In four hours, she was leaving for her first American mission.


	148. First American Mission

**Chapter 148**

Only a few hours later, Valkyrie very quietly got herself ready in her combat gear, tied her hair up, gave Nadia and Laila kisses on the cheek and left the room. Downstairs were her brothers. Saracen, Dexter, Ghastly, Erskine and Anton. They were also dressed in combat gear and weaponing up.

When she entered they nodded to her. On the coffee table was a new holster – her new gun holster. She put it on, Ghastly helped her adjust it, and she loaded up. This was not her first mission with a gun, and it wouldn't be her first mission she may have to kill someone by a long shot, but it was the first time she was so well armed and prepared going in. The holster felt very official.

Silently, they loaded in the minivan leant to them by the American Sanctuary and set off. It was only three in the morning but this was necessary. It took them two hours to get into the nearest major city where their suspect was. They parked not far from his building and Anton and Erskine, covered up so their combat could not be seen, left the blacked-out van and took a stroll around to the other side of the building. Valkyrie and Dexter jumped into the front seats after them.

Next was the waiting game. They were still and patient, waiting for any sign of someone leaving or returning. They didn't have a description of their guy, but they were told it was a male working alone from this building. They had to trust the American detectives knew what they were talking about.

Their half-hour of scoping went by. No lights went on, no sounds, no inklings of knowledge from Saracen. A whisper through the headpiece from Anton and they were out of the car.

Quick as they could, Valkyrie and Dexter jumped from the car and ran at the building, Valkyrie slamming the front door open with her boot. She screamed for everyone to put their hands up, but no one was in the front hall. She and Dexter ran through the front of the house and met with Erskine and Anton in the middle. There was an upwards staircase and a downward one. Saracen came in behind them and indicated there was two upstairs and two down.

Valkyrie and Dexter went up, Ghastly backing them up, while the other three went down. It was living quarters upstairs but that didn't stop them being armed – a large man, extremely large, almost twice the size and weight of Anton, jumped out in front of Valkyrie and grabbed the end of her gun, yanking it painfully from her hands. She barely even lifted her eyes to see his face before it was gone.

Ghastly and Dexter responded with gunfire but the man's clothing was bulletproof – his face and feet weren't as it was discovered. Valkyrie grabbed her gun back from the very dead man as he fell down and put it back up as another man came through the door holding a pinned grenade.

"Stop!" She demanded, and the man hesitated. He was a scrawny man, pale, of Asian ethnicity. "Drop the weapon and get down on the floor and we won't shoot!"

The man started shaking in fear but it didn't otherwise move. He was the only other person up here, and Valkyrie didn't want all her suspects killed.

"Drop it! Now!"

The man did, but it caught on his finger and the pin came out. She could see the shock, horror and fear on the man's face as he watched it fall but Valkyrie was already moving. She booted it into the room, a small bedroom with just a mattress, and pulled the man out, closing the door behind her. Her brothers had already grabbed the man and were running, Valkyrie coming after them. A moment later was a house-racketing _boom_.

The poor man had peed himself in fright and was relying on her brothers to frog march him downstairs as his knees were shaking so bad. He kept saying something in another language but Valkyrie didn't understand. It could be a ploy, but she suspected he was a prisoner or a slave, brought here only to work for whoever was in charge - not unheard of in any country. She patted him down and did find a single bullet but no guns. She threw it to the floor and looked him in the eyes. There was only fear reflecting back at her. She was satisfied with his innocence, such as it was.

Downstairs there were bullets flying so Valkyrie and Dexter left Ghastly to hold their prisoner and went downstairs to back up their brothers. It was dark, so Dexter flipped a light switch and stayed on the stairs for the high vantage point while Valkyrie jumped the bannister and landed next to Saracen who was holding back a man in a room down the hall. Together, they shot at the man when he leant out of his hidey-hole and slowly they advanced around the boxes and broken furniture as there were roars of anger and pain behind them from the other gunman and their brothers. There was a lull in her and Saracen's battle and Saracen immediate jumped up and she followed blindly. They stormed over to the man and Valkyrie kicked the semi-automatic out of his hands before he had the chance to fix his next lot of bullets to it. A few kicks and quick movements from Saracen and he expertly had the man on the ground, unable to move and totally vulnerable.

"Who are you?" Valkyrie shouted.

"None of your fucking bus–"

"Cub, watch out!" Saracen roared and Valkyrie turned just as another grenade was thrown right behind her. Valkyrie had no time to do anything other than shut the door to their room. Only a second later the grenade exploded, shaking Valkyrie to the ground.

Saracen had lain over their man already and was safe, but Valkyrie was winded, had dropped one of her guns and her eardrums were broken from being so close to the blast. Saracen was also in bad shape but nothing like her. A piece of the door was embedded in her hand. She hadn't worn her gloves because it was already so warm.

She hissed out in pain but refused to scream. She writhed on the floor for a moment, all reason out of her head from the pain, but as soon as it came she was able to overcome it and sit up. She grabbed her gun with her good hand, being very careful not to move the other, and stood up on shaky legs. She couldn't hear a thing, her eyes were watering so badly she couldn't see anything but shapes, and she was confused. Saracen was on the floor with their man and Valkyrie walked out the hole in the wall. There were sparks and colour in the direction of her brothers. She saw purple and knew that was Dexter, stumbling forwards. She blinked rapidly, her head telling her _sit down, don't get closer_ , but her legs just kept moving anyway. She wanted to stop this man _now_.

Something pushed into her and she fell down, landing on her bad hand, and she screamed. She saw a big figure, massive, aim something at her and without hesitated, she shot first.

She heard nothing but ringing in her ears but did feel the hand on her shoulder and someone picking her up. She passed out not long after, but with the knowledge that they had succeeded.

**.*****.**

She awoke sometime later in the back of a van with a doctor wrapping a bandage around her mud-covered hand. She felt her head and her stinging ears and realised she could hear again and within a second, all her memories came back.

"Where's my family?" She asked the doctor who almost jumped out of her skin.

"Oh!" She gasped. "I didn't know you were awake! Your family is fine Miss Cain. They're being processed by the detectives."

"Processed?"

"Yes. Debriefed, I think they say in Ireland, but less formal. You can go home soon I think," she smiled, though it was filled with tension.

Valkyrie just nodded and soon the doctor was finished with her job and Valkyrie was allowed to leave the van. Well, she wasn't, but she was well enough to do so without the doctor calling someone to force her back in. Anton, Erskine and Dexter had been hurt also in the fight, but they looked to be minor wounds that were being treated as they talked with someone official. They seemed irate and were talking loudly. Valkyrie sat close by and listened in, getting angry also when she found out what was going on. They were taking over their investigation.

"Yes, but this isn't an investigation," the man in the suit kept saying. "You are a squad sent in to grab the suspects, not detectives!"

In the end, they backed down and left, but they were all seething mad. They hadn't realised that they weren't able to follow through with taking a case from start to finish. They really were just a squad being used to take down dangerous criminals so the American's didn't have to risk their own skin. It almost hurt to be treated like that, but after a phone call with Corrival where he chewed them out, they realised it was a political thing. They were being used because they were good at it, and as long as they were there, the American's were going to send them all over to stop as many high profiling criminals as they could. Unfortunately, Valkyrie knew of more than a few infamous criminals. She wondered how many of them they were going to have to take down.

They got home and sat in the living room.

"Well," Erskine sighed, rubbing his shoulder where a bullet had grazed him. "That went terrifically."

They grunted back.

"Aww, come on guys," he responded pleadingly. "Don't be mad. It's only nine in the morning, you can't be mad all day."

"Yes we can," Valkyrie told him immaturely.

"Val! You weren't meant to be on my side!"

"Nope. I'm mad," she told him, taking her harness off. She didn't deserve cool things. She had gotten blown up.

Nadia came out of the kitchen dining area with a smile then and locked eyes with Valkyrie. Her anger seeped away like a little traitor.

"Hey," Nadia said, looking over them all. "I made breakfast if you want some?"

They all nodded and they split between the too-small dining area and too-small living room. Her hand hurt like hell, but after her warm waffles and chopped fruits with a really good citrus smoothie, plus a few leaves, she felt a ton better. She used a flannel to 'wash off' quickly – they didn't have the room or literal time for everyone to have baths every time they went out of the house – and change her clothes. Then she changed her mud bandage with some help and they were all set.

Their first proper day in America as a family.


	149. Daddy Solomon

**Chapter 149**

They decided as a family it would be nice to go out and do something to distract themselves from their inability to do proper cases. They invited Myra along, who happily accepted, but Ghastly stayed back with Laila as her parents worried she would overheat in the seriously hot Arizona temperatures. It was silly, and the parents knew it, because it was November and the weather girl on television promised it would only go as high as twenty-three degrees Celsius and that was unlikely at any rate, but Ghastly and Laila remained home anyway. Tanith was certainly pleased to be out of the house. Fletcher was working nonstop so he couldn't come.

They took the minibus and drove out to a town nearby, parking at the little diner. They didn't go to eat straight away but rather split up so they could enjoy the little town instead. Nadia and Tanith giggled in whispered voices a few steps ahead of Valkyrie. She smiled as she watched them. Nadia was wearing shorts. She was more than happy to be a part of their nefarious, giggle plans if she got to keep staring at Nadia's butt and legs.

They went into a little thrift store, a really nice little place, and had a look around. None of it was Valkyrie's size, but Nadia found a bunch of things she liked while Tanith looked over the baby clothes area as well as at a few of the tops that would fit her. Valkyrie got to hold their shopping, smile and tell Nadia if something was the correct colour for her skin or not, like the good girlfriend she was. She didn't actually know half of the time, just went off of how much Nadia seemed to like the item and told her whether it was nice or not based on that. It seemed to work.

"You're in a really good mood," Nadia commented, smiling at her. There was a dusty smell in the air, something old and woody. "I thought you would be upset after earlier."

"No, I'm alright," she smiled, sidling a little closer. "They fixed me up on scene, so I just had hurt feelings really. But if I get to spend my time with you instead of working, I don't think that's really a loss. Do you?"

Nadia giggled. "Well, that was why you quit your job, wasn't it? To spend time with me?"

"Of course," Valkyrie giggled back and went in to kiss her when there was coughing behind her.

She turned and saw a pudgy, narrow-eyed woman with her hands on her hips. Valkyrie smiled brightly at her. "Hello," she grinned.

The woman pursed her lips but did relax slightly. "Do you girls need anythin'?" She asked with a slight drawl to her voice.

"No, we're just looking thank you," Nadia said sweetly, flashing her big eyes at the woman. She shop keeper _hmph_ ed but was satisfied enough to walk away and over to Tanith who seemed to have pulled apart the entire baby section.

"Maybe we shouldn't do that here," Nadia whispered quietly, looking back at the clothing rack with a little less enthusiasm.

Valkyrie frowned. "No, we can do what we want."

"Yeah, but this isn't really our home or anything Val," Nadia whispered back, looking over a modest, three-layered shirt with disgust. "This might be one of those really conservative places. I don't want to get thrown out, okay?"

"It's none of their–"

"Valkyrie," Nadia interrupted, turning to look at her. "I know. I know, okay? But that doesn't mean I'm not allowed to not make a scene. I'm just asking you to respect that."

Valkyrie pouted because she knew she'd been bested. Nadia continued shopping and got her enthusiasm back when they met back with an excited Tanith. The lady had pulled some new drop off's from the back of the store from the brand she had bought Laila in Ireland, but in all different designs since in America, the company produced some different things. She was showing off how soft the sleeping onesie was when the lady came back over.

"Is this alright for you?" She asked, looking between them. She seemed a little less suspicious but no less stern.

"Yes, it's lovely," Valkyrie said, looking it over as well. She'd heard Tanith go on and on about all sorts of clothes brands for Laila. She didn't want to have to do this again. Pre-baby Tanith had never gone on about clothes before and she'd like to get that back. "How much is it for the box?"

The lady raised an eyebrow and told her a stupid price, so Valkyrie tried to bargain it down. She had to fight it but managed to get it down quite a lot so they were paying thrift store prices rather than more than if they'd gotten the box new like the woman originally asked. Even Tanith had rolled her eyes, and she'd have probably bought it out of excitement.

"And what about this here?" The woman asked, reaching for the three things Nadia had settled on. The woman looked them over. "You don't think they're a little revealing, dear?"

She had gotten a very sickly sweet tone to her voice, but Nadia remained cool. "No, I quite like them thank you."

The lady didn't like it, but a sale was a sale and Valkyrie paid for their purchases, getting a few off looks from the woman for doing so.

They left that shop and went for a nice walk until they ran into the Idiots who desperately wanted to watch a movie at the little theatre in town. They went for a long walk with the boys until they found the others and, after buying a few treats at the local sweet shop, went to the theatre.

As luck would have it, there was only one movie showing and it was a really bad horror. Valkyrie grinned and persuaded Nadia to watch it by showing that there was almost no one else there but them and that she, the big strong protector, would look after her if the movie was actually scary. She'd also got her a chocolate bar to sweeten the deal.

They all sat together, taking up a whole row, and Valkyrie held Nadia's hand the whole time. There was mostly blood and bad acting, but there were a few well-placed jump scares that got Nadia badly. Valkyrie had just laughed.

They left the movie theatre laughing at the awful ending, throwing leftover popcorn at each other and having a really good time. There were more people around town now, more parents with children as the school day seemed to have finished, and they decided they'd go and get a really late lunch at the little diner they parked next to.

They had to be seated across two large tables as they were all bolted to the floor and the staff couldn't make one large table, but they were fine to split up. Because of the number of parents and children that were in the restaurant, they had to sit across the entire floor from each other, but they made the best of it and laughed. Valkyrie, Nadia and Myra were split off to sit on one table and the others got to stay together.

"So, how was your day?" Valkyrie asked as she looked over the menu.

"Oh, it was great!" Myra said immediately and started rambling on about the things she and the men had done, walking around town with Solomon and Anton before going to the movie. The waitress took their order and said they'd be a wait on the food because of the rush, but they just nodded and smiled.

"How was your day then?" Myra asked after a moment of silent, elbows on the table, chin on hands.

"It was good," Valkyrie said, looking at her girlfriend who was sat next to her. "We went to a thrift store and the lady was eyeing us up I think, but she had some really nice stuff."

"Oh yeah? What did you get?" Myra asked with a little smile.

Nadia smiled back and showed off the new tops, getting them out of the bag since it was going to be a wait. It ended up being a nice conversation and Valkyrie found she liked Myra a little more over the time she spent talking with her. The way she mostly looked at and spoke with Valkyrie was still a little annoying, but she was forever sweet with them both so Valkyrie found herself dismissing the feelings of irritation. Some personalities didn't mesh well, but that didn't mean Myra had done anything wrong and Valkyrie would be being mean if she acted badly towards her. Their lunches came, burgers with _fries_ , and the three girls tucked in. Valkyrie stuck her tongue out at her brothers and they did the same back every once in a while.

The lunch was lovely and they ordered ice creams as the rush started to die down and customers started the pay and leave. They were simple sundaes, just two scoops of vanilla with chocolate sauce, but nothing could beat a simple ice cream in Valkyrie's eyes. It turned out Myra enjoyed going to comedy shows also, so they joked around some, although mostly she just wanted to talk about Fletcher and the weather and about family. It was really nice.

As the ice creams came to an end, Myra excused herself to the bathroom, giving Valkyrie a moment alone with Nadia.

"This is really nice," Valkyrie said genuinely.

"It is. I'm glad we're here actually," Nadia said back, licking the chocolate sauce from her spoon. "I know it's not ideal and all, being made to come to America, but it's really nice. Even considering this morning."

"Well, they'll be a lot more of this morning," Valkyrie said, looking at Nadia. "I sort of wished we had a room for our own though."

"Val," Nadia said, warning her but also smiling secretively. "I'm sure we can find time alone, like right now. This is nice, isn't it?"

"Of course it is," Valkyrie told her, knowing full well she'd live a happy life just holding Nadia's hand and getting nothing else. "But that doesn't mean I won't want more _later_."

Nadia rolled her eyes, but let Valkyrie take her hand and kiss her knuckles lovingly.

"You know, I'd like to take you out soon," Valkyrie said.

"What do you mean?" Nadia asked, putting her spoon down.

"Well, it's almost your birthday, and I wanted to take you on a date for it. It'll be a surprise location, but I thought I'd ask," Valkyrie said, kissing her knuckles once more.

"I'd like that," Nadia nodded, blushing.

Valkyrie leaned in and pecked Nadia on the lips quickly, nothing gory or loud, but when she heard the shattering of plates behind her head, she knew exactly why without having to look.

"What on earth!" A woman shouted shrilly. Valkyrie took a deep breath as Nadia's sagged her shoulders and tried to disappear. "Oh my! What on earth do you think you are doing?! Do you – did you know there are children right here?"

Valkyrie turned in her place at the booth to look at the lady and block an obviously embarrassed Nadia from view. "Ma'am–" she got out before she was interrupted again.

"I have never seen such disrespectful behaviour!" The lady started again. Behind her, two waitresses were gesturing for someone to come and all of the mentioned children were either looking away out of shock and embarrassment or looking on very curiously. The adults were either glaring at her or the woman but did nothing. She couldn't see her family from this angle but she knew they would be angry. "To do such vile things in public! I've heard about people like you, but shame! Shame on you for your indecency. What would your parents think of this? I dread to think what God will do to you for your actions."

"I'm not Christian," she snapped out, but that was a mistake.

"Well, I can see that!" The woman snapped. She had a little black bob of hair with blonde highlights, was more than a little chubby and was very short but wore little shorts that were riding up into a disgusting camel-toe and an oversized t-shirt she was sweating through. "God can forgive a lot of things, but kissing in front of children like horny, satanic monkeys is another thing! How dare you!"

"How dare _you_?" Valkyrie snapped back, glaring at the woman and standing quickly, towering over her. She was in jeans and t-shirt herself, but her bare arms showed just how badly she could hurt this woman right now, and, oh, did she want to. "It is none of your business what I do. What type of example are you trying to be to these children anyway? That they can scream at things they don't like when they feel like it?"

"Don't you raise your voice at me!" The woman shouted, becoming very angry even though Valkyrie had not shouted. "I am your elder, and you don't get to tell me what to do! Where are your parents? You obviously need a good telling off. And where are hers? Do they know where you are, sweetheart? Kissing other girls like a _homo_? That's not how they raised you, I'll bet! I'll set them straight on what you get up to."

A manager had come out of the back but was just looking on, his waitresses looking on with more compassion but an unwillingness to get involved. Anton had stood to act his part, but this time, Solomon beat him to it and was standing behind the woman before Valkyrie could say anything.

" _I_ am her father," Solomon gritted out from between his teeth. He was seething mad. More seething mad that yesterday. "How _dare_ you talk to my daughter in that tone."

"You did this?" The woman asked, pointing her little finger at him and leaning back to take in his full height. "Did you know these two _females_ are as kissing like little homosexual hussies in here?"

"Don't. You. Dare. Insult. _My_. _Daughter_. Again." Solomon glared at the woman, and Valkyrie felt as the building went cold, reacting to his magic. The mortals were no wiser as to why, but she'd have expected a 'god-fearing' woman like her to take the hint.

"Don't you get in my face, mister! They were being indecent in front of children, it is my right as an American tax-paying citizen to use my free speech and say if something indecent, grotesque and ungodly happens in front of the _children_! Did you hear me when I said these girls were kissing? Did you know that?"

"My daughter is having a meal with her girlfriend," Solomon said, his voice rising. "You have no such right to tell them not to kiss, so long as they are not rolling around on the seats. They have been dating for years, and I am fully aware of that. They are in a loving relationship. I support them, as do the rest of my family, including her _other father_."

"Well, no wonder she's like this!" The woman said, throwing her hands in the air. "This is what happens when people divorce. Broken homes make broken children. She needs to go to Church and be set straight, and you need to come and see how you are hurting her soul, condemning her to Hell, by letting her do these gross things."

"How dare you," Solomon hissed, and Valkyrie really wasn't sure what he planned on doing next and was mostly just watching with wide eyes, when Anton came up behind Solomon, backing him up.

"Step away," Anton said, and Valkyrie saw the woman turn white and begin to get flustered, but she was too far up on her horse to back down. Valkyrie turned to see if Nadia was ready to bolt, but she was pale and had a look in her eyes that said she was frozen stiff. Valkyrie's disgust at the woman rose.

"This is my table here!" She said, gesturing to the table behind Valkyrie and Nadia. "And anyway, I can't eat now! Not after seeing _that_."

Valkyrie's eyes narrowed dangerously and she wondered if this was a good time to punch her or not. It didn't seem to matter because she moved without really thinking and pushed the woman roughly towards her seat, Solomon and Anton jumping out of the way so they wouldn't have to touch the woman. She screamed like she'd been shot and threw herself to the floor like an idiot.

"Don't be so stupid!" Valkyrie snapped before the woman could start accusing her again. "I barely touched you, you threw yourself down there. We'll be leaving anyway, you've ruined our day as it is. Bitch."

Valkyrie grabbed Nadia's hand and she got out of the booth with her bag and Myra materialised and grabbed her things. She and her family left without another word as the crowds muttered and the woman screamed bloody murder about how she'd sue her and how she'd go to Hell for being a dirty homosexual.

They got in the minivan and drove off. No one said a word but they didn't have to. They were all mad, mad enough to hurt someone, so they stayed quiet. Even Nadia's fear and anxiety left and she was almost shaking with how mad she was. It was nice to not see her cry at the least. They'd both done too much of that in the last few weeks.

They got home and Ghastly asked what happened right as Dexter punched a hole in the wall of the house. Laila woke up at the sound and started crying, and while her family broke out in argument and explanation over what happened, Valkyrie grabbed Nadia and pulled her outside.

"Right," she said, looking at Nadia critically. "You need to learn to fight. If that ever happens again, it might not be that woman. It might be someone worse, someone with a vendetta or a gun, or someone willing to kill you. You need to learn to fight properly."

"I can fight," Nadia said moodily, crossing her arms.

"You can Shock people, but you're almost eighteen Nadia," Valkyrie said back in a hard voice. "You'll Surge soon and you very well may lose that magic and you don't have the best handle on it as it is. You said so yourself, you can only use it sparingly and not even well enough to really knock someone out. You need to learn to defend yourself with actual physical defence."

Nadia shuffled from foot to foot as the light breeze in the late afternoon sun brushed over their skin. "I don't want to fight, Valkyrie. That's you, not me."

"I didn't say fight. I said defend. Imagine right now–" Valkyrie threw her fist in Nadia's face, stopping just millimetres away from her left eye. Nadia flinched back. "You'd let it hit you and you'd fall over and get hit again and again. They could kill you Nadia! I just want you to know how to fight someone off of you long enough to run away. Is that too much? God, don't you remember what happened to me at the swimming competition a few years ago? I couldn't use magic then, I didn't even get a chance to defend myself with my training! I don't want that for you."

Nadia looked at the ground before answering her. "I guess. I just want to go to bed and never think about it, Val. Do I have to do this right now?"

"Yes, you do," Valkyrie said softer, hugging her tightly. "And anyway, I think the boys are arguing. We'll never get any sleep even if we went to bed. At least the weather is nice."

She got a small smile out of Nadia before she began teaching Nadia how to look after herself. They did basic punches and kicks, how to get out of it if someone caught her before she could hit them. They focused on muscle memory and worked out there until Nadia was sweaty and unable to move anymore from exhaustion. Only then, Valkyrie let them go back inside and upstairs.

They shared the bathroom, washing off in the bath to get off the sweat and dust from their skin, draining and washing out the tub, filling it with clean water, and soaking together with a healing stone to help their sore muscles. It had been a long day. Valkyrie washed Nadia's hair and Nadia washed Valkyrie's before they had to use sink water to rinse their hair out with the toothbrush cup to make sure their hair was actually clean of bubbles. They ended up laughing and at the end, Nadia dried them both and they got into their pyjamas, more than happy to skip dinner and just fall into each other's arms and sleep till morning.


	150. Like a bitch in heat

**Chapter 150**

* * *

**Warning: NSFW**

**Dedicated to Remus Cyka Crux**

* * *

The next day was, shocking to no one, a day of rest for them all, including Nadia who only got out of bed to stretch her muscles, eat and go to the toilet. Valkyrie had an enjoyable time going between films with her family and spending time with Nadia upstairs.

The next day brought the second day of training. In the fairly large back garden was their little makeshift gym and today Valkyrie intended to _work_ Nadia!

"Are you awake yet?" She asked, leaning over the bed. She was in shorts and a top with a fleece jacket over the top. They were on the last legs of the good weather and a cold breeze had begun. Her legs would be fine, still very used to swimming in the ocean back home, but her arms were wusses so she needed the jacket. "Come on Nadia, you can't do this two days in a row."

"But it'll hurt," she moaned, glaring up at Valkyrie from under the covers.

"I don't care. You need to learn to protect yourself, not just from mortals but also anyone that might try to hurt you to get to the Dead Men and me. So get up."

It took some more persuading, but eventually gave in and Valkyrie helped her find some leggings and a top to wear. They went outside into the midmorning sun and began.

"Alright, so we went over some basic movements last time. We're going to warm up and then go over those to make sure you haven't forgotten anything," she said. Warmups were a few laps, some push-ups and sit-ups, which was repeated a few times. Nadia struggled with the push-ups as she lacked a lot of upper body strength, but she powered through.

They went through the drills they did last time, the clutches and kicks and how she should get out of this basic hold or that.

"I don't want to do these holds," she whinged when she had struggled out of the fifth one. "I remember them."

Scowling from behind her, Valkyrie took a step forwards, gripped one arm and had Nadia on her knees in a moment. Nadia made an attempt to escape it, the annoyance dying on her lips as she realised Valkyrie wasn't messing around. She shook herself and put all her strength into it but with just the strength of one arm, Valkyrie was able to keep Nadia on her knees and unable to get away from her. After a good forty seconds of trying to get out, she stilled.

"Okay, okay," Nadia said, her voice softer and a little bit pleading. "Let me up."

Valkyrie did. "Do you know why I did that?"

"No," she muttered after a moment of rubbing her shoulder.

"Because this is really important. Nadia, if I at seventeen can keep you from getting away from me with one hand, imagine what some of the evil people we deal with could do to you. I just want you to be just strong enough to handle yourself, you don't need to look like me or be able to fight off a whole army by yourself, just give me, you and our family the peace of mind that you aren't going to be completely incapable in a real fight."

"I'm not completely incapable–"

"I _know_ ," Valkyrie interrupted. "But that's only with magic. I mean physically. You can't use magic against a mortal if they attack you, can you?"

Nadia sighed. "Alright. I get it. Come on then, what's next?"

With a better attitude than before, Valkyrie started some new exercises. She needed to work Nadia's body to get to enough muscle strength to really be able to do any wrestling, so that's where they started. The breeze kicked up, but it was good on their skin as they worked out. Valkyrie demonstrated what she should do with the rocks, tires and dumbbells, and then Nadia would do it. Her technique was good, her lifting posture and her hand grip always as it should be, but she just lacked _so_ much strength. Valkyrie had to assume that all the strength that she worked up from a child to teenager had melted away when she went to India and stopped eating properly. It had taken away so much of her fat but also gotten bad enough that her muscle mass had broken down, as not eating would do. Plus at this boarding school they apparently didn't do physical exercises and everything was in one building so not much walking was even done. They all relied on and used their magic.

"I guess I kind of get why the Dead Men would be so revered if this is how everyone in the magic community basically begins their life," Valkyrie commented. "There is no emphasis on physical strength at all."

"Nope," Nadia managed to say as she pushed herself, and her seat, back from the wall along with her weights with just her legs. Valkyrie had outgrown these weights when she was still twelve, having made her leg muscles so strong from swimming as a child. Everything above the hips had been a very different story but at least she'd had that. It was almost cute to see Nadia struggle with them.

"You can take a break after this," Valkyrie smiled.

Nadia lowered herself and the seat gently back to the wall before speaking. "Can I choose what you do?"

"What, you're going to train me in your break?" Valkyrie laughed.

Nadia grinned before pushing out her legs and struggling again. "Yep."

Valkyrie snorted a laugh. "Sure. As long as it's safe."

Nadia had to do three more reps and then she was allowed off. Well, she actually sat there for a few minutes, demanding Valkyrie get her water which she dutifully did. Only after that did she begin her commands. "You can do this shit," she said, sitting on the machine next to them under the little wooden three-sided shelter the non-electric machines were kept in. "Put it at the highest!"

"Yeah, no," Valkyrie said, sitting in the seat and pushing it back a bit to account for her height. Then the weights went up to what she was currently being made to use in training. "Does this please you?"

"It'll please me when you're in pain," she said, taking a long drink.

"You're going to feel ill on your next round if you keep drinking water," she replied and then began. It was tough, because her family always pushed her hard, but then they needed to in order to get her to where she wanted to go. And since she often left it weeks between training when there was a lot going on, she had no choice but to struggle and get back to where she was on occasion.

"Is it hurting yet?" Nadia asked curiously.

"No," she said easily, knowing how to keep the correct muscles working instead of tensing her whole body. "I wanted stronger thighs so this is great."

Nadia made a face. "Do you mean that or are you just messing with me?"

"I'm messing with you. But I do want to get my arms and stomach up."

"You already have a six pack," Nadia said quietly like it was bad to say out loud. Valkyrie couldn't help but start smiling. It was like she was talking about her breasts or something in public. "And your arms are strong. Why make it more? Not that I wouldn't love for you too."

"Because that's what I want. And this is more of a four and a bit pack, it does _not_ count," she said disapprovingly.

"I like it," Nadia said, patting her tensed muscles. Then she just rested her hand on her stomach, made eye contact with her and stared as Valkyrie when down and back up. "I like it a _lot_."

Valkyrie burst out laughing, Nadia following. "Stop it, you're not meant to be having fun! It's your turn now. Let's do some combat training."

"Yes! The good bit," Nadia grinned cheekily.

"Well, we're actually going to do some role play crossed with martial arts, but it's a good starting post. We've done a little bit of this before."

"Yeah, but only a few times," Nadia replied. "I was rubbish at it."

"You just don't have any strength to put behind it. That's why we're doing all the muscle work. But I still want to show you how to hit someone so come over here."

She hesitated. "I don't want to hit you."

"It won't hurt me," Valkyrie said flatly.

"But what if it does?"

"But it won't."

"Yeah but–"

"Get over here."

Nadia swayed back and forth. "No."

Valkyrie frowned, putting her hands in her hips. "What do you want?"

"What does that mean?"

"It means I know your stalling for attention," Valkyrie said. Nadia smiled ever so slightly. "So what is it you really want?"

"Hmm, to watch you do more weights?" She said, with a little question at the end.

"Fine. If I get ten minutes of you doing what I say, I'll do ten minutes for you. Deal?"

Nadia grinned and came straight over to her, hands behind her back and smiling cutely. "Yes ma'am."

"Right, so let's pretend you're walking down the street. A car pulls up on the road and someone gets out. It's obvious they're trying to kidnap you. Mortals are around, you can't use magic. You have to fight them," Valkyrie said, pushing Nadia back so she was in position and then standing back like she was the attacker. "Okay. I'm out of the car and running towards you. What's your first reaction?"

"Cry."

"Nadia," Valkyrie said warningly.

"I scream and change my stance, dropping anything in my hands," she said confidently.

"Do it." Nadia moved her stance and raised her hands in front of her but didn't scream. Valkyrie let her get away with it considering they were just in the garden. Valkyrie rushed in front of her and Nadia waited until she was almost close enough for Valkyrie to reach out and grab and then she stepped forwards and shot her hand out.

It hit her in the chin, the fleshy bit between the bone of the jaw and the beginning of the neck. Valkyrie made a short sound, her eyes wide with shock and reeled backwards, coughing but regaining focus quickly. Nadia had put her hands down and went to put them back up when Valkyrie lunged but it was too late. Valkyrie knocked into her and picked her up, taking her into the three-sided cover, Nadia squealing on her shoulder.

"Put me down!" Nadia demanded, trying to keep her voice down.

"You can't make demands here, I've kidnapped you!" Valkyrie told her strongly, setting her on her feet but keeping her arms pinned by her side. She had a big grin on her face. "Tell me everything you know."

Nadia pursed her lips. "I don't know anything."

"Oh really? Not even if I do this?!" She grinned, twisting Nadia around quickly, but painlessly and pushing her so she was bent over the stack of tires.

Nadia gasped. "Val!"

"I want to know where the jewels and treasures are!"

"Are you a pirate?"

"If I say yes, can I have your booty?" She asked, laughing. Nadia laughed too, but then Valkyrie got back in 'character' and stepped closer so she could press herself against Nadia's good-looking, leggings covered butt. "Come on Nadia, how are you going to get out of this? What if you were attacked by my really gorgeous stunt double and she bent you over, you'd really do nothing?"

"Yep," she said, but didn't let Valkyrie do anything before continuing. "I can't do much when I'm like this anyway."

"Well, the most logical thing for me, the attacker, to do is conduct a full body search," Valkyrie said, her heart beating erratically.

"Val–"

"Quite, captive!" Valkyrie commanded, holding Nadia's wrists in one hand to use her other to touch her girlfriend up. She began innocently, stroking her hair like a weirdo, and then crawling more seriously down her sides and over her back long enough for Nadia to close her eyes and enjoy it. When she noticed Nadia relax, she lowered her hand to her hip. Slowly she reached forwards and around to her front, rubbing Nadia's clit through her clothes. It only took a moment for Nadia to moan and Valkyrie stopped her movements.

"I think I've found it," she said quietly, trying to smother her grin. "You've hidden the treasure in your clothes."

Nadia frowned and moaned angrily. "We can't do this out here. And you're being cringy."

"I swear this is training Nadia."

"You're trying to finger me in the garden, what would this be training for?"

"Distracting captors," she smiled, knowing she'd get told off later. Before Nadia could tell her what an idiot she was, she put her hand down Nadia's leggings and into her pants, rubbing her clit. Something that sounded like half a word came out and then she bit her lip to keep in a moan and pushed her hips down on Valkyrie's hand. Valkyrie smiled and leaned over, kissing Nadia's neck and sucking behind her ear.

Valkyrie could feel how wet Nadia got with just a few seconds of ministrations. A little more slowly, but no less desperately, Valkyrie's fingers dipping further down and found Nadia's pussy. Choosing to be quick, because she didn't trust her family not to come outside, Valkyrie slid two fingers into Nadia. Nadia groaned deep in her throat, putting her forehead on the tire. "Fuck Val," she whispered desperately, breathlessly. "Oh my _god_ , that feels good."

Heat pooled between Valkyrie's leg as Nadia spoke, turning her on more than what she was even doing. Biting her own lip, she let Nadia's arms go. "Don't make a sound or I'll stop," she threatened and then removed her hand only to flip Nadia around, standing her up and put her hand straight back down there. Her thumb found Nadia's clit and she rubbed it quickly. Her long fingers dipped into her pussy again and she took advantage of the position to flick her fingers. Nadia's knees almost buckled so Valkyrie had to wrap her other arm around her waist. Nadia's head rolled back but she still twisted one leg so it was up and helped to spread her lips for better access.

Valkyrie kissed and sucked her neck, not being able to stop herself from licking behind her ear, hearing Nadia's breath catch and pussy clench when she did it. Loving the unexpected reaction, she switched hand positions to palming at her clit and carefully pushing in a third finger, being careful to gently stretch her girlfriend before she could continue. Nadia's mouth hung open, her eyes closed and expression of pure pleasure. "You look so hot like this," Valkyrie whispered quietly, her mouth watering as she greedily took her in. Nadia made a small keening noise and Valkyrie grinned.

"No, no, don't do that. I don't want to stop," she whispered into her mouth, kissing her fully. Nadia was almost unresponsive, only feeling and enjoying what her hands were doing. She heard a window get opened somewhere and her heart rate jumped. It didn't take a moment for her to get Nadia to cum with her so ready for it. Valkyrie just licked her neck again and thrusted her fingers for a moment before finding that special spot she was starting to memorise and rubbed along the rougher skin until her walls clenched down. Valkyrie had to kiss her to drown out the little cry Nadia made. She felt so good to touch.

"I love you so much," Valkyrie smiled into her mouth.

"I'm shaking," Nadia breathed quietly.

"Guess you need more training," Valkyrie teased as she carefully pulled her fingers from inside of Nadia and tried to keep her messy hands from touching their clothes. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Very fine," she said, blinking and carefully moving her legs to stand up without Valkyrie's help. "Good, even. That was really quick."

Valkyrie giggled quietly. "Yeah, like three minutes. I must be getting better at this. Everyone inside knows what we did."

Nadia glare. "No they don't."

"Oh, they do. The moment Saracen noticed he would have announced it. I bet Anton is the only thing between them and the back door right now," Valkyrie said. "Aww, don't get embarrassed. That was hot. You are fucking gorgeous when you cum, you know that?"

Nadia's flushed. "I don't want them knowing every single time we have sex."

"I don't think that counts as sex sweetie," Valkyrie said as she poured water from her bottle into her dirty hand to clean it into the grass where the house couldn't see. "It's more like being fingered in the garden while our whole family is one wall away."

"Stop."

"Aww, baby," she smiled more gently now, not wanting her to get upset. "You know what they're like. They don't care, they think it's fun to watch us grow up together. Alright? I love you. If you want, I'll never mention it again. And I'll make sure no one mentions it to you."

Nadia sagged a bit. "No, it's okay. I know what they're like really. It's just, you know, I don't want the first thing I hear after _that_ is not about your family please. Maybe you could just kiss me and do it again or something."

"Okay, I can do that," she smiled, kissing her lips softly. "You really are pretty though. You made me so wet just from watching you."

"I can return the favour if you want," Nadia smiled a little shily.

Valkyrie kissed her again. "Later. We do still need to do something productive out here to make them all go away. They'll give up in half an hour."

Nadia rolled her eyes. "I'm not moving, I'm all messy. I'll watch you."

True to her word, Valkyrie let her watch her for the next half an hour and they spoke and messed around a bit. Her family did forget about the whole thing by the time she went inside although Anton did send Valkyrie an amused look from his place at the kitchen table. By then Nadia had calmed down and had regained her confidence enough to act like nothing happened out of the ordinary. True to her word, she returned the favour that afternoon while Tanith fed Laila downstairs, almost making Valkyrie scream as her revenge.

She fucking loved her girlfriend.


	151. World Wide War?

**Chapter 151**

A week went by in the blink of an eye, a routine settling in fast. In the very early late-November mornings, the whole house would awaken as a bath was drawn, by Laila being awoken by her mother to be fed and changed, by the sound of the old gas cooker being clicked to life by Anton downstairs. It was an enjoyable part of their stay in America, the part that made it feel like a holiday. They would get ready and do exercises unless they were on a mission in which case the Dead Men would leave early for that. But on the days they hadn't left early on work business, Valkyrie, Dexter, Anton and Ghastly would go out for a sprint around the town that left them gasping for breath, and then they would spend time working out in the back garden with the rest of the family. Tanith and Laila would come out in the morning too. Laila would coo at the clouds and Tanith had begun to take on some easy exercises to begin to get back in shape. Nadia would follow Tanith's lead and struggled a lot, but it was nice to see her put in an effort.

The rest of their time had been easy. All the missions they had gone on had been early morning or late evening, and all of them had been easy with relatively no harm to themselves – at least by their standards, they had still been highly volatile and dangerous situations. Valkyrie had gone back to the Necromancer Temple once more, Nadia and Solomon following her and being unhappy about the idea. Nadia just seemed to not like Norma and her sister, and Solomon was still brewing on the idea of Valkyrie and the Magic Keeping issue. But they were going back for the magic training, so it seemed like she was going to get her choice respected.

She wasn't able to help with Solomon's unhappiness, but she decided it was time to do something nice for Nadia. That day her family decided to go out once more on a trip to see a small town a few miles away for fun. Everyone was going but this time, Valkyrie and Nadia stayed back.

"So," Valkyrie smiled, holding Nadia's hands. "I thought, since everyone is going out, we could have a little date lunch."

Nadia immediately brightened. "Aww, Val. That's really sweet."

"It's alright. I made a little picnic," Valkyrie told her and brought her over to the living room where, on the coffee table, was a wicker basket full of treats and fruits she knew Nadia would enjoy. "It's been a really nice holiday so far, even if I am away working sometimes, but I thought we needed some alone time."

"It's really pretty," Nadia complimented, sitting on the sofa with Valkyrie. "I didn't even see you make all of this."

"To be fair," Valkyrie admitted, "it's mostly just in packets." She picked up a packet of Nadia's favourite chocolate biscuits and handed them to her smiling girlfriend. "And anyway, nothing is too much work for you."

Nadia laughed a little at how cheesy Valkyrie was being and thanked her. They enjoyed the little finger sandwiches she had made that morning. They stuck on a movie they had found in the shops a few days prior and hadn't yet watched, speaking over it as they shared the food, kissed and were generally just very inappropriate on the sofa. They made it to the bedroom before things got too serious.

"You know," Nadia said softly when they had finished kissing and crawling all over each other's bodies. "I could imagine my whole life with you."

Valkyrie smiled softly at Nadia's glowing, beautiful face. She was looking out of the window and couldn't see Valkyrie's gaze.

"Can't you see it? I can imagine living in our new house and going downstairs and hugging your brother's good morning, and all having breakfast together. We'd all go off and work or whatever we all do and come back in the evening and it would be all smiles and small talk about our days and we'd go upstairs to our apartment alone and hold each other. I can imagine all the years, the ones where we are so in love we can't get enough of each other," she said with a sneaky smile. "And I can imagine when we fight and make up, and wait up late for each other to get back, and celebrating our birthday's and all the Christmas' we'll have together. One day we'll be married and have children, Val. I know we will."

Valkyrie kissed the told her Nadia's head and, without moving her body, reached into her suitcase under the bed and grabbed Nadia's present. Nadia was looking out of the window with glazed eyes, imagining their future. Valkyrie held out the Dragon Diamond.

"Valkyrie–" Nadia asked, and her eyes landed on the Diamond. Her mouth opened in surprise at the palm-sized crystal, looking it over with admiration. "What is that? It's so beautiful."

"I know," Valkyrie whispered into Nadia's neck as she leaned back into the pillow and looked at the pink Diamond also. "It's a gift, for you. I was saving this for your birthday in a few weeks. But I think you just stole my speech on how I plan to spend my life with you, so I may as well give it to you now."

"But Valkyrie," Nadia whispered, reaching for it with a finger. As soon as she touched it, the Diamond's colour swirled like smoke and they watched in fascination as it gently faded into a gorgeous rich purple. "It's so pretty."

"It's for you. Do you know what it is?"

"It's a diamond…?" Nadia asked, looking at her with a frown.

"It's a Dragon Diamond."

Nadia's eyes bugged out of her head for a moment, and then she sat back and looked at it with a smile. "I'm not even surprised. You _would_ just have a Dragon Diamond. I have no idea what I'm going to do with a diamond the size of my face though."

"And I'm not surprised it changed colour. A Dragon Diamond only does that if both the original owner, me, and the person I give it to, you, are in love. I'm looking at it as a promise ring. By giving this to you, I prove my love to you and promise that I will love and look after you forever. Will you accept it?"

Nadia smiled, looking at Valkyrie with so much love and happiness in her eyes. "Of course I do. You know I always will. I love you Valkyrie, even when you're cheesy as hell. Forever."

They smiled at each other. The Diamond was thrust onto the side table as they took advantage of being alone once more.

**.*****.**

"Big day tomorrow," Saile said from his place on the sofa next to Erskine. He had his feet on the coffee table and an arm around Erskine who looked absolutely shattered to the great amusement of everyone else. "They have a lot riding on this mission."

"We know," Dexter nodded, sipping on his can of beer. Most of them were having a small drink, nothing too much because they were, of course, working the next day, but it was nice to have a few sips of something nice. "They only told us about it this morning."

Saile shrugged. "They do that to us too sometimes."

"How do you feel about it?" Tanith asked, looking at Fletcher with a hint of a smirk on her face.

He nodded, an expression of 'yeah sure, I got this' on his face. "I'm good."

"Ready to fight?" Valkyrie asked. "Dodge some bullets, catch some knives?"

"That doesn't happen," he said confidently, but his eyes still flickered over to Saracen who just raised an eyebrow. "It doesn't."

Valkyrie shrugged. "If you say so. But just to be sure, what would you do if someone threw a knife at you?"

"Teleport away."

"What if there was a hostage behind you? Maybe a child hostage. You can't teleport away if there's a child behind you."

He stuttered and looked around for help.

"Aww, leave him alone!" Aurora said, throwing a pillow at Valkyrie. "There isn't any hostages."

"Any _known_ hostages," Nadia chipped in, texting her friends.

"Shush. Fletcher, there aren't any hostages," Aurora told Fletcher, who nodded quickly. "Hey, can I hold the baby?"

Tanith had just finished feeding her for the millionth time – Valkyrie felt like Tanith spent all her time sleeping and feeding the baby – and she was happy to give her over. Valkyrie had to take her and walk to the other side of the room and give her over. Aurora agreed to burp her.

Valkyrie and Tanith sat back and it only took a moment for Laila to spit up on Aurora.

Valkyrie laughed and Tanith threw the blanket over. Aurora swore at Tanith and wiped the spit off of her trousers and Laila's face. "You're lucky you're cute," Aurora muttered, putting the blanket over her shoulder and holding Laila better. "Too pretty for your own good."

Valkyrie wasn't sure if Aurora was talking to Laila or Tanith, but it was fun to watch anyway. It had been fun, having Aurora and Saile come over every day or two, just for a few hours. Aurora made Tanith joke around more, and Saile made Erskine happy. Plus, when Aurora was here Tanith stayed downstairs which gave Valkyrie a lot of time with Nadia upstairs. She was sure Tanith had caught on to what was happening but she was letting them do it anyway. She was the best sister ever. It helped that she had no boundaries and did not care about sex in the slightest.

"Valkyrie," Aurora said, snapping Valkyrie out of her thoughts. "Are you ready for tomorrow?"

"Yeah, I'm good," she nodded. "Not going to get blown up this time."

"Good," Aurora agreed. "What does Nadia do when you're gone?"

"She is right here," Valkyrie said, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, but she's busy."

"She mostly does things around the house and spends time with anyone at home. At home in Ireland, she'd spend time with Gordon," Valkyrie thought, thinking over everything. "She reads a lot."

Aurora wrinkled her nose. "Sounds dull."

"It's okay," Nadia said defensively.

"I don't think it'll be a long term thing," Valkyrie added. "We've been really busy recently. I've quit work at the Sanctuary so I'll be home a lot more, and we'll start doing things together."

"Yeah, but at home all the time?" Aurora questioned.

"I don't know. We can do what we want really," Valkyrie said, looking at Nadia, who was looking at her.

"I need to go back to school," Nadia said suddenly. "After the Spiders and this whole, you know, war problem thing is fixed. Then I can get a job and do more. I bet you'll go back to work after that Val."

"I will?"

"You'll get bored at home after a while."

Valkyrie thought about it and then nodded. "Yeah, probably. I don't know if I'll be a detective though. Maybe I will be."

"I bet Skulduggery will go back to the Sanctuary," Aurora put in, looking at Laila.

Valkyrie watched her closely. She seemed casual, nonchalant, but Valkyrie wasn't convinced she hadn't heard something in her voice. She answered anyway. "Yeah, I guess so. He's a really good detective."

"No argument there," Aurora said, sitting Laila on her lap and supporting her neck and back so she could look around with her giant blue eyes. At only seven weeks old, she was hitting all her milestones beautifully and none of her family could be prouder. "How far are you guys in looking into the Spider dens?"

"Not that far," Valkyrie admitted honestly. "We know they moved from their last known place, and we have information about what they did there, but not much else."

"I heard they had assassins."

"I expect they do. I would be a pretty rubbish attempt at taking over the country and world at large if they couldn't kill off select people, wouldn't it?" Valkyrie told her. "They have mercenaries as well. We don't know much about them all, but they've hired a few people, probably with promises of special places in their ' _new world_ '."

"They sound serious."

"It is serious," Valkyrie told her sharply. "They're underground. We _should_ have seen they were at their old castle site, but they were able to hide under the rubble and ruins. It was checked several times but no one ever found anything, and no one reported seeing anything, even now – the people who checked had their minds scanned by Sensitives to make sure they weren't lying too. They're damn good at hiding."

"I'd expect so," Aurora replied. "They always were good at it. But you realise not all the Sanctuaries are taking you seriously. They think Ireland is organising a coup. To take over the rest of the world."

Valkyrie stared at Aurora. The rest of the room stared at Aurora.

"What?" Dexter finally said.

"It's true. It's why the American Sanctuary jumped on you coming here, especially with Fletcher. No one can get Peregrine to come help us, but he isn't helping Ireland either. So the guys up top pushed at getting the Dead Men plus the only teleporter willing to help a Sanctuary in centuries. You're Ireland's biggest threat to the rest of the world," Aurora told them matter-of-factly. "That's why they sent me and Saile here. We're meant to be watching you."

"Are you?" Tanith snapped.

"No," Aurora snapped back just as strongly. She kept bobbing Laila on her lap. "We hardly have to lie though. We just tell them that you're either quite about Ireland or that you maintain what is happening and that you all seem genuine. We tell them that you're enjoying the local areas to visit, you act like a family and that you like to train but you're not any worse or crazy than you ever were before."

"So you're telling them the truth," Valkyrie said flatly.

"Basically," Saile yawned. "You guys don't do much."

"The only thing the Sanctuary is interested in is how you train. They're convinced you're turning Valkyrie and Fletcher into secret assassins or super warriors or something to fight armies single-handedly or something stupid. And we tell them as it is. You're teenagers and you act like them, albeit one of you is trained by the Dead Men and their friends. You're no way near what the Dead Men are, but still a threat."

"So, the truth. Again. Why are you telling us this now?" Valkyrie asked.

"We think they're planning something," Saile said more seriously. He was still sitting as relaxed as ever, but his voice got deeper, more authoritative. "We don't know what it is they're doing, but there's been a lot of meetings. International meetings kept under the table, without record. We don't know what they're talking about but we haven't heard anything about anyone Irish at all, or African or Australian. We think _they're_ planning a coup to retaliate against Ireland's coup, except you don't have one. They're just using the idea of it happening as an excuse to fight the Cradle countries. _If_ they can manage it, that is."

"Oh my God," Valkyrie gasped. "You think they'll all go to war?"

"We don't know, but it's what it feels like," Aurora finished, getting up and giving Laila to Tanith. "We don't really know why they've decided, but you guys know how they've been about Ireland in the past. They've always been wary."

"We need to stop them!" Valkyrie cried, looking at her brothers.

"Val…" Saracen said tiredly, rubbing a hand on his face. "I don't know if there is anything we can do."

"What do you mean?"

"If we go guns blazing and call them out for something like this, even if they are doing it, it's going to be denied. They can pretend it's because we're paranoid and unfit for work, unstable and untrustworthy," Dexter explained. "They could turn the people away from us around the world, even people within Ireland. I mean, even Nadia's parents have left Ireland because the Spiders are threatening war, and there is _no_ way they have a big enough army to destroy the Irish Sanctuary long term _and_ stick around. But people are frightened and that's what the Spiders really need for success. What do you think they'd do if around the world everyone turned their backs on us?"

"But, how are we meant to stop it then?"

Her family looked at each other, all as unsure as the rest. Valkyrie and Nadia locked eyes. This was going to get a whole lot worse, and soon.


	152. A short fight

**Chapter 152**

Valkyrie woke up quietly once more in the early morning and got herself ready in relative silence. Nadia felt the difference in bed and got up with her, putting a jacket on over her thin pyjamas. They went downstairs where most of her brothers were halfway ready as well. Fletcher was sitting on the sofa, pale, staring. His breakfast was in front of him, uneaten.

"Morning, Fletcher," Valkyrie said quietly, trying to reassure him. "You should eat something."

"Can't," he croaked, not looking at her.

"You need to. If you don't eat, you might faint if something happens. We need you to be on it today, and you need to be on it for yourself. I don't want you to get hurt," she told him, keeping her voice quiet and gentle. She put a hand on his shoulder and he tensed for a moment. "Don't think about it too much. You'll make yourself anxious, and there's no point in that."

She left him there to get herself some food and Nadia followed like a puppy. If anything, it felt like Nadia needed comfort as opposed to being there for her. She put on some tea and made Nadia breakfast while she got her own.

"Here," she whispered, smiling at her girlfriend.

She smiled weakly. "Thanks."

"Don't be scared," she said, putting her cereal on the table next to Nadia's. "I'll be alright. Okay?"

"I know," she breathed, hugging Valkyrie close. They held each other for a long time before letting each other to go.

By the time she had brushed her teeth, it was time to go.

**.*****.**

They pulled up to the town they were stopping at in silence. There were four cars. She and the Dead Men were in one. Aurora, Saile and other Americans were in the car behind, and in the two ahead of them were more American's plus Fletcher. They had been given a full arsenal. Valkyrie had never shot a semi-automatic assault rifle, but that's what she had been given alongside her brothers. She had knives and several other guns with her, and shock and smoke grenades. She'd had big missions with a lot of arsenals before, but this was a different level. She had on a bullet-proof vest over her normal safety jacket, as well as a helmet. A radio was built into it.

They filed out and quickly jogged over to the first van group with Fletcher and waited while two women unbolted and pulled up a sewer plate. Fletcher looked down it with a torch, after being checked by the American's, and teleported with the first group. There were a few moments of silence again, and then he was back and took another group, and kept doing that for them all – except for the last group that was on guard, hidden in the bushes around them. Valkyrie was teleported down as the cars were driven away.

A quick hand gesture from the team leader split them up. The American's went East, the Dead Men went West. Silence reigned as the two groups jogged in opposite directions, just their footsteps echoing. Valkyrie's heart raced as she brought up the back of her group, keeping her gun up and ready to keep them safe from the back.

They came up to their station ten minutes of running later. Anton radioed over to the second group.

They were early.

Valkyrie felt a bead of sweat roll down her face. It stank in the tunnel and the darkness was hard to see around. She locked eyes with Dexter. Nothing felt off yet. The other group had longer to go. Two minutes to the arrival date. Saracen said nothing.

A small click in their ears was the cue – Erskine used his magic to snap the metal keeping it in place with efficient skill. Within a second the cover was off and they all trained their guns on the open hole.

Valkyrie saw movement and three of them shot at once and the person fell to their knees. Another shot later they were dead. She saw he had been holding a gun. A moment later her brothers across from her shot also, seeing something she couldn't, and then someone came into her view once more and she shot at them. They went in aggressively and Anton, Ghastly and Saracen going in the room above ahead of the rest of them and finished it off. They all followed.

Valkyrie took in her surroundings quickly, smelling the tangy odour in the air. Saracen had a deep frown on his face but didn't say anything and they went through into the next room. They opened the door and they all started shooting the second it opened.

Shots were fired back. It barely took a minute to take them down.

Valkyrie put her hands up.

**.*****.**

_**Nadia's POV** _

"Tanith?" Nadia called as she put the whisk on the counter and washed her hands. "Are you coming downstairs?"

There was no sound for a moment, and then a door upstairs opened and a few moments later Tanith was downstairs with an ever watchful Laila. "Hi," she yawned. "You making breakfast?"

"Yeah, I thought I'd make pancakes. Is Laila okay?"

"Yeah, she just ate," Tanith nodded, sitting down with the baby on her lap. "Then she threw half of it up burping."

"I think babies do that sometimes," Nadia smiled, hoping to bring some positivity to Tanith's morning attitude. "How many pancakes do you want?"

"Three?" Tanith guessed. "I really want some fruit."

"I'll cut some." Nadia got on with that while Tanith changed Laila's nappy and cooed at her. After twenty minutes, Nadia had a small stack of pancakes with a little bit of proper butter and powdered sugar over the top, and a large bowl of berries and melon for them to pick at together. Laila was starting to wave her hands around now, and it was very amusing to watch her stare open mouth at the two women eating while dribbling and batting her hands around for the fruit bowl out of her reach. She was too young to get bits to eat still at seven and a half weeks but Nadia was really excited for when she was old enough to feed actual food. She could hold her own head up, although was sometimes a little shaky, and she was starting to smile by herself whenever she saw her mother after being away from her. Ghastly wasn't quite getting that reaction, but to be fair to him, Laila mostly watched out for her mother's breasts rather than her face.

"So," Tanith said, pushing her plate, knife and fork away from her curious child. "When do you think the others will be back?"

"This afternoon?" Nadia asked.

Tanith shrugged. "Maybe. I kind of want to go out."

Nadia hid her grimace. Her stomach was rolling with nerves. She didn't want to go out, she wanted to hide in bed and hug Valkyrie's pillows. She was already wearing Valkyrie's unwashed top under Valkyrie's slightly cleaner hoodie. Not to mention, the weather had taken a turn over the last few days to look a lot more like winter. It was seriously cold and kept raining without warning.

"I'm not sure," Nadia said.

"You don't have to come, but I think I want to go on a walk," Tanith said, standing up and picking up Laila. "I'll be, like, an hour getting ready."

Nadia smiled. "Sure."

Tanith _did_ take forever to get ready and then needed help getting Laila into the little baby carrier harness. The two of them looked absolutely adorable together and Nadia even took a picture of them to show Valkyrie later, and then she left. Nadia took her time getting a really long, warm bath with a bunch of bath salts and even did a moisturising hair mask followed by a face mask. She cut her nails too short trying to get them all the same length and cleaned the kitchen. Myra came down and got breakfast at one point and they spoke about their families baking recipes but disagreed on how to get the gooiest chocolate chip biscuit and, perhaps it was because she was already really nervous, but Nadia got way too upset and practically stormed off.

She got guilty after just a few minutes of crying and calmed down enough to think about how stupid she was before getting worried for Valkyrie and deciding she'd apologise when she felt like not crying again. She heard Myra go into her own room after a long time and after some time bickering with herself, she very quietly left her room and snuck downstairs to watch television to distract herself.

There was a knock on the door.

Nadia muted the television, looking at the door. Should she open it? Could she defend herself and Myra? Was she being paranoid? It was probably just a neighbour. Or was it someone from the Sanctuary here to say something awful had happened?

Her heart jumped into her throat but she got herself up and answered it. On the other side was a smiling, dark-haired man. He was of Asian ethnicity and work tight jeans with a tucked in black shirt, dress shoes and a coat. His hands were in his pockets and he towered over Nadia at what seemed to be over six-foot-five.

"Good afternoon Miss Robin," the man smiled. He had an American accent but Nadia wasn't familiar with what area it was from. "I am from the Sanctuary here in Arizona. Do you have a moment to talk?"

"What about?" She asked, frowning.

"About your partner, Valkyrie Cain, and her family. It is very important. May I come in?" He asked again, the smile unmoving.

Her heart jumped into her throat but she tried to stay calm. She had no idea who he was – she couldn't be stupid and let a stranger into her house just because he said something she didn't like. "Can you show me your identification, please?"

"Of course," he said, and pulled a hand from his pocket. He cocked the gun at her face. "I'm Lilo. May I come in?"

**.*****.**

_**Tanith's POV** _

Tanith sat on the park bench, looking at the ten or so children running around and playing on the small playground together. Laila was asleep in her little pouch, and she was tired herself. It was a struggle recovering from pregnancy. She hadn't felt this unfit in her _life_. She remembered the first ever time she was told to climb a rope and had been completely incapable. She felt as weak as she did when she was seven years old. She had never wanted that for herself – but at the same time, it felt sort of worth it for the baby on her chest. Not that she was enjoying feeling so out of breath by any means, but it was good to have her Laila with her.

There was a dull thud and Tanith looked up in time to see a four or five year old start crying because she'd fallen off of the fireman's pole and onto the floor. Half a dozen mothers went running towards the child and that same child was screeching like a demon. She tried not to roll her eyes. She hoped Laila would learn to not screech like that. She was allowed to cry, but God, that kid was hurting her ears from where she was sitting.

She looked at her phone and tried to work out her way back home. She'd been out for an hour and a half already, and it looked like it would take that much time to get back. She was about to leave when she saw an ice cream van pull up on the other side of the park and got the craving to have something cold. She had no idea why it was about in late-November, but she was suddenly glad it was.

She and all the other parents and kids lined up to get something – she supposed it was sort of comical how it was around so literally all the parents were allowing their children the treat. She waited at the back with the slower parents.

"Hey, are you new?" A mother asked her, tapping her shoulder. Tanith turned and smiled.

"Yeah, I moved here a few weeks ago," she said sociably.

"Aw, how fun!" The woman cheered and the three other mothers nodded around her. "Where are you living?"

"In a little cul-de-sac an hour walk from here," Tanith said vaguely. "It had a bunch of oak trees around it."

"Oh, I think I know where you mean," the woman grinned stupidly. "Is this your little one? She is just so sweet."

"Thank you," Tanith smiled now, looking at Laila. "She's almost eight weeks old now."

"Aww, that's such a good age," one of the other mothers, a very unnaturally blonde woman, said. "I loved it when my little ones were that old. I've got three now, and none of them want to cuddle anymore."

"Tell me about it," the first one rolled her eyes and they laughed. Tanith just smiled. Laila was not allowed to not hug her, so this did not apply to her whatsoever. "You know, we have a tumble-tots class in an hour, do you want to come? I know your baby is too young, but we'd love to see you there. It won't be long until she's joining in, and there are a few other mom's with littluns there."

Tanith thought about declining but then thought about being at the house with Nadia trying to hide how stressed she was, and Myra who was constantly hiding in her room, and considered how boring it was to watch television all day, and agreed.

"Oh, that's great! We're walking over in a minute," the woman said, and Tanith let her babble on while she got her can of coke and little ice lolly.

Tanith waited for the other ladies to be ready and ended up in conversation with a mousy brunette with a child that walked all over her. She was talking about her Thanksgiving dinner a few weeks ago and how her mother-in-law had upset her, and Tanith just let her vent. She watched the group and saw how there were three 'leader' women with the most amount of children, five women that were happy to just be there and either listened to the 'leaders' or spoke together, and then there were three 'followers' who just nodded and looked as if they had followed every fad that had existed in their lifetime, and then there was this one outcast that looked very downtrodden. Usually, Tanith would ignore a woman like her too – it annoyed her when people didn't stand up for themselves enough to not get spoken over by their own friends and children – but she just felt bad for her today and listened.

"What would you do?" The woman, perhaps called Ashly or something like that, asked.

"Well, I had something sort of like this happen," Tanith told her, trying to think of a good answer to her problems. "My mother sent me to boarding school as a child and it made me hate her, but I never said anything. I didn't talk to her for years after I left the school, didn't even visit after I graduated. I decided to forgive her eventually, although it took a long time to choose to do that. But even after, I still get mad at her. She wanted me to call my baby some stupid family name when I didn't want it. But after what she did to me as a child – sending me away that is – I had to stand up for myself and tell her how it is. She cannot control my life, and if I want to call my child a name I've chosen, or move to a house I want to live in, I will do that. It took a long time for her to get over that, but each time I take control it makes us have a better relationship."

"It does?"

"Yeah," Tanith nodded. "It creates boundaries. It makes us understand each other more. For instance, she can suggest names for my baby, but she cannot just tell me what my child is called and expect me too just accept that."

"Does she take it well?" The woman gasped, shock in her eyes.

"Sometimes," Tanith smirked. The look of shock didn't leave. "I take it you don't think your mother-in-law would take it well?"

"Never!" She said with conviction.

"Well, it might take a long time, and you might make her angry, but I expect it would make you feel better to have some personal space," Tanith told her. She was obviously more than unconvinced, so they spoke of other things like schools and food and their holidays abroad. "And, really, it's up to your husband to do that. His mother shouldn't be allowed to be horrible to you. He's a dick for not standing up to her."

The lady didn't look very convinced. She was about to answer with some overly negative response when Tanith heard someone running up behind them and turned to see Myra. She was pale, sweaty and panting.

"Myra?" Tanith asked, looking at the girl. "What are you doing here?"

"Tanith!" Myra gasped out. "I need to talk to you! Something happened to Nadia and the others!"


	153. This is a mess

**Chapter 153**

_**Nadia's POV** _

Lilo, the man, was riffling around the house. Another man and a woman had walked in a few minutes after he had tied her up on her knees and left her next to the wall, and now Lilo and the woman were trying to find whatever it was they wanted while the other, new man was 'watching' her.

He was actually on his phone and didn't seem to be paying attention. He was man-splaying his legs so wide Nadia would have usually asked if he was hurting himself, but he had a massive assault rifle on his back and it kept her very quiet.

Her main thoughts were of three things. Firstly, that Valkyrie was alright. She and her brothers were on a major mission and although Lilo hadn't really indicated if he and his friends were maybe doing something to interfere with that, she had a little feeling that it was connected. At the least, she hoped they were just using the opportunity to steal things while the Dead Men were gone. She suspected that wasn't what was happening but thinking of anything else would make her panic so she tried not to.

Secondly, she was worried about Tanith and Laila. Again, no one had mentioned them at all, so she hoped they were alright, but she had no way of checking. They had put duct tape over her mouth anyway. She was more worried that Tanith would walk through the door any second now with her little baby strapped to her chest, completely exhausted, and be able to do nothing to protect herself and get away. Tanith was tough, but Nadia was keenly aware of how much Tanith was struggling from the damage pregnancy had caused to her body as she was the one that did the things Tanith couldn't while they were stuck in the house together.

And lastly was her and Myra. Something was bugging her about that. She hadn't heard a peep from up the stairs. She didn't think anyone had been up there, but she also couldn't be sure they hadn't used magic to check. Did they just think a mortal couldn't fight back? She'd thought, at first, that maybe Myra could hide and call for help, but every five or so minutes that past just made this nagging feeling in her head intensify. Why hadn't Myra done anything? Why hadn't she heard a sound? Why hadn't these invaders gone to check for more people? She'd heard them say 'teleporter' several times, so they knew about Fletcher staying here – so surely they'd know about his mortal girlfriend.

Something wasn't sitting right about that, but there was hardly anything she could do. Or, maybe she was overreacting because she was tied up, had duct tape over her mouth and was surrounded by people that would more than certainly kill her if she attempted to do anything. Myra might have heard the commotion of her fighting when Lilo had tried to tie her up and hidden away and the invaders just didn't care about a mortal. She needed to find a way to help them, or at least herself if her gut was right, before something drastic happened.

How was she meant to do that exactly?

**.*****.**

_**Tanith's POV** _

"Tanith!" Myra gasped out. "I need to talk to you! Something happened to Nadia and the others!"

"What's happened?" She asked, eyes narrowing and stalking forwards. The woman she'd been talking to, her name forgotten, watched them.

"I don't know! Some man came into the house and started threatening Nadia, I snuck out the front when he was tying her up. I didn't know what to do, I just ran to find you!" Myra rushed out; her voice high with panic but quiet enough that she wasn't shouting.

Tanith nodded quickly, trying to think of something useful. "Okay, we need to get back there."

"How? Do you know someone who can help?"

"No, but I can deal with it," she said firmly.

Myra stuttered for a moment before pushing out, "But what about Laila? Tanith, this man had a gun, he sounded really horrid. I think he wants to kill us!"

"Then we better get there," she snapped. Tanith turned and looked at the woman she'd been talking to who was now standing ridging, awkward and biting her lip. "Do you know a taxi number?"

"No, but I have Uber?" She tried. "Shouldn't we call the–"

"Get me a ride. Now. Myra, you have to look after the baby," Tanith instructed, pulling the wrap off and just putting Laila and the balled her material into Myra's arms. It hurt, like physically hurt, to leave her baby with a relative stranger, but although she wasn't Myra's biggest fan, she trusted her not to hurt her child. "Go to the toddler group and then go to this woman's house. I'll call you when I have Nadia and busted this guy's ass, okay? Don't go anywhere else, don't answer any calls from unknown numbers, and don't get anyone else involved. I've got this."

She didn't know what else to tell them – she didn't do explanations, she did action – the woman had ordered an Uber and in just a couple of minutes, it had arrived. The woman tried to ask for her address and seemed like she was getting enough of a grip to try and bring up the police again but Tanith snapped at her to go to the toddler group and she shut up. She told at the driver to go and her heart clenched as she watched Myra and the woman walk after the rest of the mothers and kids' group with her baby in Myra's arms.

She took some deep breaths, stretched her arms and core in the back seat and after jumping out of the car a few streets away, she jogged around to the back of the house. This meant jumping over a neighbour's fence, their dogs going wild from their back doors. It took barely a second for her to scale the building by walking up the side. She flattened her hand against her window and the latch clicked. She climbed into her, Nadia's and Valkyrie's bedroom. It was quiet.

In her trainers, leggings and fleece jacket, Tanith snuck across the room and reached under the bed, pulling out her trusted, sharp, glorious sword. She hadn't used it in combat since the night the Remnant's got free. After that, she'd found out she was pregnant and had kept it stored under her bed and in her wardrobe. She was so glad to have it back in her hands, even as she felt the strain in her shoulder and abdomen muscles.

She crept to the door and listened closely. She didn't hear anything and carefully opened the door, having to open it quickly to avoid the squeak it would do if she were slow. No one was there. She looked around the hallway and saw the other doors were closed.

Quietly, Tanith jumped up onto the ceiling and felt more secure in her position. She crawled along the slant down to the ground floor and looked into the living room, seeing Nadia tied up roughly and on her knees under the television on the wall. A man with a large gun was sitting hunched over on the sofa. Nadia was staring at him with wide eyes and didn't see her. Figuring that was best for now, especially as Nadia couldn't say anything and was only going to give her away rather than help, she turned the other way and went through the dining room to the kitchen.

There was a man and a woman looking through the drawers of the dresser and cabinet. They had placed some papers on the table, but Tanith didn't recognise them. The door to Anton's bedroom was open and she could just about see all of his few possessions on the floor and the lamp smashed over them. For whatever reason, this just infuriated her. Anton was a strong, unmovable man, but he was also sweet and loyal. To see his property disrespected like that was just something she didn't like. Thinking that Myra had told her a man had come to the house first, Tanith snuck over the women's head and dropped down, landing on her shoulders and crippling the woman immediately.

The man jumped and swivelled immediately.

"Why are you here?" Tanith whispered her sword already at his throat. He hadn't even gotten to touch his gun. She told him to put his hands up and he did. She repeated her question, still whispering.

"No reason," he whispered back, his voice hoarse from her sword tip pressing into his throat. He even tried a smile.

"Try again, bitch," she growled softly, pressing a little harder.

He winced and Tanith tried not to smile. "We were sent to collect information."

"What information?"

"Anything we could fine."

"On what?"

"On you," he said flatly, his whole face changing. He looked dead inside. "On the Dead Men."

"Who sent you here?"

"We weren't sent. We heard about the Dead Men leaving and decided to come here ourselves," he lied.

"Don't test me," she sneered. "Who sent you? Was it the Spiders? That mafia gang my family is fighting at this moment, or maybe a Sanctuary?"

The man gave no indication. "We came by our own accord."

"That's a rather scripted thing to say," Tanith told him, having every intention of pushing the issue when she heard the sound of tape ripping off skin and then Nadia cry out.

She made the mistake of looking away from the man for barely a glance and then he had a gun on her. She ducked before he fired and slashed at his leg, but he was better than that. He used his magic and flung her across the room with the air before she could see him move his hand and it hurt like hell. She heard Nadia screaming and the man in the other room shout, but her head was swimming too much to see her opponent walk right up to her and kick her in the stomach.

**.*****.**

_**Valkyrie's POV** _

Shivering, Valkyrie huddled closer to her brothers. They had all been stripped down to their underwear and thrown in a small cell. It was big enough to give them room to sit without touching, but the cell was made of stone. In the top corner of the cell was a metal grate, and behind that was a white, plastic air conditioner that was blasting cold air into the small room. There was no bed or even a toilet. There was just a small bucket and the icy floor. They had all awoken slowly, lying in a heap on the floor, their clothes gone and no real recollection of what had made them all pass out or what happened to their clothes.

She and Erskine were pressed up tight to either side of Anton, who was the largest and so the warmest of everyone. Thankfully, although the men were down to just their tighty-whities, they had let Valkyrie keep both her underwear and her sports bra. Not having that would make cuddling a bit weird.

They had remained quiet, trying to listen over the air conditioning, but it had been useless. For hours, they sat there, waiting for any sign that the American's had been captured or gotten away. They hadn't had anyone come to boast. They didn't know where Fletcher was, which she could tell they were all concerned about.

Their only contact had been when a man dressed in black had opened the door, walked straight in, grabbed Saracen by the arm, dragged him out and slammed the door closed so fast none of them had even cried out before he was gone.

That had been a long time ago now.

Valkyrie rested her head on Anton's shoulder.


	154. Mr Sorry and his knives

**Chapter 154**

_**Nadia's POV** _

The back of the van was swelteringly hot. Outside was picking up wind, but the people at the front of the van had turned the heat on high and Nadia was sweating badly. She had no idea where they were going or what was going on or, so much more importantly, where Laila and Myra were. She wished Tanith would wake up.

Despite how uncomfortable she was, Nadia was listening. There were two people at the front, two men, and the woman that had come was in the back with them staring daggers into Tanith unconscious form. The men were whispering but every once in a while they would say something louder and have a short conversation about it with the woman in the back. She knew all their names now. Lilo, Marvin and Smith. Smith was the woman. Nadia didn't know if that was a first, last or only name, but it was all they said.

"What the fuck is up with all this traffic?" Marvin muttered loudly. He'd been the one on his phone 'watching' her earlier. He was also responsible for her bleeding lips, swelling eye and bruised ribs. He spoke and acted like a typical idiot, roll-his-eyes play-online-all-night guy, but he had been brutal to her. "We've got somewhere to fucking be, god."

"Shut up," Smith snapped quietly, still just glaring at Tanith. They went around a corner and Tanith's body slid across the floor. Smith watched Tanith; Nadia stared at her lap.

"You shut up!" He snapped back. There was a long pause and then he continued in a normal tone once more. "How long is it now?"

"Thirty-two minutes until we're there," Lilo said quietly, probably thinking Nadia couldn't hear. As if there was anything she could do anyway. She was tied up with proper anti-magic shackles now. "Forty-three until _he_ arrives."

Nadia heard that also. She didn't move, tried not to make it obvious that she had any idea what they were saying. Someone was going to meet them where they were going. Was 'he' one person, or a main person followed with a dozen followers? Nadia couldn't do anything, now or when they got there, but Tanith would want to know when she woke up and broke them out of this mess.

Marvin tutted. "Not if this traffic doesn't fuck off."

"That's not how traffic works," Lilo continued in a useless whisper.

"Yeah but still. It's a weekday, it's not even lunchtime! Why so much traffic? Hey, what happens if we're late?" Marvin asked.

"I don't know."

He tutted again. "After, I'm getting food. Got to get ready for a date."

"With buying food?" Smith asked, her angry glare turning into an equally mean frown and still aimed at Tanith. "Not like you to cook. Or go on dates."

"Yeah, this one's got me though," Marvin said, chuckling. "Met her at this crap place yesterday and asked her out. And for the record, I can cook! I just hate it. Anyway, we're going out for dinner, I'm just fucking starving."

Smith rolled her eyes and went back to staring.

"What're you even doing, since you think my nights so stupid?" Marvin asked, glancing back from the passenger seat to glare at Smith. "God, are you still staring at her. Fuck off, Smith, glare at the kid. She's a fucking idiot anyway."

"No, you just don't know how to keep an eye on a captive child with next to no defensive abilities," Smith snapped, actually turning to glare at Marvin now. Nadia was tied up underneath their shouting area. " _You're_ the idiot."

"Oh, shut up," he taunted. "She had a knife!"

"Your knife," Smith reminded him of the moment she had pulled herself free enough to try and attack him. It hadn't worked for more than a second. She should have Shocked him. "If you hadn't messed around with the TV that wouldn't have happened. So yeah, you're an idiot that can't even watch a defenceless, tied up child."

Their bickering turned to screaming pretty fast but Lilo told them to stop and it was silenced. Nothing more was said until they arrived and the car stopped.

"Get out."

Nadia struggled to her feet, her ribs protesting painfully. Smith grabbed her arm and yanked her towards the now open door. There was a man standing outside, with two covered up people on either side of him in black, padded gear with guns all over. Nadia was pretty sure this was the 'he' they spoke about earlier. He was wearing a suit, smoking a cigarette and had an air of boredom like he'd rather be dealing with something else.

Smith jumped out of the back with Tanith over her shoulder. Tanith, for her part, was limp. Not even being picked up woke her up and Nadia felt more and more like her chances of getting away – of survival even – were slimming.

"Pack 'em up," the guy with the cigarette muttered, turning on his heel and going towards an exit door of whatever parking lot they were at.

Nadia wanted to protest, but even without tape, she didn't dare try. Smith nudged her and she walked towards a car. She was sat in the back seat, Tanith laid out next to her, and an armed person sat opposite them with a gun. Someone else sat in the front.

The door slammed. The windows were blackout, but Nadia could still see out to Smith's glaring face. The car pulled away and they smoothly rode out of the lot, the exchange done.

**.*****.**

_**Valkyrie's POV** _

Valkyrie knelt on the floor, grinding her teeth, as the man paced in front of her. The room was dim but she could see from the low candlelight that the half-dressed man was sweating all over, splattered with blood and exhausted to boot. Why they had picked her up and brought her to him, she had yet to work out. Surely this building had more than one torturer? Had Saracen caused the cut on the man's leg?

"Do you know who I am?" The man croaked.

She considered saying nothing and changed her mind. "No."

He forced out a laugh and paced faster. "Your brothers have left you unprepared."

She said nothing this time.

"You're probably wondering how all this happened," the man shuddered. "Do you know why you're here?"

"I don't."

"We're looking for someone," he stared at her for a moment and then resumed his pacing, this time shaking his hands out. "Do you know who Richard Killer is?"

Valkyrie did. He was not very old, she remembered her family saying he was younger than Tanith, but he was legitimately insane. He would run and jump over buildings, take bad falls and sustaining broken bones, and then do this screaming laugh as he kept running. All anyone knew was that he had been abandoned by his mother to a nunnery at birth and the nuns had abused him, leading to his killing them all when he was only eight or nine. No one knew for sure but it was a well-known theory that he had Neoteric magic – that being, he was a person with magic based on his personality without any training or thought. It was some of the most dangerous magic there was. "I do."

"Is he in prison?"

"Not that I know of."

"Tell me about him."

Valkyrie did. She said about the suspicions on his magic, about his known upbringing and how many people they believed he killed. He was one of the people every Sanctuary around the world was interested in capturing and throwing in a cell so a detective like Valkyrie had to memorise a lot about him.

"Anything else?"

"There isn't much on him," Valkyrie told him honestly, her back aching from being hunched over in front of him. "He's never once been caught, and we only know what we do from his own admissions before he usually kills everyone. It's all from security footage and a handful of mortal witnesses."

"Where is he now?" The man asked, staring at her.

She looked straight back at him. "No one knows. He hasn't killed in a few years and no one has turned up with his description. He's a top priority criminal, we'd know if he surfaced."

The man stared at her for a length of time but Valkyrie didn't dare look away. Eventually, he nodded and continued. "What do you know of Noirette Paine?"

"He is currently working for the Spiders in Ireland. Assuming they haven't killed him yet," she told him. He asked for everything she knew and she told him the little she did.

"And what about Remus Crux?"

"Of course I know him," she snapped as shoots of pain went down her spine. "He's utterly insane but works for the Spiders also. We don't know his motive for working with them other than they both hate the Dead Men."

He nodded and walked over to her slowly. "Are you working for the Spiders?" He asked.

"Never," she replied.

He slapped her.

**.*****.**

_**Nadia's POV** _

Nadia wasn't sure where they were, but she was sure it was in the city. She'd had a bag put over her head and was taken into a building and the bag removed. It looked as if she'd been left in a greeting room, somewhere fancy. The luxuriousness of it was disconcerting. Tanith was no longer with her and she didn't know where she was anymore. She still had her shackles on.

Nadia tried hard to think of what she could do but she wasn't stupid – outside of that van and now alone, she was able to think without panicking. If she could get a key to remove her shackles, she'd be able to fight her way out of the house. She needed to stay calm to use her Shocking magic but as long as she did that, she'd be okay. And once she got out, it wouldn't take long to call for help and someone else could save Tanith, assuming she didn't do it herself. In fact, if Tanith woke up maybe she'd save them both and that would be a wonderful solution.

The wooden, double doors were opened and a very elderly man walked through. He had dark hair and dark blue eyes, a white beard and was already raising an eyebrow at her.

"You're Miss Robin?" He asked immediately, sitting down across from her.

"Yes," she quietly said.

"I need information." He lit a thick cigar before he spoke again. "Where are the Dead Men right now?"

"They went on a mission," she said instantly. "Then a man turned up at the house. He called himself Lilo."

"Yes, but do you know where they _are_?"

"No, I don't get told that stuff," she said. Nadia would rather grit her teeth and say nothing but something about him compelled her to speak.

He hummed. "Okay then. Where are your parents?"

She felt the blood drain from her face. "They're in India."

"So nobody knows that you're here right now?"

Nadia clenched her jaw shut. He grinned, so he obviously knew.

"At the moment," he told her, taking a long drag of his cigar, "your little girlfriend Valkyrie Cain is with one of my men, Mr Sorry. My name's Samael Grievers. You see, I've entered a business partnership. I do something for this other… company. And they're doing some things for me. Do you know what two reputable businesses like ours may have in common?"

Nadia took a shaky breath and shook her head.

He grinned again, and then picked up a remote and turned on an old, dusty television that looked to belong in the nineties. Nadia's mouth opened in horror – it was a feed of Valkyrie and Mr Sorry in a tiny room. There was blood everywhere, knives scattered around. Both of them were red all over, but only Valkyrie was chained to the floor.

"I really hate this girl. She's smart, for sure, and talented to boot. But she's a nuisance for a business like mine, and she caused me to lose a lot of my previously loyal patrons. I'm a changed man, though, for now I know that allowing a child into my premise when I don't know enough about them is, what I like to call, a liability. She killed one of my best men and now I need to have her killed."

"No," Nadia whispered, tears springing into her eyes. She could feel bile in the back of her throat and couldn't draw her eyes from the screen as Mr Sorry slowly cut through the skin of Valkyrie's thigh and Valkyrie screamed silently.

"The Spiders only want _some_ of the Dead Men," Samael continued to grin, sucking on the cigar. "They couldn't care less about Cain. She's not one of the original. Suits me just fine. I'll leave you to mull over this, okay? But you don't have long. A client is coming for you soon. And he paid a whole lotta money to get you, so make sure to smile, okay?"


	155. All out war

**Chapter 155**

_**Valkyrie's POV** _

It was so dark in the cell. There were lights everywhere, lighting her torturer's face, but her eyes were fuzzy and painful. Her body was on fire from the agony. But, at least, their blood was mingling – he lay on the floor facing her, his eyes lifeless while she kept breathing.

She held no thoughts for his death, just as she hadn't when she killed him. For an eternity he had cut, sliced and hurt her and she had done nothing but scream. But, like all torturers, he grew bored and started talking. She had cried through him talking about her brothers because they were strong, and she had gritted her teeth when he insulted Tanith and Nadia like they were the same stupid, incompetent slut he wouldn't mind meeting on a dark night when no one else was about. But when he did the same thing to Laila, she had snapped.

Even being chained to the floor it hadn't been hard to wrap her legs around him, taking him down. She bit his ear off, kicked him and when she got some grip, she practically shoved her foot into one of his open wounds in his abdomen and when he lay flat on the ground screaming, used her other foot to kick his head up and snap his neck. It was disgusting and dirty, but it was much less painful than what he would do to Laila.

These thoughts swirling around in her head got her to blink out of her stupor. She shuffled over to him and, taking her slow, aching time, loosened the slack in her chains until she had just enough to reach a hand into his pockets. Whoever had him look after her was cocky to leave keys with him, knowing who they were dealing with.

She unlocked herself. That success gave her the motivation to get up.

Stumbling, she opened the door, which hadn't even been locked in the first place. She was lucky – there were no guard stationed outside. She remembered the way she'd been taken up to this torture room, so she could get back down. But she'd only taken two keys from her torturer. One for her chains and shackles and the other was unknown. It could have been for the door, which made the key useless. It was better she found a guard for their keys and got her brothers. They weren't tortured and could get them all out better. It would also help if she found some more clothes, because the torturer had just cut through her bra to get to her skin, and she was relying on her own blood to cover her important bits at the moment. At least she still had her underwear.

Moving as quickly as her broken body could take her, Valkyrie stumbled, swayed and hobbled as she kept up the tirade of thoughts that let her keep moving. She didn't really remember it, but she was at the stairs going directly down to her family's cell, and maybe more prisoners. In fact, it should also hold the rest of their team, the American's, if they'd all been captured.

Unfortunately, there were also enemies. Valkyrie noticed them and took her luck with a nearby room, opening it and stepping in fast. There was one person, but he was reading a book and didn't look up.

"Did you check on the Dead Men? They talking yet?"

At the other side of the room was a small table with a few bit and weapons on it. Valkyrie grunted and walked over – the man chuckled – and grabbed the metal stick. The man looked up right in time for her to slam it down on his head. He was unconscious.

She searched him quickly and found he had two keyrings, both with multiple keys on it. Useful. However, he also said he had a friend checking on her brothers, meaning that friend mustn't be far behind and she had left a trail of blood coming into the room, and she was starting to feel really lightheaded...

It was hard to think of whether she wanted to risk moving or wait for the friend and attack then, so she looked over the weapons more closely while she thought. None of it was of real use unless she wanted to kill someone. She had come here to kill the enemy, but she suspected this was a larger scheme at work and she needed her suspects alive. And anyway, she didn't fancy the feel of any of those straps or heavy items over her cuts.

Her eyes went black and she swayed for a moment before her feeling came back and she decided to risk moving. She shoved the three keys into the side of her underwear, where they would hopefully remain, and got going. It wasn't quite or sneaky but the guys at the top of the stairs were gone. She could hear their voices below. She just needed to open the cell door her family was in and she was in the clear. There was no handrail, so it was a dangerous few minutes trying to get down, and these stairs felt especially long, but she got down eventually.

Not far was those two men, and a third person she couldn't see standing in front of a cell. The one her brothers were in. They were laughing and hitting them. She could make a distraction up close. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. Valkyrie stood up straight, held the metal rod by her side and marched up to them with even, normal steps, pain shooting through her whole body.

She swung before anyone saw her. One of the men went down but he wasn't unconscious. It was okay though because her brothers rushed out and dealt with them while she leaned against the wall and tried to stay conscious.

**.*****.**

Valkyrie woke up to screaming, gunfire and pain all over. For a moment she only remembered the torturer and thought she was still there, swaying in and out of consciousness, and then she realised she was in Erskine's arms and he was cradling her closely behind a short wall. She blinked at him and surprised herself when she had the energy to look over her body and noticed a lot of the wounds had been healed at least partially. It wasn't good work and it looked like she may well be scarred all over if they didn't get to Kenspeckle soon, but she was alive and in much better shape. Erskine had his eyes shut, was humming one straight note and rocking them both.

Gently, as to not shock him even with all the craziness around them, she reached up and stroked his hair and his eyes snapped open in fright. "Cub?" He asked, his voice small.

Valkyrie, for all her injuries, knew he was doing a lot worse than she was. "I'm okay, Snake. Calm down now, it'll be alright. We're going to get out of here."

He looked around wildly. Dexter jumped over the wall to reload and gave Valkyrie a wink despite his serious face and then started shooting again. It was an all out battle then. Valkyrie needed to try and help.

She persuaded Erskine to let her go and he did, hugging his legs in place of her.

"Wolf, what's happening?" She asked over the racket.

"Thirty heavily armed soldiers, think they're all sorcerer, fighting against us. Trying to break out. Got the American's already but not enough weapons for all of us. Anton, Bear, whatever his name – he can't use his gist. Fuckers been hiding that since we fought Bliss!"

It took a moment, but Valkyrie suddenly remembered the moment Bliss grabbed and directed the gist all those months ago. She had no idea it had had a lasting effect; Anton hadn't had to use it in a long time. It also meant they didn't have their very best weapon though, and the enemy was obviously trying hard to kill Anton first to avoid the apparently unusable gist.

" _Fuck_ ," Valkyrie muttered before taking a peek over the wall. She was almost shot so she ducked back down. Still, she had her magic and she was good enough to take a few shots if Dexter got them distracted. She told him that and he crawled down the line. A few moments later he was shooting again and then the enemy was shooting back at him, Valkyrie focused hard on her magic, let it swell to killing levels, turned and shot it at the people in bulky black with massive guns. It shot two people, then went through them and hit two behind. The others got out of the way, but she continued the stream, feeling her body heat up quickly, feeling the sweat coming and her cuts hurting worse and worse. She cut down almost ten people singlehandedly before she cried out and fell back behind the wall. Erskine screamed, something hollow and manic, and jumped on top of her, covering her from falling debris from the ceiling above.

He was heavy and it really, really hurt, but she put on a smile and patted his head. "It's okay Snake, it's okay."

"Room clear!" Dexter boomed, and he and a few other people that had been there but hidden in other places jumped up from their cover and run out of the room to the gunfire further away, leaving her and Erskine to recover.

"It's okay," she said as her eyes closed. "It'll all be okay. I promise."

**.*****.**

Valkyrie next awoke in a small room that was jammed with people. Two of them seemed to be the onsite medics, so Valkyrie quickly assumed they had taken hold of the building. Anton noticed her and stepped over. She had a vague memory of being put under by someone for treatment but she wasn't sure if that was a real memory or not.

"You're awake," he said simply. "How are you feeling?"

"Better already," she said, shaking the thoughts of torture from her head. She sat up and pulled him into a shaky hug. He held her tightly. "How is everyone? How did it go?"

"Our group has casualties, but none of the Dead Men. I was shot, as was Dexter, nothing too serious. Saracen was tortured but not to the extent you were as he became unconscious and they moved to you. Erskine is… not coping well mentally. They pulled a television into our cell after they took you away. We were able to keep it secret that you had broken out and stopped the guards from leaving before you got to us, but it damaged Erskine. He's asleep now."

"Oh no," Valkyrie said sadly. Erskine didn't appear to be in this room. "Do we have any information on what's happening?"

"A little," he said, sitting beside her to talk more quietly. She stretched her legs and arms as he spoke, continuing to keep herself covered with the thin sheet. "The enemies we encountered were not who the American's thought they were. They also knew exactly where we were getting into the building from so we suspect a spy is in the Sanctuary here, though we don't know who. No one of exception was catalogued, mostly mercenary types and a few guards, and the torturers of course. From what we can gather, this is two groups come together. Some are hired by Grievers, the man that ran the basement you went into the last time you worked with Skulduggery."

"I remember," she nodded.

"The other half won't talk but we have two likely options. They work on drugs which supply Griever's Down. Or it's someone with a vendetta against us that knew where we were and where we were going."

"The Spider's."

"My thoughts also. Are you ready to stand?"

She stood, Anton helping her wrap the blanket around her like a towel, and actually felt a lot better than she looked. She didn't have much energy, not that she had much choice except to keep moving. She didn't want to miss out on anything. They walked from the room and he took her to another which had a lot of guns. The Dead Men, Fletcher, Aurora and a handful of others were in there.

"I can't get a hold of Tanith, Nadia and Myra," Dexter muttered as they walked in.

Valkyrie's blood went cold. "If they knew we were coming here, would a team have gone to meet them at the house?"

The others looked over before looking at each other and then rushing to get up and ready. Someone threw Valkyrie's clothes at her and she got ready in the corner, Anton holding up the sheet for her, and then all linked hands. Fletcher teleported them to the house.


	156. Filthy bitch

**Chapter 156**

Valkyrie couldn't find a single clue in the house. Not a single thing to indicate what exactly the raiders had tried to find when they were pulling the place apart, nor an indication of where they went. There were a few blood spots in the living room which they suspected came from either Myra or Nadia, or from someone Tanith had cut. Tanith had also been here because her sword was on the dining room floor.

"What about Laila?" Dexter asked as he came back down the stairs.

Valkyrie bit her lip. "I– I don't know. Tanith wouldn't pick up her sword with Laila around, but it was an emergency, she might have had to. The buggy's still here."

"Did she say anything this morning?" Ghastly asked. He was pale but he was holding it together.

"Nothing. She was asleep when we left, remember? So was Laila. She has been going on walks in the morning, but she wouldn't have just left Laila outside. She's definitely not hidden upstairs?"

"Nothing," Dexter repeated.

Valkyrie told them to all sit down so she could look around again and they did that. She was going through the dining room when she was suddenly called over by Saracen.

"Her phone!" He exclaimed, holding Nadia's smartphone out to Valkyrie. She snatched it, unlocked it quickly and looked through the messages and phone log. It was empty. She sagged and then pressed the 'tabs' button and noticed the camera as a recently opened app. She pulled up the photo album.

"It's Tanith and Laila. They went for a walk this morning, but she took her in the carrier," she told them quickly.

"The carrier isn't here, I'm sure," Dexter said, but Valkyrie ran to her room to check. Sure enough, Tanith's carrier was gone, but she checked the window and found the lock had been broken just as only Tanith could have done. So she had to have known something was up to sneak in. The question was, where was the baby? With Tanith, or with someone else that got free? That person could be Nadia or Myra, surely not a neighbour.

Saracen, at least, knew that she wasn't with neighbours, but he didn't seem to have any other indication and was getting frustrated. While he tried his hardest to influence his magic, she and Fletcher searched his and Myra's bedroom and didn't find a struggle or anything useful at all. That meant both Myra and Nadia hadn't seemed to have fought.

Narrowing her eyes, she surveyed her family on the sofa's. She had a suspicious, though small, and wanted to check it.

"Fletcher," she said, turning to him. He was still on the bottom step, waiting for her to move. "Can you call Myra please?"

He frowned but pulled it out and quickly called her. It almost rang through, letting Valkyrie's suspicion die out, and at the last moment, picked up. They went to the kitchen, Valkyrie staying silent and Fletcher put it on speakerphone.

"Fletch, are you okay?" Myra's voice said.

"Pretend we're still there and won," Valkyrie mouthed.

He nodded. "Err, I'm fine babe. We're all done here, waiting for everyone to finish up so I can leave and come meet you. Are you still at the house?"

"Actually, I've gone for a walk with Tanith and Nadia," she said. Fletcher and Valkyrie locked eyes. "We won't be gone for too long. Hey, how long do you think it's going to be?"

"Oh, like–" Valkyrie indicated ten fingers "–ten minutes? Y-you know, I'd love to meet you guys, maybe we can all go to lunch?! It went so well, we should celebrate."

There was a very short pause. "That would be great babe!" There was a small cry down the line.

"Is that Laila?" Fletcher asked quickly.

"Yeah, she's a bit grumpy," Myra said, a smile in her voice. "Hey, I'll talk to you soon, we're all a little busy at the moment, is that okay? I love you, see you soon!"

She hung up quickly. The second the line closed Valkyrie stormed into the living room.

"Myra was the fucking spy!" She growled. "She has Laila!"

"Where is she?" Dexter asked, standing up immediately.

"I don't know, it sounded like outside, and she isn't with Tanith and Nadia if they're in public, neither of them would let her leave with Laila without a fight. She was in on the whole fucking thing! I can't believe this!" That was a lie. She hadn't completely liked Myra from the start, and now she wished she had trusted her guts more. How could she have guessed that her dislike of a person meant that they would kidnap a baby and organise her family to be held captive and tortured though? She had been dating Fletcher and she didn't believe for a second he was in on it. "She must be going to meet with whoever her boss is. They know we'll give ourselves up for Laila."

"We need to find where she's going," Saracen said.

That meant he had no ideas. "Right. Look, we know that there has to be someone in our mission location today that was aware of us coming, so maybe whoever orchestrated that is also Myra's boss – and we know that when two separate groups come together, there could be two separate bosses and she likely only works for one. Everyone at the mission site today has been killed or arrested so most likely chance is the bosses don't know we won that. So we have time, and we already know about Grievers involvement."

"Or she's working for a third party," Ghastly pointed out.

"Also a possibility, but we can't think of that right now. The only definite player we have his Grievers. What do we know about him?"

"Other than his teleporting dark alternative to the Midnight Hotel? Not a bunch. He's American I think, and if he's the one we're looking for he'll be stationed nearby," Dexter said quickly.

"Right. Dexter, call all your contacts and everyone else to see if they know where he might be around here. Saracen, you call Aurora and Saile and see what they might know about places with criminal activity nearby that might lead to Grievers. Anton, you should stick with Erskine and you two should sit this out. Fletcher, tell Ghastly everything Myra has ever said or done that might in any way be suspicious. I'm going to drive around and see if Myra or anyone suspicious is nearby. Keep your phones on!"

She was rushing from the house before anyone could say if they agreed.

They still had their large van, having been teleported to the Sanctuary that morning, so she got in and started driving around, finding it rather difficult to stay on the wrong side of the road. Thoughts went through her head on what she had to do to get to Myra and Laila, and then to Tanith and Nadia. She was worried about the women, but the baby was more important right now. Tanith and Nadia would never forgive her if she found them and didn't have Laila already safe.

She drove erratically, going in any circle she could while looking up places on her phone Tanith might have wondered to. She found a few parks but no Myra, she found a community centre that was closed for the day, a café that she stopped at and found that no women and baby in a carrier had come in that day. At one point she found a police vehicle and followed it for a little bit but it was just patrolling so she cut away and kept looking around. Unfortunately, it was all residential streets and she had no idea which way around the residential area Myra would have taken. She was outside when Fletcher called her, Valkyrie just had to hope she still was. It wouldn't be too hard to apprehend her if she got there before anyone else did.

It just so happened that Valkyrie spotted a woman walking around looking quite worried and red in the face. She slowed to a stop, got out and jogged over to the women, noticing suddenly that she wasn't red in the face so much as bloody.

"Excuse me!" She shouted, going up to her. The women stopped dead and looked as if she might cry but didn't speak. "I'm so sorry, what happened to you? I'm looking for someone who is a little bit mentally ill, perhaps you ran into them? They should have a baby in a carrier with them."

The woman immediately started nodding and began to cry. "Yes, I saw her! She was with me and– I took her to my house like the blonde woman, Tanith, told me to after she left to help someone and then that girl hit me! She really hurt me and I remember calling for help and then I woke up and she was gone. I've been looking for her and the baby."

"Take me to your house."

**.*****.**

Valkyrie drove herself and the woman to her house, which she thankfully remembered despite her obvious head injury. Valkyrie did feel guilty, trying to make this woman talk when she needed a doctor, but at the same time a baby was on the line and she just had to prioritise. It didn't even seem selfish when she thought of it as a grown adult in danger versus a baby in danger, so she stuck with that reasoning.

At the house, having learnt absolutely nothing other than the fact that Tanith gave the baby to Myra after Myra turned up saying Nadia was under attack, and then she had beat this strange mortal woman and left the house with Tanith's baby, Valkyrie noticed the camera's in the corners of the house.

"I need to see your CCTV footage," she demanded, and the wounded women ran quickly to do as she was commanded. Valkyrie followed behind.

Valkyrie took over at the computer which was in the living room of this woman's house. Somewhere in the house there were screaming children playing rough and every once in a while some man would shout at them to shut up which did absolutely nothing as the children continued to scream.

She looked back and found the times Myra went to the house with the lady and Laila, plus the lady's children. Then just five minutes later Myra left the house casually walking up the street, the opposite way to how Valkyrie had come. Sometime later a car arrived and at the same time, the freshly bloodied woman came out of the house and went wandering. Her husband only looked at his phone and didn't notice her dazed, bloody face.

Only thirty minutes later was the present time, so that means in thirty minutes Myra left with Laila, had a phone call and kept walking. Valkyrie had been gone from the house for almost thirty minutes also. She couldn't have gotten that far.

"You were at that playgroup when you met Myra, right? How long was the session?"

"Two hours?" The woman asked back.

So, two hours of the session, however long it took to get back, five minutes in the house, an immediate phone call from Fletcher as she left and half an hour to get somewhere.

She thanked the woman and told her to go to her husband and tell him she was attacked before wiping the footage clean. She left, took the car and phoned Fletcher as she drove.

He picked up after a moment. "Call Myra again and try to meet with her. Tell her you're alone and will be a little while. Tell her the Dead Men are looking for Griever's hideout and that they said you could go for the day because you got hurt or something. Be quick."

"Okay, do you want to know what the others found?" He asked her hurriedly.

"Please," she sighed, turning right on a whim.

Ghastly came on the line. "We think we know where Grievers is. But we need to get our source one hundred thousand dollars within the hour or he'll tell everyone where we're going."

"Use my card, do you have it? We'll bust them back for it later." They took a few moments to establish where her card was and then they continued. "What else do we know?"

"The American's weren't in on the plan; they're offering us all their help now they've found out about Laila. They seem to be trying to avoid an international scandal."

"If anything happens to Laila I'll _make_ _it_ a fucking scandal."

"I know," he said fiercely. "We plan to move on Griever's house soon so we can secure it and move onto the second enemy group if Griever isn't responsible. We've already found cars, but we're avoiding talking to the Sanctuaries in case of more spies."

"That's good."

"I want to join you Val, but I have to leave you to find Laila so I can get Griever. Saracen seems to think the two are linked but he can't work out why or how. We're assuming it's to keep Tanith and Nadia compliant so he can use them in Griever's Down."

"I killed his fighter before. They might want Tanith for that."

"That was our thoughts too. I doubt we have long. We're going to leave in a moment."

"Okay, keep me updated. Fletcher needs to call Myra," she said, and he hung up.

She drove for five minutes before getting a call back. Fletcher had found out that she was on her way into the city with 'Nadia and Tanith' but 'both of their phones had died'. There were only two main ways into the city, and they were both on the highway. Only one of them went in the direction of Griever's house, so she sped that way. Fletcher said there had been a racket in the background and Myra said she was on a bus with the others – they believed her. Laila had also been crying.

She sped as fast as the car could go towards the city.


	157. Myra put the gun to Laila's head

**Chapter 157**

_**Dexter's POV** _

The panic coming from his friend was almost physical – that is, Dexter was sure it was some parasite that had latched onto Ghastly's entire body making his hands shake, sweat all over, either talk very fast or not at all. All his movements were barely visible, although that might have been the boxer in him.

How could anyone blame him though? His baby girl had been kidnapped by a sex-trafficking drug lord. They were _all_ panicking a bit.

The house they had been given the address of seemed to be the one. Saracen was talking a lot and being quiet a lot too. Not having Erskine, Anton and Valkyrie was really throwing him off. He could work alone and in small groups, even with people other than the Dead Men, but the longer he lived and worked with his brothers the harder it was to be away. That was just how he was.

Dexter shook his head of the thoughts. He couldn't keep distracting himself. He was the driver after all. Just a few streets away and he'd have brought them to their destination.

"Are we sneaking in or being direct?" Fletcher asked in a lull in the conversation.

"Being direct," Ghastly said firmly, commandingly. "If we keep Griever's distracted Tanith might get free. At the least, we need information from him."

Fletcher hesitated. "Don't you usually just punch the bad guys and make them talk? Why aren't we doing that?"

Ghastly hesitated this time.

"I like Fletcher's plan better," Saracen seconded.

"Let's compromise," Dexter said, revving the engine and driving straight through the iron gates, sending the dog running away from the car. He didn't stop there though, even as his friends shouted at him to stop, he smashed into the side of the house, causing a scraping _boom_!

There was a split second of shock from them all and then there was the big scramble to go. They all had guns, although Dexter didn't trust Fletcher to use his, and Ghastly gave a good kick on the door and it burst open. There were two people in the front entrance, one with a gun and one without. Dexter jumped on the one without a gun and started punching, twisting and choking the guy out. Ghastly flicked his wrist and the other one crumpled as his neck was snapped by the speed of the air.

His friends moved through the house and he took up the back, keeping it clear. Saracen led them directly to a living area that Ghastly opened using his magic to snap the lock.

Nadia was balled up on a sofa in a fancy looking living room, tears on her face.

"Nadia!" He whispered loudly.

She practically shot into the air. "Oh my god!"

"Fletcher, get her out of here," Ghastly told him.

"Wait!" She almost shouted, then slapped hands over her mouth. Fletcher popped beside her but didn't take her away. "Where's Val?"

"Looking for Laila and Myra," Dexter told her as Ghastly and Saracen left to move onto more enemies. "Do you know anything?"

"You know who kidnapped us, right? Tanith is here, but I think in a more secure place. I don't know where Laila is, but Myra's bringing her here," Nadia told him quickly.

"Good to know. You need to get out of here," Dexter told her and barely a second later, she was gone and Fletcher was back.

They caught up to the other two in the kitchen and the fight started to become more of a battle for the second time that day. The house – or mansion rather – was crawling with armed mages. Dexter was almost surprised because he realised they, the enemy, had planned for this eventuality, and they still hadn't found Tanith. Fletcher was picking people off and sending them god-knows-where which helped massively, but for everyone they shot down or got teleported away, another rounded the corner. Dexter gritted his teeth.

**.*****.**

_**Valkyrie's POV** _

It was beginning to sprinkle with rain, and Valkyrie's frustrations, worry and anger were being maximised by the rapidly cooling temperature. Laila was seven weeks old, she needed to be fed, a place to sleep without interruption and warmth. She could die without those things.

Valkyrie had an idea of where Myra may be, however. She was parked across from a bus stop in a multi-story parking lot, or whatever it was called in America, and looking out steadily. If her phone was right, this was the only bus stop that would come out near to Griever's private property. That was still a twenty-minute walk on foot, according to the phone, but she should have gotten here before Myra. It was all based on if she took the thirty-minute mark bus, or the one after it, or if there were delays that meant she was held up for some time at one bus stop or another. The buses here came every ten minutes and although a lot of women with children had come and gone in this nice area, she hadn't seen Myra.

This was assuming she hadn't gotten a taxi. Which Valkyrie had no way of knowing.

Still, she had to hope. She knew her family had to be at Griever's home by now, so if Myra was ahead of them hopefully Saracen would pick up on it and get to Laila without her. But… her gut kept her still. She always had to trust her gut feeling.

Valkyrie was on the bottom floor and pacing like a lunatic when the correct bus turned up. She caught sight of Myra through one of the windows and ducked behind a car. Some moments later the bus came to a high-pitched screech of a stop and Valkyrie watched carefully as Myra got off. Knowing she was no longer able to keep travelling by public vehicle, and sure of her destination now, Valkyrie went around the car, jumped the barrier and began carefully stalking the girl.

Myra didn't seem to notice anything at first. Valkyrie ran across the road and joined a small group consisting of maybe six adults and ten children and followed behind their protection. Eventually the parents of the children started looking at her oddly and she had to cross to the opposite side of the street. That was when Myra caught sight of her.

They locked eyes.

Myra ran, jostling Laila terribly, who had already been crying. Valkyrie put on the speed and ran into a car, jumped over it, and tried to catch up to the girl. Myra turned a corner and just as Valkyrie followed her around, Myra was standing there. Holding a gun level to Valkyrie's nose.

"Myra," Valkyrie said, pouring magic into her voice. "Drop the gun."

"That's not my real name," Myra informed her viciously. "Get on the floor or I'll shoot you."

"That's not going to happen," Valkyrie said, although she did put her hands up. Two men came around the corner, attempted to grab Valkyrie – she didn't so much as look away from Myra's eyes – and came to a skidding halt when they realised what they had involved themselves in. They were gasping and gaping. "If you give me the baby I'll let you go. I won't tell anyone what happened, I'll even help you get to Australia again if you want. But you know I'm not leaving without that baby."

"My whole mission was to report on you and keep you on the right track here," Myra told her, spittle flying from her mouth. "Now you know I'm a spy, it won't be long until everyone does. I have to complete my mission or they'll kill me."

"I'll kill you if you don't give me the child. I'm a certainty, the others are only small chances if you help me help you. It's your best shot," Valkyrie told her, keeping her voice measured. Some of the rest of the family turned around the corner, wondering why it was all so quiet. They stopped dead and then most of them ran back behind the corner, although a handful of children and one of the women seemed to fall over at the sight of the gun and didn't move. Again, Valkyrie didn't look at them.

Myra laughed. "I'm better off killing the kid and then getting killed by you than _giving_ you the kid and waiting for them to torture me to death, you do realise that, you bitch? At least if I kill her, and you while I'm at it, I can get some satisfaction out of all this. I didn't spend the last year and a half dating a dumb boy for nothing, you know. I have plans, deadlines, expectations. If I kill you and the kid, I'll get protection, and they'll use me to get to the rest of the Dead Men. I'll get my rewards!"

"Or no one dies and no one gets hurt. Bear in mind, Myra, Griever's and his little army are being busted right this moment, and the Spiders are going to lose each ally and each bit of support piece by piece. You're on the wrong side."

"No, I don't think I am," Myra smiled.

"You do know the Spiders want to kill all mortals and _you are a mortal_? You understand this?"

"Don't patronise me, whore!" Myra snarled, shaking the gun and taking a step closer. Laila was still crying but was weaker, more tired. "I'm older than you, and I've had a lot more training than you. I was picked out from birth to help take down the Dead Men! It's my purpose!"

Police sirens in the distance. "I don't want to fight you, Myra. The Dead Men don't want to fight you, you were welcome in our home. No one has ever done anything hurtful towards you."

"Do you think I care?" Myra asked.

"Yes, I do. Else you would have shot me by now. Let me help you. I can get you away from all this, to somewhere safe," Valkyrie pressed.

"You can't reason with me," Myra grinned and took the gun away. She held it towards Laila's head and Valkyrie almost fell to her knees. "But why don't you try. Tell me, Valkyrie Cain, how much are you willing to bargain for her measly life?"

"Whatever you want," Valkyrie said immediately, staring at the tip of Laila's head that was visible from behind the carrier. "What do you want, I'll get it!"

"Hmm, how about killing Meritorious?"

Valkyrie swallowed. "Yes."

"Would you give me your brothers?"

"Yes."

"You'd let them die for the kid?"

"They'd rather die than her," Valkyrie said with certainty.

Myra pretended to consider the offer. "I know what I want!" She suddenly said. "If you kill all these mortals, I'll let you have the baby. You'll have to let me go too of course, with immunity and protection, but the baby won't get hurt."

Frighteningly, Valkyrie thought about it for a moment. But no, she couldn't even consider murdering those innocent crying children. "I can't do that," she whispered. "You know that."

She grinned. "Of course I do, silly," Myra grinned. "Well, if there's nothing better you can–"

Valkyrie struck before Myra could finish her sentence – using her magic, she pulled the gun firstly up, making it both fire and break Myra's finger, and then pulled it again and it flew into the air. Before the second was up, she was in Myra's face and punched her harder than she'd ever punched another person before, grabbing her limp body before it fell.

Carefully, Valkyrie let Myra fall to the ground, not letting her jolt the baby. She abandoned the carrier and just pulled Laila straight from it and held her in her arms, heart beating erratically. A moment later the gun fell out of the sky and skidded into the road and the mortals started screaming and crying, and then a police vehicle came around the corner from the opposite end of the street.

Valkyrie was in a lot of pain again now, whatever medication they had given her on-site at the job had worn out. Her arms were aching from the tense drive, she was tired from the pacing and stressing, and was just burnt out from all that had happened. She felt as if she were about to burst out crying. She had been horrifically tortured already that day.

But she had Laila. She held her goddaughter close, supported her head, and got the hell out of there before the police got a good look at her face.


	158. The finishing blow

**Chapter 158**

_**Tanith's POV** _

It was cold, wherever she was. She gritted her teeth, mad at herself for getting into this situation. She was a trained assassin, she was an ally of the Dead Men, she should be able to take down three stupid people without a problem. But no, now she was in a cold room with thin clothes and no idea where she was. God knew where Nadia was.

She was in luck though, and she sensed it before it struck. She lay down on the floor where she'd woken up and stayed still. The door to her black room opened and a dull yellow light came in. She kept her eyes only slightly cracked open. In the distance, she could hear gunfire.

"Oh gosh," a woman fretted, her voice shaking. She came shuffling into the room. "Oh gosh, oh gosh. Miss? Oh, no no no."

It was tough to stay still, but she did. The woman, obviously quite elderly, came close enough to shake her shoulder, and that's when Tanith jumped up, grabbing the lady by the mouth, forcing her jaw shut. Her eyes widened in fear, but it only took a moment for Tanith to choke her of oxygen and she took Tanith's place as the unconscious female on the floor.

Standing too quickly, Tanith suddenly swayed and she felt nausea build quickly. She threw up in the corner, breathed deeply, thought about her daughter and stood back up. She had to get back to her daughter. Thank god she'd had Myra to leave her with, she'd have hated it if Laila were with her.

She glanced out of the dungeon door and looked around. There were only six cell rooms, and a quick tug on the doors found that she was the only one held prisoner. The light came from a bare bulb in the ceiling that hung over a lush, expansive office cross small library, which was held in a round room in between the stairs going up to the fighting and the corridor that led to the cells and whatever else was down that hall. A quick hop up to the ceiling proved she had her magic and that her body was even more bruised than she had thought. In fact, she was pretty sure she had a broken rib, but it didn't hurt too badly.

She decided to go down to the end of the hall. Most likely chance was her friends had found she and Nadia were missing, probably finding Myra and Laila and getting her story, and now Valkyrie had used her detective prowess to find them. So, instead of going up with her broken rib, she'd find what was down the hall on the other side of the cells and give them the heads up or clear it if she could.

Nodding to herself, she crouched and ran. The more she shuffled along the ceiling, the dizzier she felt, but it was progress and she wasn't getting shot at least. Through a door and–

It was a room of chains, blood and semen covered sofas, leather straps, metal cages, electric dog collars, a couple of coffins. Everything had blood on it. And there were people too. There was someone in a coffin, dead, naked and _used_ – Tanith almost threw up when she thought of the word. There were five others. Someone very elderly was tied up and chained to a wall, although he seemed to be a willing participant. The middle-aged looking woman in a box with a dog collar on so tight she was red in the face and one tug on the lead from passing out didn't have the same look of pleasure on her face. The other three were enjoying themselves. Two men and a woman. The woman was beating the chained up old man. The other two men were naked, legs splayed and talking in low voiced. Tanith was fairly sure they were high.

Three people. Only one armed, that being the woman. Could she take them even when she was nauseous, dizzy and had a broken rib?

Of course she could, she was Tanith Low. She dropped on the man with the lead, making him drop it, and another kick to the second man head and he was out. She turned back around as the first tried to lunge at her but she easily kicked him to the floor before hissing in pain and holding her side. The woman threw a knife at her and it burnt like hell to drop and roll. The woman obviously wasn't a real fighter because she had small, unmuscular arms and even when she whipped Tanith it barely hurt. Tanith moved through the pain and punched the woman in the face. She fell straight to the floor.

"Hey!" The old naked man said. He was still erect and Tanith made the mistake of looking up from the woman, meaning her poor eyes had to look at his penis. She was a woman who had been around, seen the block, tried out a few rides on her way. But she didn't want the merchandise to be so close to her god damned _face_. "You can't just do that you know."

"Sure I can. What is this place?" She asked with a hard voice. She went over to the struggling woman and used the heel of her shoe to bust the lock open. The woman threw herself out and into Tanith's arms. That was much nicer. She undid the buckle around her neck.

"I don't have to tell you anything, slut! This is a private affair! Who let you in?"

"I was brought here," Tanith told him, standing up and letting the woman cry and suck in some oxygen in peace. "You'll tell me where we are or I really will cause you some damage. Want a shattered kneecap?"

It was a risk saying that to a man who enjoyed being chained and beaten, but a shattered knee appealed to him as much as her, as to be expected. He grimaced. "I can't tell you that. You're a prisoner."

"Right now, my friends are arresting every person in here. If you comply, they'll make sure you have a fair trial with everyone else. Even if you're working with the enemy."

The man paled significantly. He was going flaccid now, thankfully. "Oh god. You have to get me down lady! They– they can't know I was here!"

"Who are you?"

"If you don't know, that's only a good thing! Let me down, I don't want anyone to know I was here!"

"I might, if you tell me who this woman is and how she got here," Tanith bargained, crossing her arms.

"Arr, for Christs – she's a mortal from Mexico or something. Please, lady, I can't be seen here!" He begged.

"Hey, hey, slow down champ." She smiled without humour. "You and your friends were holding a moral captive and sexually abusing her. I think I'd better leave you there considering your crimes."

"What?! I wasn't involved, I swear! She's just a mortal, they can make her forget everything and send her home, it'll be fine! My kids will find out about this!"

"I guess that's just too bad," Tanith rolled her eyes and helped the woman stand. She had shaky knees but looked at Tanith with gratitude. "Can you speak English?"

"Err, a little," she said in a thick accent.

"Oh good," Tanith nodded. She took her fleece off and wrapped it around the woman's shoulders. She pointed up. "Upstairs are my friends. They're arresting the people who kidnapped you."

The woman nodded, hold the jacket tightly. "Okay."

"I'm going to check on them, you need to stay here until then."

"No!" The old man screeched, shaking his restraints.

"Okay," the woman said nervously.

Tanith left her and jogged back the way she came, taking out a guy on the stairs as she went. Bingo! She had her sword _and_ a gun. She took both, jumped onto the ceiling and kept on with new vigour.

She chose to again go away from the main fighting grounds so she could pick enemies off, and there were certainly enough of them. She sliced from above, rolling away from bullets and having to use the gun once to take out three guys that were on their way to the main fighting area in massive protective suits with built-in ammo holders and gigantic guns. She threw it away after that, out of bullets.

Swords suited her better anyway. She went up the stairs again, taking out a few more along the way, noticing the very male heavy population. Up on the landing, she picked off the remaining people quickly, hearing a bang from downstairs but keeping focus. She ended up on the floor grappling, choking people out, punching and kicking. None of them were a real challenge in terms of skill but her rib was starting to cause her real issues.

Of course, she knew it when she found the boss. She could hear his voice furiously screaming from his room, two guards stationed outside. They were hiding. But the high ceilings covered her well – they never suspected her. She was done flipping to the floor before they could make a sound, and she killed them swiftly.

And inside that room was Samael Grievers.

She knew his face.

Fury bubbled inside. She took a step forward.

He levelled a gun at her. "Got to go," he said into the phone and put it down. "Tanith Low. I'm disappointed but not surprised."

"Your men are almost finished, Griever's," she told him, holding the sword ready. "It's just me and you up here. Drop the gun and we'll possibly not allow you to be abused in prison."

"Slightly better than shitty? I'm not enjoying this bargain, sweetheart. And I'm guessing no one's told you yet. You're going to help me out or I'll kill your kid."

Tanith's heart stuttered in her chest. "What do you mean?"

"Your baby, you left it with the spy, the bitch dating the teleporter. She called ahead and said she got it already. She'll be walking through those doors any moment now and unless you help me, I'll make sure my people kill you, the Dead Men and your kid. Understand me a little better now?"

Tanith considered if it was a hoax, and then dropped the sword, a glare fixed on his face.

"That's better. Oh, I do like that type of fury in a woman, so fiery. Come now," he said, shaking the gun. "Lead the way."

**.*****.**

_**Dexter's POV** _

The stream of men stopped. The floor was slick with blood and bullet shells, but they had won. They must have all been shot. Fletcher was pale, baring keeping himself sitting up, two bullet holes in his shoulders and one on his thigh. He'd tried telling him to teleport away, but he hadn't been lucid enough to hear.

They all stopped shooting and looked around together. No more enemies. Bodies everywhere, but none of them fighting, possible none of them alive.

There was a sound and their guns pointed at the far door, about to shoot, when Tanith came through, pale and angry. They lowered the guns, frowning.

Grievers came through after her, gun at her back. Their guns went back up. Both of them were standing on the bodies him and his brothers had shot down.

"Let her go," Dexter commanded immediately.

"Now now, let's not get hasty," Grievers grinned, pulling a cigar from his pocket. "Lower those guns or I'll shoot the bitch."

Dexter glanced at Saracen. He nodded, so they lowered their guns. "What do you want?"

"Oh, just the usual. To leave, free, and not be pursued," Grievers smiled, lighting the cigar from a lighter. "The Spiders spy, the mortal, has this bitches child. Let us two leave and I won't kill her, you or the kid. I'll even let you get the mortal, though The Torment won't be happy with me."

"You're not getting anything," Ghastly growled.

"Oh yeah, you're the daddy, aren't you? Forgot about that," Grievers nodded sucking on the cigar. "Well, you can have the kid. I just want the momma. Sound good?"

"You're not. Getting. Anything," Ghastly said again, raising the gun.

"Ghastly!" Dexter snapped.

"Oh-ho!" Grievers laughed. "I'll shoot before you can, Scarface. Be a good boy and lower that gun."

Ghastly's phone rang then. Grievers told him to answer it.

Slowly, Ghastly lowered his gun and pulled out his phone. He pressed the answer button and Dexter tried not to look over at him as he could hear Valkyrie's voice but not hear her words. He just said, "Good."

Tanith threw herself left – Anton shot at the same time as Grievers, and then Tanith had fallen out of the way and the rest of them opened fire.

"Stop!" Dexter demanded, running over and looking down at the man. Crouching, he pushed Grievers onto his back and held a finger to his neck. "He's alive. Let's keep him for questioning."

"Is she okay?!" Tanith gasped, holding her side as her shoulder bled. Saracen and Ghastly were already on her and trying to stem the flow.

"They both are," Ghastly said gruffly. "Valkyrie said she's fine."

"Thank God," Tanith breathed, sagging to the floor.


	159. Hospital reuniting

**Chapter 159**

**_Valkyrie's POV_ **

"Hey," Valkyrie smiled softly. Nadia smiled up at her from the sofa at Kenspeckle's hospital. "You doing okay?"

Her girlfriend didn't answer, just stood slowly and wrapped her arms around Valkyrie. She held her back. Valkyrie had just gotten to Kenspeckle's. "I missed you."

"I know, I was really worried about you," Valkyrie whispered into Nadia's hair. "I'm sorry it took me so long to get here."

"It's okay," Nadia nodded into Valkyrie neck. "It's not your fault. How do you feel?"

"I'll be fine," she smiled, pulling back. She was aching all over and wanted nothing more than to go home to Gordon's and sleep. "Laila took it really well. When we got back to the house in America she had a bottle and nappy change, I switched her clothes and she slept. I took a bath with a healing stone and it really helped."

"I'm glad. You still have to get checked though," Nadia smiled, some stress leaving the edges of her eyes. "I don't want you packing up on me now."

"Packing up on you?" Valkyrie grinned. "Who have you been spending time with?"

"I don't know," she whispered, closing her eyes and leaning against her again. "I'm tired, okay? I want to go to bed."

"Lie down then. I'll be back later and we'll talk."

"Is Laila okay?"

"I already gave her to Tanith, and Fletcher's good too. Kenspeckle will be pretty mad when he realises he teleported to get me though," Valkyrie smiled sadly. Fletcher had been in more than a bit of pain and heartbreak, Valkyrie felt really bad for him. "Go on, lie back down. I'll see you in a few hours and it'll be a new day. I promise."

**.*****.**

The morning after Valkyrie got to Ireland – a good seven or eight hours after everyone else because of how bad Fletcher's wounds had been – was a whole lot better. The familiar smell of the hospital, the noise of the doctor's bickering with Civet and Stentor, the light breathing and talking of her family. She realised quickly that Nadia had procured a bottle of baby blue nail varnish and was painting Valkyrie's toenails. She smiled, laughed softly, and sat up.

"Morning, baby," Nadia smiled tiredly.

"Good morning. Did you sleep at all last night?" She asked.

"I slept loads, I just feel like shit anyway," she shrugged with a smile. "I didn't have any bad dreams though."

"Good." Dexter had already phoned her last night and in their long chat while he waited for his surgery for the bullets he had acquired, he had told her that Nadia had to sit in a room watching her get tortured, then her escape to Ireland via Fletcher and had no idea what had been happening for hours. It must have been really hard for her. "Do you know if we've had word from any of the Sanctuaries yet?"

"Irish have called. Elder Deuce and Grand Mage Meritorious were really concerned and said they'd back you guys up no matter what. They said since me and ' _the baby_ ' were involved and the fact the American's have already started looking for a spy gives them enough grounds to ask for you to stay here again. But they also said that America probably won't like that, and then Dexter and Solomon got into a pretty heated debate about doing what was right for our country and family in both politics and tactically. I didn't understand much of it, but I don't think they made a decision," Nadia relayed. "I get the feeling they're going to wait until everyone's better and then ask you what you want to do."

Valkyrie sighed. "We need to go back. We need to keep the peace. And anyway, we don't know where the Spiders are in our own country but there's a good chance there's some in America and we should try and cut that off now, rather than when they come over to Ireland halfway through a battle and annihilate us."

Nadia smiled. "We can go back if you want to."

"But to a different house. And no one from any Sanctuary will know where we are. And I want to go on holiday with you there for a week to celebrate your birthday."

"It's only a few weeks away now," Nadia grinned. "Then I'll be eighteen."

"Yep. Any idea of what you want to do? Or anything you want?"

"Val, you gave me a Dragon Diamond, I think you've outdone yourself already!" Nadia giggled very quietly so no one would hear her. She was still painting Valkyrie's feet. "And a week's holiday will be another great gift. I'd rather spend time with you than have presents."

"Younger me didn't get that memo," Valkyrie grinned back.

"Younger me didn't either, but we've grown up."

"A little bit."

"Just a tad," Nadia said, and then winked at her. Valkyrie's grin widened.

"Are you awake over there?" Ghastly's voice called.

"Yes, I'm awake," she said, and not a second later the curtain was ripped away – it had only been at the side, meaning the end of the bed was open for anyone to see and just gave Valkyrie privacy from whoever was lying next to her. The certain swung before hitting the wall.

It only took a moment for all her family to start crowding her. She had kisses and hugs and handshakes for fun, and lots of kind words. Solomon took a long time holding her and apologised for not being there. She told him to not be silly and he smiled and sat on the chair on the other side of the bed. Lastly, Tanith wrapped her in a neck-breaking, one-armed hug.

"I love you," she said simply, the other arm holding Laila close.

"Love you too, Tan," Valkyrie replied, and stroked Laila's little head when Tanith pulled back enough. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Tanith sighed. "Just very bruised. And one fractured rib."

"Not too bad then," Valkyrie joked. "What about you lot?"

There was a quick report on how everyone was healing, as well as updated on how bad the damage had been, which wasn't as extensive as anyone initially thought considering they had been held hostage, two of them badly tortured, three of them kidnapped and bullets had been shot in everyone's direction. In fact, it seemed that Fletcher was the worst of them all as he was not used to this kind of situation. He had gone for surgery first and been given his own room away from the Dead Men to 'keep him out of trouble' although that hadn't actually helped. Apparently Kenspeckle had tried to scold him but he passed out from pain after a few minutes so it hadn't done a lot of good.

"We need to do something for him," Valkyrie decided as Nadia put the varnish away and told her not to move her feet. "He's not had a good few days."

"I don't know what," Dexter said, rubbing the back of his head. "But we've actually got to decide if we're going to America again before thinking about Fletcher. They're not fussing about being here yet, but if no one mentions an actual plan soon, they might try to make one for us."

"We'll have to go back," she told them, and explained how it was more important to keep the peace for the time being and to try rat out a few of the Spider's allies before staying in Ireland again. "With any hope, all the big shots trying to kill us will follow us to America and Ireland will be safe."

"Unlikely," Ghastly muttered. "Unless you mean more Spider's."

"Yeah, only people working with or for the Spiders," Valkyrie conceded. "But picking people off now might give us an advantage. Think about it, if we hadn't gone there already we wouldn't have found Grievers and have him in custody. I know his basement place can still move around without him but he's the brains behind it, right? Any mishap down there and no one will be able to fix it so we've actually done a massive favour for ourselves, it just needs one last kick in the shins. It won't take much for one Sanctuary or another to take it apart."

"You really like metaphors today," Nadia commented.

"I do, they're fun. And it's true. _And_ we've found out who the spy was close to us without anyone getting properly hurt, which is useful, and Fletcher didn't get kidnapped or killed which was probably Myra's intention."

"That might be right," Anton nodded quietly, his deep voice capturing their attention. "Although there's a lot of variables with the rest of your thoughts, Myra is a massive issue to have sorted, and one none of us saw in our own home."

"I bet she panicked," Dexter said. "The moment we moved to America she and whoever was sending the money had to choose between staying with Fletcher or making an attempt on Dead Men. They tried their luck with the Dead Men and now look where we are."

"What happened to Myra?" Valkyrie asked.

"She was picked up by cops where you left her, and then the cops and all the witnesses were seen by someone to forget everything," Erskine said. He had dark bags under his eyes, a little shake in his hand and a bandaged leg but seemed otherwise fine. His voice was steady and strong. "Myra was taken by sorcerers and is being held in custody until America, Australia and Ireland decide who gets to deal with her."

"So, it'll be a while then," Valkyrie rolled her eyes. Laila let out a cry of happiness and then all grinned and cooed at her.

The transition back to America would be in another two days after Kenspeckle would allow it, and that gave them all time to talk and recuperate. America came back with their thanks and promises soon after news reached them, and they agreed to the terms that missions were sent via text and no one was to have contact with them outside of that. Meritorious and Corrival were grateful and were able to change the contract with Fletcher to give him more time off and limit the places and actions he could do. That being, he could live with the Dead Men or not, and he didn't have to stay in America full time so long as he was doing what he had to for the contract of work. When he woke up, Fletcher appreciated the change and said he'd like to stay with the Dead Men until he worked something else out, which they were all happy to accommodate.

Solomon waited for Valkyrie to be ready to go on a walk before he tried to speak about her Magic Keeping plan again.

"Now it's been some time, how do you feel about it?" He asked her after a while of silence. There was a light layer of snow on the ground and it was just after lunch hour. Not many cars were about.

"I still think it's best. But I think getting some eggs frozen is the best thing to do, just in case the side effects are as powerful as they say."

"I imagine they are," Solomon warned her seriously. "I want to support you if this is what you want, but I don't like it."

"You don't have to like it. Even though I appreciate your opinion," she told him. "I've thought about it a lot since we spoke, and I'm already a lot better at using my magic in combat. I doubt it'll be a few months before I'm ready to have it sealed and then we'll never have to worry about it."

"I understand. I just worry that you're too young to make this decision. I know, you're an adult, or close enough. I know you say you understand. But have you ever thought about having children before this? Have you thought about the risk it may have to other parts of your body if it's going to not only destroy your eggs but also do something so damaging to your uterus that you can't carry children? It could kill you."

"And I'll have to take that risk." She stopped him walking and they stood at tiny flakes of ice started to fall. "I'm okay with not having children by giving birth to them myself. I'm okay with this because I've thought about it. The seal makes it so nothing of mine leaves me, in a way, right? So I can't pass on my magic or genes. But it doesn't matter that the seal does that, because I'll have eggs frozen. Yeah, I might be disappointed I can't be pregnant one day, but I'd rather that than have a maniac suck my magic away and become a super-charged maniac. So, I have children _and_ no maniac by doing this. It's a win-win. There's no reason for the seal to damage anything else, and so long as it only affects what we think it will, or at least does nothing drastically outside of that, then I'm happy with the cost."

Solomon closed his eyes and counted under his breath. "It's not the logic behind it Valkyrie. It's the fear of you changing your mind."

"If we got scared at every big decision, nothing would ever happen. I've made my decision. You just have to hold my hand and let me cry when it hurts, alright? That's all I want."

He let all his breath out after another bit of counting. "As long as you're sure."

"I am."

"Good. Norma tells me the procedure should be excruciating by the way."

"I'd expect no less. Can we get coffee now? I'm actually really cold."


	160. Checking in with Crystal

**Chapter 160**

"Alright, group meeting!" Valkyrie called. They were scattered around the ground floor of Corrival's mansion. It was clean and beautiful, but also almost exclusively made of dark oak or walnut and only a few dark shades of deep red, purple and green. The green was only in the handful of fake plants scattered about too. All the furniture was soft, and the rugs were plush, so it still felt cosy despite the sombre first impression.

Her family came in from the three bottom rooms they'd slept and rested in that day. They sat on the sofas and waited patiently.

"I've given it some thought, and I think it's time to put on paper exactly how the next two months are going to go," Valkyrie told them.

"Is the contract two months?" Fletcher asked.

"Yes, didn't you read it?" Valkyrie asked. He shook his head and checked his stupid hair in the massive mirror again. "Oo-kay. Well, we have until tomorrow and then we have to get back to America, then the two months start. Bear in mind it's about to be December so we need to choose how we want to do for Christmas."

"Together," Tanith voted immediately.

"Yeah, Val, we want Christmas together!" Dexter said in pretend anger.

"Shut up. I meant, when are we meeting and how much time off are we asking for. There's always stuff going down on Christmas and we might be needed," Valkyrie reasoned.

"It's been a big year for us all," Nadia said. "We all deserve time together for Christmas."

"Okay, we'll ask for those days off. My suggestion for the time goes like this then. We go over tomorrow. We then spend the first week and a half working lightly, training and trying not to piss off the Sanctuary. I am then abandoning you and taking Nadia with me. You'll be working still, so nothing will change. After the week me and Nadia are gone for, we'll meet you back wherever you are and we have another week of work and then we'll take Christmas Eve, Christmas and then Boxing Day off. We won't be allowed New Year's because there's always way more trouble then than on Christmas."

"True," Saracen nodded.

"After that, it's going to be a stream of work I expect. Probably some travelling. We'll still get time off between missions and we are allowed full access to all the information first-hand from now on which is nice. Plus the contract is only two months, whereas before we had another three months there. We'll be working on trying to track down the American Spider den while we are working. Hopefully being on the big-shot missions and getting to talk to the criminals will reveal some secrets."

"I'm not sure what we'll do about the house though," Nadia said, her voice a little higher with panic. "It won't be ready in two months! We'll have nowhere to go!"

"Baby, we'll stay here," Valkyrie comforted her. "If we're lucky the house will even be done."

"It won't be," Erskine said and the others chuckled at her expense. "The designer and architect had to make a bunch of changes to our original plans so that the structure will, you know, not fall down. It's going to take even longer than we thought. It might not be done until June or July."

"What will happen after the two months," Solomon took over seriously, "is me and Valkyrie going away for probably a month alone. I need to continue researching the Necromancer artefact the Spiders possess, and Valkyrie needs to keep training with her new magic. Norma and Helana, the Necromancer's I've been working with, have found a place we can train and research more seriously, as well as eventually do perform the Magic Keeping ritual. From there it'll be a handful of days in recovery. We can't risk going to someone like Kenspeckle or we risk the procedure being noticed."

Valkyrie nodded seriously. "We'll make preparations for that while we're in America."

"I know," Solomon said again. He really hated this idea. But at least he was trying to help.

"Is there any other news?"

"Only a few updates on the Spiders. A few were caught and questioned but they managed to escape like those other prisoners a while back," Dexter told them. "Corrival and Meritorious are pretty sure they know who the spy in the ranks is this time though. They said that the spy will have settled into their prison sentence nicely by the time we get back."

"I mean, at least they know who the spy is. I assume it's no fun information?"

"Not really, just old locations and names we already had or suspected," he shrugged.

Valkyrie tutted. "Alright. Well, I figured me and Nadia would leave you guys to mope and go visit Crystal since we're here."

Nadia smiled and there were a few more comments on stuff they wanted to do in America concerning Sanctuaries and officials – plus the outcome of the man Tanith had found in Griever's home. He was a low-level official for the Sanctuary but had nothing to do with the mission. He'd been 'publicly humiliated' and had to wait until massive cutters had been found to get him off the walls due to the other, more important issues at the time and the fact no one had wanted to help him. The woman, a mortal, had her memory wiped of the magic, returned to her family and was receiving some money as compensation. A nasty way to put it, but at least she could afford therapy, Valkyrie supposed. Hopefully she’d never regain her memory and have to live through that all over again.

After Tanith's final story, they left. They had one of their own cars that Valkyrie took the wheel of and they were quiet most of the way. When they got to Haggard, they held hands and Valkyrie decided it was a wonderful idea to walk to her Aunt and Uncles house.

"I thought you still hated them," Nadia questioned.

"I do. So much so I want my Uncle to know that his daughter is learning magic," Valkyrie said with an evil grin. Nadia tried to glare but ended up laughing. "I'm joking. I'm not going to tell him we're teaching Crystal magic. I'm just going to plant the seed that we _might_ be so he'll get really paranoid and upset but won't be able to ask her because he couldn't ask those things just in case she _doesn't_ know about magic. See?"

"Seems like psychological warfare to me," Nadia told her.

"I'm okay with that," Valkyrie grinned and kissed her girlfriend. "We're at their house now."

They sighed and walked up to the front door. There were four cars at the house now, so both Crystal and Carol seemed to have been gifted with their own. Valkyrie knocked.

It only took a few moments for Beryl to open to front door. She gasped loudly like she really was shocked to see them. "Stephanie! Oh my goodness, what are you doing here?"

"Hi, Aunt Beryl. Me and Nadia were passing through and we thought we'd see how you were," Valkyrie said, trying to seem chipper. "Could we come in?"

"Of course!" Beryl said quickly, stepping aside. They were taken quickly into the kitchen. "Fergus! Stephanie and her friend is here!"

Valkyrie sucked in a deep breath and let it go. Nadia just smiled and squeezed her hand. "Is Crystal and Carol home?"

"Yes they are, I'll go call for them," Beryl said, rushing from the kitchen and shouting for her family to come downstairs. Crystal was first down. She and Valkyrie hugged and then Crystal and Nadia hugged.

Fergus had his eyes narrowed on them but didn't say anything.

"How have you been?" Valkyrie asked Crystal. Carol hadn't come down.

"Good," Crystal said, grinning widely. She'd lost some weight, Valkyrie noticed.

"You're looking good, what have you been doing?" Valkyrie complimented.

She blushed and looked down at herself self-consciously. "Oh, I've been going on a lot of walks recently. Do you think it's helping?"

"Helping? You look good anyway Crystal, don't be silly," Nadia rolled her eyes. Crystal blushed even more. "How's work going?"

"Really good," she nodded. "I've been getting some extra shifts, almost saved enough to move out now."

"Yes, Crystal has decided to stay in Ireland for another year," Beryl cut it in a sickly voice, coming up and putting her hands on her daughter's shoulders. "You know, she was thinking of moving to Australia but now she is going to move nearby and do some classes!"

"Ooh, really," Valkyrie grinned. "Sounds good Crystal."

"Ha, yeah," Crystal said awkwardly. "Err, Mum, I have something I want to show Steph, we're going to go upstairs."

"Oh okay," Beryl said. "Do anyone of you girls want a drink?"

"No thank you," Valkyrie said, and Nadia asked for some tea. They made small talk and then went up to Crystal's bedroom.

It was only a small room, but it had a wardrobe, desk and chair, dresser and a single bed. It was mismatched and so obviously given to her as a child.

"Sorry it's cramped," Crystal said shily. "Here, sit on the bed, there's more room. I'll take the chair. What happened then, I thought you were staying in America for ages?"

"So did we, but a mission went wrong," Valkyrie told her. "Like, really bad. We had a friend living with us, a teleporter called Fletcher. We've known him for a while. Anyway, he had a girlfriend who has also been living with us. Turns out she was a spy and along with some other people in the Sanctuary, our government, they told the enemy where we were and got us caught. I got beaten up pretty bad. Tanith, Nadia and Laila all got kidnapped but we got to them before anything bad happened."

"Oh no, that sounds really bad," Crystal said, eyes wide.

"It was for a few hours but we've been in Ireland a few days now and we all feel a lot better. We're going away for another few months."

She tried to hide her disappointment but not very well. "Ah, that's too bad. I have to show you what I've been doing though!"

She clicked her fingers and a bright flame came immediately. It extinguished when she wanted it to, and she was able to move a piece of paper across the whole floor.

"That's really good!" They told her supportively.

Valkyrie grinned. "You're going to get to be a mage."

"I know! I'm really looking forward to you guys coming home and helping me with it, I'm struggling with water," she admitted. "But I've got flames down."

"I was the same," Valkyrie nodded. "It's just a whole lot of practice. We'll help when we're back and the house is finished."

"Sounds good," she smiled. "I drove past the house and saw it was busy with people renovating it. They're working really fast, the extension must almost be in by now! But then they put some trees up at the front gate and I can't really see the house anymore."

"We added them for some extra privacy," Nadia told her. "As soon as we've settled back in you'll have to come visit."

"Totally."

"How's the whole Carol thing with school going?" Valkyrie asked.

Crystal sighed and looked at her phone instinctually. "Not good. She's not been talking to me much except through text, and that's just to pick fights. I'm just ignoring it now and focusing on finding a place to move into."

"I assume the classes are you learning magic."

"Yeah. And then I'll need to take some magic tests, I bet, so I can work in magic places? I want to get a good job."

"I'll hook you up with something," Valkyrie promised. "What did you study at college?"

"Just maths and accounting."

"Well, that's very versatile. I can hire you in my company or find someone who needs an intern or something like that for you. Or I might be able to get you something at the Sanctuary but it'll be a pretty bottom of the barrel job there. They don't often like taking young people, but since you're my cousin they might make an exception. But you need a name first. Have you thought of one?"

Crystal twisted a few times in her chair. "I've thought about it. Like, a lot. But I can't think of something that sticks. I liked one for a time but it didn't feel like it was, you know, sticking like you said it would."

"That's okay, you still have time," she said reassuringly. "Can you tell me what you were thinking of?"

She hesitated. "Well, I liked more normal names. Like, I prefer Dexter and Nadia to Valkyrie and Ghastly, like you said there was that difference. But I don't know which one is me. I've never considered any name other than Crystal."

"Anything on last names?"

"Nothing again. It's going to be basic, right? Like, Cain has meaning. I don't do anything like you do," she said self-consciously.

"You don't need a name like Cain," Nadia said. "My last name is Robin, after the bird. It doesn't have to have a meaning that everyone understands so long as it has meaning to you. Cain is a real name with bad connotations of killing siblings. But Valkyrie identified with it because of its other meaning to make trouble. Don't think of other people's views of it, just your own."

"But I tried that," Crystal said. "There's just a lot of words in the world and I can't find the right ones for a name."

"Don't get unmotivated now," Valkyrie grinned. "You'll find the right one, I'm sure of it. Tanith didn't get hers until she was fifteen and she knew about magic from the moment she was born, you've only known for a few weeks. Text me as soon as you work it out."

"I will," she smiled.

"Have you been reading those books I gave you?" Valkyrie asked.

"Yeah," Crystal said, going to her wardrobe and pulling out the stack from under a hoodie. "They've really helped me actually." The books were on beginner level magic, and two were on the history of the Mage community in Ireland and a fun one from the Monster Hunters. "I feel like I might be ready for a bit more though."

Valkyrie pulled out her phone. "Let me call someone quickly." She dialled China's number while Nadia jumped in to show Crystal how to work on water. "Hey China, it's me."

"Valkyrie, it's good to hear from you," China said down the line. She sounded just as she always did. "This is a surprise. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Well, you know I mentioned having cousins? One of them has found out about magic and we've discovered she is capable of using it. She's got a basic understanding but needs some more help. I wondered if I could send her your way for some resources and if you'd guide her along, so to speak."

"Another Edgley? I'm not sure this world can handle that," she said through a laugh. Valkyrie's lip itched up at the sound. "Perhaps you could introduce us?"

"I think we have time, we'll meet at the library."

It took some doing to dislodge Beryl from Crystal and let her join them on a drive. Fergus was sat stoically in the living room glaring at the television and actually didn't cause a fuss, but Beryl could not be convinced that her adult daughter should be allowed to leave the house without knowing where she was going. It didn't help that she asked to see Valkyrie's driving licence and she had to admit she didn't have it on her. She actually just didn't have one but she was a more than capable driver. Crystal told them to go ahead and spoke to her mother until Beryl was angry and then joined them. They all heard the door being slammed shut from inside the car.

"She's not happy," Valkyrie said, looking at Crystal's unbothered face in the mirror. She was probably used to it.

Crystal just shrugged. "Parents."

It was a quiet journey to China's apartments, but Nadia made sure to talk to Crystal about the history book she'd been reading the whole way over. She also told her more about the Dead Men which was obviously very interesting to Crystal.

"We're here," she smiled. "It's the third floor up."

They went that way and Valkyrie took pleasure in watching Crystal look around and made very sure to get to see her face when they met China in the centre of the books.

"Alright, that's enough," she laughed quietly, taking Crystal's elbow so she wouldn't fall over.

China laughed. "Meeting new people is always fun. How are you, my dear?"

"Grand, of course," she smiled, leaning on the desk. Nadia shily stood behind her. She was always unnerved by China's beauty whenever they met, and Valkyrie didn't think Tanith's view of China had exactly helped. It was a healthy wariness, Valkyrie supposed. "This is my cousin. She doesn't have a name yet."

"It's wonderful to meet you," China said, holding her hand out.

Crystal stumbled forwards and very delicately took it to barely shake and then stumbled over to Valkyrie and hid behind her also.

"Oh my god, you guys need to get a grip," she whispered to them through a laugh. Crystal's face was incredibly red and there was no doubt what she had thought about in the last few minutes. Nadia just glared up at her. She turned back to China. "Are you doing this?"

China smirked. "Perhaps."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "Do you think you can help her with finding what she needs?"

"Of course I can," the woman said flippantly. "In fact, I've called over a tutor to help. He'll be a while yet. He'll be able to teach your cousin everything she needs as quickly as possible. She doesn't have long before the Surge and people who do not have a good grasp of magic beforehand do not make good sorcerers, after all."

"Mhh," Valkyrie hummed seriously, looking behind her. Crystal looked embarrassed but a bit better. "We'll have to work out where you're meeting them, but I'll work something out."

"I'm sure you will," China smiled.


	161. The 'M' word for real this time

**Chapter 161**

Getting back to America was not fun, especially with Fletcher still an utter mess due to his heartbreak, but they got there safely. They would be in a little town for the first week on a stakeout mission. They had a small house Saracen had found them in town and at least three of them would be in an old, busy office block building in order to stare across the street at _another_ building the American's believed a drug gang was dealing out of.

Valkyrie, Saracen and Anton were taking the first shift in the office. They went in quickly, dressed casually to avoid detection, and set themselves up in the office. Dexter, Tanith and Nadia would be going to a gym in the town over to train – that being, Dexter had been made the personal trainers of the girls.

Erskine, Fletcher, Ghastly and Laila were staying in the house they rented for the week.

And that was it. They rotated for the week, taking a few pictures of each person that came and went from that building, getting all their clients identified. Some of them were mortals, some of them were mages. Some of them were working there, some were suppliers of ingredients. They even spotted a group of other people come in and tracked that group as they left town and arrested them.

The American Sanctuary had been pleased, to say the least. It was a long and boring job but the week was filled with training, laughing, making a few arrests and stopping two pretty large drug rings in the area. They were able to get it all done in five days, giving them the weekend before Nadia and Valkyrie were set to go away for Nadia's birthday.

"What's your plans, then?" Dexter asked, a smirk firmly planted on his face.

"Sightseeing," Valkyrie told him nonchalantly. Erskine, Saracen and Ghastly were with them in the upstairs, boring beige bedroom. "Going out to meals, I want to go ice skating."

"Where are you going?" Ghastly asked more seriously.

"We're going to New York."

"Bit clique," Erskine commented, wrinkling his nose.

"Yeah, but Nadia really wants to go to the Natural History Museum there. It's her dream. And, you know, after the last few weeks, the last year, there's something I really want to do," she hinted at.

"Get laid," Dexter announced immediately.

"What?" She asked, having to hold in a smile after seeing the look of disgust Ghastly sent Dexter's way. "No. I mean, that is on the list, but that's not what I was saying."

"But you are going to get laid?"

"I assume so, yes," Valkyrie nodded, trying very hard not to laugh at Ghastly. He looked crushed.

"But what were you thinking of?" Saracen asked, eyes wide. He knew then. Valkyrie winked at him. "Valkyrie, I can't keep this a secret! Tell them!"

"I am, okay. I'm telling all of you. But you have to keep it a secret from Nadia, alright?" She said, and they all leaned in close. "Please don't get all, you know, worried about it."

"Worried about what?" Dexter asked, his massive grin giving away his excitement.

"Well. I think I might ask Nadia to marry me?" She asked.

The reaction was amazing. "Oh my god!" Erskine almost shouted and then clamped his hands over his mouth.

"Fuck!" Dexter laughed quietly.

"Be quiet guys! I don't want anyone to hear us! I mean, she might not say yes, she might want to wait a bit longer. And there would never be a wedding until her family and Skulduggery were back and stuff, and probably not until after this Spider business. I mean, I wasn't even going to ask until then."

"Why change your mind?" Saracen asked. All the men were grinning and leaning in close still. Even Ghastly, so he must really be excited for her.

Her heart swelled with love for them. She was very young, only seventeen, to be asking someone to marry her. Especially in the magical community, it was practically unheard of. "I don't know. When we were about to move out of the house and come here I mentioned the idea to Fletcher. Because he's my age and I thought you'd be pretty against the idea considering I'm so young. And I said then that I wanted to wait until all this drama was over with. But now I'm thinking that I really want to continue my relationship with Nadia and I'm trying really hard to do that. We've already moved in together. We're building a house together. We're planning on going through what might turn into a war together. I think those things are way more important to a relationship than a ring, even though marriage sounds pretty concrete. Plus, I think it might help her parents a bit. Not at first but when they get used to the idea, they might understand that we actually are taking this seriously."

"My mother," Ghastly said after considering her words, "told me she didn't agree to marry my father until after they had been together for well over fifty years. She told me that waiting was the best thing she could do for herself, and back then it was a big thing to choose to live together as a couple but not marry. But despite what she did, she told me that it wasn't about the marriage. It was about being together and enjoying their relationship. When they got married after fifty years it was more of a gathering of friends that loved them rather than a ceremony to begin their lives together. If you think this is right for you now and that you are absolutely certain you want this relationship regardless of if there's rings involved then go for it. But not everyone will be approving. Most people will tell you to just wait if you're so sure it's just about the relationship."

"I know," she said quickly. "I know it's not just about rings and a party. I want to stay with Nadia my whole life."

"Then go for it. Just be prepared for someone, probably Pa, to tell you that if you mostly want the relationship then you shouldn't get married until later because it 'surely doesn't matter in that case'."

She smiled. "Yeah, I know that. I mean, I might not even do it if the moment isn't right."

"You'll know when it's time," Dexter smiled, kissing her cheek. "Oh, I'm so excited though!"

"Imagine Nadia's father's face when he finds out you're engaged to his daughter!" Erskine laughed, and Valkyrie laughed too although she didn't fancy having that conversation with him any time soon.

"Okay, I'm going to tell Anton," Valkyrie said quietly. "Just, don't get too over excited, okay? She might _not_ say yes, I might not do it yet, I don't have anything planned. Alright? Just be chill about it. You also need to keep Nadia off my back because I'm going into town to get the ring now."

They claimed they would be 'chill' and she left to find Anton, who was downstairs alone. She pulled him aside into the tiny utility room. "I have to tell you something."

"Are you pregnant?" He asked immediately.

She glared at him. "No, why would you ask that? How do you think I even got pregnant Anton?"

"I wouldn't like to assume."

She sighed and then continued. "Fine. Well, you have to keep it a secret. I just told Ghastly and The Idiots. I think I might ask Nadia to marry me next week."

His eyebrows went up high. "That's a big step. Congratulations."

"I hope it will be," she whispered nervously. "I hope she says yes."

He pulled her in for a hug. "You're a good girl, Valkyrie. So is Nadia. You will do what is best for you both."

He let her go and they exited the utility. She smiled as Anton got back to his daily life without missing a beat.

Next, she gathered Solomon, Tanith and eight and a half week old Laila together and got them into the car. She made small talk with them until they were out of town and in the larger town over. When she had pulled into the small parking lot, she took her seat belt off, turned around and looked at both Solomon and Tanith.

"Alright. I'm going to tell you something and you can't freak out," she told them slowly. "We're in town to get Nadia a gift. I really need your help."

The two of them nodded, picking up on how nervous Valkyrie was. "What type of gift?" Tanith asked suspiciously.

"A ring," she said and watched as the clogs turned in both of their heads. "I want hoping to ask Nadia to marry me soon."

"Oh my god!" Tanith blurted out. "Seriously?"

"Yeah, I really want to," Valkyrie grinned.

"Are you sure?" Solomon asked, but Valkyrie couldn't reply because Tanith jumped between the seats and held Valkyrie tightly.

"Oh my god this is so exciting!" She squealed. Laila woke up and began to fuss. "And we get to help pick out the ring too!"

"I know! I thought you'd be better at it than me. I have no idea what to get," Valkyrie said pushing Tanith back a bit. "What do you think Solomon?"

"It's a serious thing to do," he said, taking a deep breath. "You're still very young."

"I know," she said softly, reaching out and holding his hand. "But me and Nadia have been together for a while, we've already moved in together, things are going really well. I think it might be the right step forward."

"Her family won't approve," he said after a moment.

"They won't at first but it might actually help them to accept that me and Nadia are serious about our relationship. A lot of people won't approve, at least until we've proven we're doing the right thing by staying together for the next god knows how long. We won't be getting married for a long time anyway, this is just the engagement. I need her family and Skulduggery back on board before we start even thinking of planning anything."

This seemed to satisfy him a bit more. "Alright. I assume you know the way."

Valkyrie didn't but she led them towards the centre of the town until she found a high-end ring shop. It was nicer looking than anything in Ireland she'd ever seen so hopefully it would have something nice.

"Good afternoon," the shopping assistant greeted as soon as they were in the room. "Do you have an appointment with us today?"

"No," Valkyrie said, taking the lead. "I was hoping to have a look around. I've never looked at rings."

"Well, we don't usually let the public in to peruse," he said in a mock sad voice. "I can give you a catalogue though–"

"We're looking to buy, thank you," Tanith said before the man got to the little books. "We'd just like to have a look for ourselves to see what catches our eyes."

"Ah, okay," he said, looking over at one of the other girls in the shop. No one else was in there. She gave him a little shrug. "Well, I think that should be fine. Is there a price range you're looking at?" He asked, looking more at Solomon now.

"Not at the moment," Solomon said and the three of them were let loose on the store.

They started on the right side and got about five seconds alone before the man began to pitch to them.

"So, this area is our white gold rings, all with white diamonds. It's about midrange in price, and many of them are slim and dainty in design, they're beginning to come into style right now," he said. Valkyrie ignored him, which was easy because he was pitching to Solomon and not her. He was right though, many of them in behind the window stand were small, silver and had small stones. There were a few really pretty ones, but would that be what Nadia wanted? She had no idea; Nadia didn't wear rings.

Working anti-clockwise, Valkyrie turned ninety degrees and had a look at the ones on the right wall. These were many of the same rings but showcased different coloured bands and sized stones, and a few differently cut stones with different light refractions. It was just to show the options she could have, and seemed like a useful thing to look at, so she did.

"Do you think she'd rather have a gold ring?" Valkyrie asked, not really aware of who was listening.

The assistant paused in whatever he was telling Solomon to answer. "It depends on who the person in question is. Most people are buying white gold or platinum rings at the moment," he said, and then turned to Solomon again. Valkyrie didn't listen to whatever he said.

She moved up the shelves and looked over the different rings, most of them yellow gold on this side. There were a few that had just one stone and a few with multiple but none of them caught her eye. While Solomon was pretending to talk with the sale person down at the front, Valkyrie and Tanith spoke in low tones about what they liked. Nadia liked both big, flashy and loud, and she liked more subtle things, it just depended on her mood. There were a handful of rose gold metal ones that were pretty but Valkyrie had never seen her wear rose gold so she and Tanith decided it was too much of a risk, plus they didn't dare get her a metal that might not end up being a timeless colour despite its current popularity. It was better to get something timeless, something she wouldn't need to replace. She remembered both of Nadia's parents had gold rings. The back wall, when they got to it, had almost exclusively white ones with white diamonds.

There was one, a silver band with a few stones in the band and then a large one in the centre in the shape of a heart she liked the looks of. "What do you think about that," she asked Tanith.

"It's nice but Nadia will probably want something without a heart," Tanith suggested and Valkyrie conceded she was right.

"She would want something round then," she nodded.

"Or a square or oval. Oh, or a flower. These are really nice," Tanith noticed. Around the centre of the room was a large circle counter with lots of glass cases that acted as both a table and display case. In the case behind them was a handful of sparkly, differently shaped rings. Some of them oval, a small number of rounds, clusters of three, and of course a good selection of flower and star type rings. They had a large round stone in the middle and then a few smaller stones all around the large one that made it seem like either a flower or a star depending on if the ends were in points or rounded. Something made Valkyrie think Nadia would like something along those lines and went over.

The other assistant, a lady, was in the centre of the round display cases, and came over to see to her.

"Is there anything in particular you like?" She asked her and Tanith.

"I'm not sure," Valkyrie said, holding her hair back and having a closer look. "I like the flower ones, but I don't know if I see the one I want."

"I can get a few out if you like," the woman asked, and a velvet, dark purple tray came out of nowhere. "You like the flower shaped ones?" She began getting a few of the different rings out and placing them on the tray, and then locked up the counter and allowed her to look at the rings and hold them.

They were pretty, and she, Tanith and Solomon agreed that this was more of Nadia's style. It was different but still large and shiny, and there was more of a reason – or excuse – for all the diamonds because it was a flower as opposed to a large stone alone which Nadia probably wouldn't like. It was hypocritical because there were just as many diamonds, but the design just justified it for some reason and it just appealed more.

"Who is it that's looking to purchase the ring, may I ask?" The lady asked.

Valkyrie smiled, thinking it was funny that the man hadn't bothered asking yet. "I am."

"What's the occasion?" She asked as she led her over to a few others on the other side of the circle.

"I'm asking my girlfriend to marry me soon," she explained. "This is my sister and father; they're helping me today."

"Oh, that's lovely," she smiled, leaving her colleague on the other side of the circle to sulk. "Do you have a specific price point in mind?"

"Not really, but I am not allowed to go too wild," she said. "We're redecorating the house over Christmas so it can't be too extreme. I quite like that one there."

"The rose and white mix?" The woman asked getting it out. It had a round stone in the centre, five teardrops on the outside as petals and then the band was a woven mix of white with rose gold leaves. It was quite a lot at once but also gorgeous. "This piece is seven thousand, two-hundred and ninety-nine dollars."

"I'm not sure if Nadia would like it though," Valkyrie said. "I think it's the leaves, it's really pretty but maybe not for every day."

"What sort of jewellery does your partner usually wear?" The woman asked.

"Well, she has her ears and belly pierced and she has a bunch of jewellery for those. She has a lot of studs, a few pearls. But she also has some really big and flashy bits that she loves, they usually come out at balls and parties," she explained, noticing the woman's ears perk up a little at the word 'balls'. The woman no longer cared about her price range then, so Valkyrie better watch out for prices herself. "Her mother is from Ireland and her father is from India so she has a blend of style."

"Ah, okay," the assistant said. Valkyrie hoped that meant she'd show her the perfect ring. "It sounds as if you have a lot of options then, which is good. Do any of these catch your eyes?"

Valkyrie had a proper look but they didn't. She was led around the shop and even had the lady pull some out from the back that they didn't keep on display because they were "special". Which meant they were deadly expensive. Even then, none of them clicked like Valkyrie hoped they would. They left the shop and carried on down the street and found a chain seller and had a small look before leaving because nothing was quite what they wanted and then stopped to eat. After that was another shop and Valkyrie began to lose her confidence that she could pull it off that day.

They were on their way to the car to travel to another place when Valkyrie caught something out the corner of her eye. It was a vintage shop, not a charity but all old bits and pieces. They decided to go in for a change of scene although they weren't sure if Nadia would want a vintage ring to begin with, or if they sold any rings. It was just fun to look.

They went into the dark, narrow building and wandered about. Laila was awake and looking around happily in Valkyrie's arms, drooling and sticking her tongue out a lot. Tanith and Solomon looked over some old records together while Valkyrie took Laila to look at the jewellery.

Most of it was faded, rusty or didn't look very good. Most of it was boring. She didn't much like any of it except for a necklace that she rather fancied for herself. The elderly man came over from the counter, pulling his glasses further up his nose, opened up the case, let her try on the necklace and then closed it up, patted Laila on the head, and took her to the counter.

The counter was scratched, old and grey, and was actually a display case again although it held mostly old figurines. Of course, this was where she found Nadia's ring.

"Oh my goodness," she whispered, looking down at it. A bit of Laila's dribble fell onto the counter and Valkyrie wiped it with her sleeve. "Could I please see that ring?"

He pulled it out, telling her about the history. A woman brought it in not long ago saying it was her Great-Aunts but didn't know when said aunt had acquired it. It had been left to the woman in a will. Not liking the item particularly, the woman left it with the man in exchange for a golden brooch. The man had checked it and found it to be genuine diamonds, enough that the brooch he had exchanged it for had been expensive.

The band itself was white gold. The flower was a medium, perfectly round stone and around it was a bronze coloured metal in the shape of petals and three small diamond studs were set inside each petal. It was simple, it was unique, it was a bit grimy. But it was the one Valkyrie was absolutely certain Nadia would love.

Tanith came up behind her after she had paid for it. "Look," Valkyrie said.

Tanith gasped softly. "Oh, that's really pretty."

"It just needs a good clean," Valkyrie said.

Of course, Solomon was sure he could get it looking amazing and he promised to have it back to her by tomorrow evening. He'd go over to the nearest mage town and have it done there by an expert and Valkyrie had no issues with that.

Back at home, Nadia greeted Valkyrie with a hug. "You were gone all day."

"I know, I was shopping," Valkyrie said, and then kissed her.

"Get anything nice?" She asked, her big brown eyes looking up at her.

"Just a necklace. Sorry, I didn't see anything you'd like."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://img1.etsystatic.com/100/0/6503122/il_fullxfull.831136571_f095.jpg


	162. What Mr Hagan did

**Chapter 162**

* * *

**NSFW: child sexual abuse account**

* * *

The next day Solomon was off early in the morning to help Valkyrie with his secret task and all Valkyrie needed to do was keep any of her family from accidently letting slip what was happening. It shouldn’t have been too hard. They were adults, soldiers, feared around the world.

Valkyrie didn't think it would be so easy.

"Come on, we can go to the movies," Valkyrie encouraged.

"But I want to sleep all day," Nadia whined. She was snuggled into bed and Valkyrie was already ready. In this house, they got to have their own room although it was tiny and the walls were made of paper. "Go watch a movie downstairs."

"I don't want to do that, I want to go outside with you," she tried.

"Mmm I don't want to though."

"What if I don't give you a choice?"

"I'll call CPS on you," Nadia smirked into her pillow.

"You're not a child."

"I am for another week."

"It's actually just four days," Valkyrie told her. "Have you even had your advent chocolate today?"

"No. Can you bring it to me?"

Valkyrie sighed and brought over the little one dollar calendar they'd bought. Nadia's reached out of the covers only to get the chocolate, stick it in her mouth and then grin and cover back up. "Ah, come on baby. We need to do something."

"You can do me," Nadia grinned.

"Tempting, but these walls aren't really designed for that," Valkyrie said, getting onto the bed. "Any other ideas?"

"Give me your chocolate?"

"I already ate it."

Nadia tutted. "What's the point in dating if I can't even steal your chocolate? I don't want to date you anymore."

"You don't have to," Valkyrie said. "Do you want me to tell your parents you've changed your mind or would you like to do it?"

Nadia cringed. "Yeah, no thanks. I think I'll just suffer."

"Suffer? You don't suffer!" Valkyrie laughed and then kissed her. Her lips tasted like chocolate.

"Yes I do! You left me all of yesterday and now you want me to go outside after eating my chocolate!"

"Your chocolate?" Valkyrie scoffed. "Keep that up and you really will have to call CPS. Bitch."

Nadia burst out laughing. "No, you're the bitch."

"That's it!" Valkyrie said and jumped onto Nadia, making her squeal loudly and pulled up her and the covers.

"Put me down!" Nadia shrieked.

"No! This is your own fault!" Valkyrie shouted. She let Nadia drop from maybe five inches in the air and Nadia screamed like she'd been killed, and then Valkyrie ripped the covers away.

"No, it's cold Val, don't do that!" She shouted.

Valkyrie didn't say anything, she just knelt and sat, half propped up because she was far too heavy to fully sit, on Nadia's hips. She pulled up Nadia's top and began tickling her.

"Wh- no! Oh my god!" She began laughing, her legs kicking out behind her. "No don't tickle me! Val!"

Valkyrie laughed and kept tickling her. "You deserve this!"

"You're–" she shrieked mid-laugh "–such a fucking _bitch_!" Valkyrie leaned down and blew a raspberry into her neck and Nadia laughed so much she wasn't even making a sound.

"Are you done being bad?" Valkyrie asked her in a quieter voice, sitting back.

Nadia took a moment to calm down, look at her and then shook her head.

This time Valkyrie grabbed both of her hands and pulled them behind her head. "Are you sure?"

Nadia didn't stop grinning. "Fuck you."

Holding Nadia's arms up with just one hand, Valkyrie mercilessly tickled her waist and stomach, keeping clear of her piercing, and up her sides and tickled her underarms and her neck. Nadia was crying from laugher and barely got any sounds out between the tickles. Her little pyjama top road all the way up over her breasts and it was only inevitable that Valkyrie got distracted. It really wasn't her fault. She tried to stay focused on tickling but then she was suddenly sucking on her nipple.

Nadia's laughs turned quickly into moans. Valkyrie's fingers went from tickling to trailing quickly down Nadia's body and into her pyjama bottoms. She let go of Nadia's arms but she didn't move them from above her head. Nadia raised her hips and Valkyrie pulled the trousers off of her.

"Can you be quiet?" Valkyrie asked, a grin on her face. She glanced at the door. It didn't have a lock but she was pretty sure on one was upstairs. The third floor above them had some people though, she'd heard their footsteps. "If you make a noise I'll stop."

Nadia had a glint in her eye, grinned and lay her head back down flat. Trying not to giggle herself, she pulled Nadia's trousers off all the way, threw them on the floor and shuffled down the bed. She took her time winding Nadia up but hardly went slow. She did the bare minimum to get Nadia wet, which wasn't hard, kissing her legs and licking gently on her clit, and then she became more aggressive in her ministrations. She sucked, licked and played with her clit and as soon as she could, Valkyrie pushed two fingers inside of her. Nadia sucked in a breath and raised her hips into Valkyrie's mouth but she didn't make a sound except for her heavy breathing.

Valkyrie paused for just a moment to look up and then started flicking her fingers, grinning evilly and stopping, fingers still inside, when Nadia made a small sound. It would have been a much louder sound usually.

"No, no, no baby, don't stop," she whispered.

"But you made a sound," Valkyrie teased meanly, pulling herself up to Nadia's head, not moving her hand. She brushed her thumb over Nadia's clit and she sucked in a breath. "That was bad."

"I wasn't," she said, but Valkyrie didn't really want to play like that right now, so she just kissed Nadia on the mouth and flicked her fingers again.

Apparently her pause in the action wasn't good enough, or maybe this had been planned. Nadia pushed Valkyrie and she went onto her back, a little confused and thinking she had overstimulated Nadia, so she stopped touching her. She realised that wasn't the case when Nadia got onto her knees.

Trying not to grin and hyperventilate from a very sudden and unexpected amount of excitement, Valkyrie helped Nadia to position herself over her own head. It was not like how she expected it to be, yet it was still good. She was lucky to be strong because the more they got into it, the more Nadia rubbed her hips against her mouth and she had to keep Nadia above her by holding her up. Still, she worked on Nadia until her girlfriend's legs were shaking, her back was arched and she was grinding her teeth trying not to shout. She came not long into it and Valkyrie let her ride it out, licking her pussy as best she could when Nadia kept trying to grind against her face, all while pressing her own legs together and occasionally lifted her hips out of her own horniness.

Nadia fell off her face and onto the bed. Valkyrie pushed herself up slowly, a bit dazed, messy and very happy to get some proper breaths in. Nadia was still panting on the bed when Valkyrie threw the packet of cold baby wipes on her bare belly.

She yelped and threw them off. "Valkyrie!"

"Sorry," Valkyrie smirked, wiping her face and hands clean. Nadia tried to glare but was too happy and just ended up rolling her eyes and taking one of the wipes to clean herself. "That was unexpected."

Nadia just giggled. "It was good though. It might be the best thing you've ever done to me."

"I think you might have done that to _me_ ," Valkyrie pointed out slowly. No that she didn't minded. "Now that I've done what you wanted, can we please do something?"

"I'll think about it," Nadia said as she sat cross-legged in the bed, just her top on. "I thought about it. I just want to stay in here."

"We don't have any food or a bathroom."

"We have a bucket and a phone, we'll order," Nadia said.

"What, order food from my family? Yeah, I'm sure that would go down great," Valkyrie said. She got the covers and folded them at the bottom of the bed out of the way. "If we are going to stay in here, what are we doing?"

"I don't know," Nadia shrugged. "Talking and fucking I guess."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "Fucking? Is that what we're calling sex now?"

"Yes, it is. That was too short to count as anything else."

"I think it's more of a one-sided oral session honestly," Valkyrie said snidely.

"I'm happy to return the favour. After I get my chocolate."

"For god's sake," Valkyrie sighed, sitting on the bed too. "Just shush about the chocolate. We'll just have to talk like we like each other. Tell me a secret."

She hummed and thought about it. "How big of a secret?"

"I don't mind. Something funny."

Nadia smiled at her. "You know we have two guest rooms in our apartment? Or, you know, rooms at home?"

"Yeah?" Valkyrie said slowly.

"One of them is going to be a cat room. Me and my friends found a designer and they've designed the whole thing already and send it to the architect. The window has a cat-flap and a little wooden cage so the cats can sit outside and look around."

"Oh my god," Valkyrie muttered. "You know, it's okay. You can have the room. Because in the rest of the entire house I'm going to have a dog and it'll be way happier than the cat because it'll have the whole house."

Nadia snorted, knowing she had won the battle. It was too late anyway; Nadia had already organised it. That didn't mean Valkyrie had to let her _get_ the cat. "You tell me a secret."

"I don't have any funny secrets," Valkyrie said.

Nadia sobered and bit her lip. "Can I ask you something serious? You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to."

"I suppose so."

"Can you tell me about that man? Mr Hagan?" She asked quietly. Valkyrie took a deep breath. "I know it's bad and I know what the Sanctuary found when they looked into him so I kind of have an idea of what you'll say. I just thought it would be good to talk about it."

"I know. I promised I would," Valkyrie muttered, picking some balls of fluff off her socks and tossing the dirty baby wipes towards the bin. "It's not very nice though."

"It's okay if you don't want to say. I get that right now might not be the time."

"It's alright. I mean, it's not as bad as you're probably thinking," Valkyrie said, feeling a bit defensive. "You know I grew up nearby and stuff, and I would go out and play with friends. Well, Haggard is such a small place that my mum and all the other parents would let us go out from a young age to play. My street is really close to the beach and I loved going there to play so I always got to go and after playing there me and my friends would go to the shopping area not far away and get ice creams or drinks. Sometimes we'd play games like hide and seek or tag or stuck-in-the-mud over the whole town and all the kids would get involved so there were almost forty of us including the big kids.

"Well, honestly, I felt off about him before anything happened. We, that being me and my mum, would go in to get flowers for my grandparents or my sick aunt. My mum's side of the family really likes flowers. Anyway, after we bought things he'd always ask if I want a sweetie and my mum would always think I was shy of him and make me take it. She didn't know that I thought he was weird. I never told her or Gordon or anyone any of this. Well, when I was maybe five or six I was playing hide and seek with my friends. I tried to hide in the flower shop. I don't know why, I thought he was creepy but everyone liked him and I didn't even think he'd do anything to me. Nothing had ever happened to me, I mean, I was little, no one had explained how men could abuse little girls. Well, he took me by the arm and told me that he'd help me stay hidden. I didn't want to go, but he pulled me into the back of the room and took off his trousers."

"Oh no," Nadia whispered. Her eyes were wide and sorry.

"It's okay. I didn't do anything he told me too but I was really scared. One of the older kids came in the shop to look for me and he pulled them up quickly and I ran back to the front and the kid said he found me and I had to go help find the others. But I was really shaken and wanted to go home, so I did. I just walked into the house went to my bedroom. My mum called me for dinner later and I never said a thing. I didn't think about it for a long time."

"Why didn't you tell anyone?"

"I don't know. I didn't even think about telling anyone, I just thought I had to keep to it secret so I did. My Hagan never even said I had to, so I don't know why I thought that," Valkyrie explained, thinking back. "I just knew it was wrong and that I didn't like it, so I tried not to think about it at all. Any other time something bad happened like I broke something, I hid it. I guess my little brain thought that was best."

"What did he try to make you do?"

"He wanted me to touch him I think. Honestly, I don't remember much of being there other than saying I didn't want to and then being too scared to say anything else, but I didn't do it. A while later, I don't remember how long, we went back to the shop and I remembered being really scared of him and refusing to go in and my mum told me off for being rude to Mr Hagan so she made me apologise to him for being naughty. I remember I was so mad at her and I didn't eat my dinner and she sent me to bed early. I was furious and couldn't understand why she didn't feel like I did, even though I didn't want to tell her what happened, and I don't know if I ever said that he was weird even after what he did. After a while I gave in and started just going to the shop and being good for her, though, because I didn't like being in trouble and I didn't really understand. I think I thought I actually must have done something wrong and I wasn't remembering what happened correctly. I don't think that now but I was only six then, so…"

"Did it happen again?" Nada asked.

"Yes, but not the same way. He found me on the beach once but I ran away. He once caught me in the street when I was seven or eight and tried to take me to his house and I remember being really scared but some people came around the corner in their car so he had to let me go and he told them that I had kicked his dog and that was why he was telling me off and grabbing my arm. They believed him and had their daughter walk me home. I remember she didn't say anything to me all the way there and I was really embarrassed about what he said I did. She didn't tell my mum Mr Hagan's story, just that I got lost so she brought me home."

"Oh no," Nadia said. "She must have been hurt by him too."

Valkyrie thought about it. "It would make sense. I mean, he's really well-liked by everyone, no one thinks he's bad. But it makes sense that someone else would be hurt by him too. I just never like to think about it. He tried a few other times. It was right before my mother died, when I was nine, that he got me alone in his shop again. You know there's that hatch that goes into the basement?"

"Kind of, yeah."

"I don't remember how I got there or what happened, but I remember thinking that I had to get home and I was really scared like the time he tried to take me to his house. He opened the hatch and there are these really old stairs. He made me go down them and I tried to run and I think I knocked over a stand of flowers, and he grabbed me and pushed me down to the basement." Valkyrie felt her chest tightening and she started pinching the skin on her hands. "He exposed himself again. And this time he made me touch him. He said if I did it then he'd let me go. I don't know how long I was there. I never, you know, finished though because I threw up and he got mad. He hit me and said he'd tell my mum that I was bad and that my father would be disappointed. He told me he was trying to be a father to me and that this is what fathers and kids did and that I was really messed up for not knowing this. And I remember, I vividly remember, telling him that it's not true because Gordon is like my father and if that's what fathers and kids did, we would already do it. It was just all really, really messed up. But I still didn't really understand what he was doing. He hit me again and kicked me, on my arms and legs. I don't really remember what happened next, just that I got home and I was crying to my mum and I got really hysterical and she called Gordon to help and he came over. They calmed me down but I couldn't tell them what happened. I remember being on the sofa in the living room and them both kneeling in front of me asking what happened. But I was scared I'd be in trouble for not saying things before and I was embarrassed because I didn't want to say I touched his penis, so I didn't say. It was only a few weeks before my mum died in a car crash. Then I moved to Gordon's and I didn't see him again until we visited Haggard together."

Nadia picked up her hands and held them in her own, stopping her from pinching. "I'm really sorry that happened."

"It's okay, it's not your fault. I just don't like to think about it. It makes me sick," she said, feeling tears welling up. She didn't want to cry. "I think Mum and Gordon must have through someone hurt me because Mum noticed all my bruises and asked me, but I just told her that I fell over at the beach. They didn't really ask many questions and I guess no one wanted to bring it up after my mum died because they just wanted me to be happy."

"They should have asked more," Nadia said strongly. "They should have put him in prison."

"I probably wouldn't have said it happened even if they asked if Mr Hagan had done it," Valkyrie told her quietly. "I didn't want to think about it. I haven't thought about it in years."

"I'm glad he's dead," Nadia said venomously. "He deserved a lot more than having his shop burnt down. I'm glad he was killed too."

Valkyrie didn't say anything. She didn't know how to feel about his death. So she pulled Nadia close to hold.

"Do you hate him?" Nadia asked when she was settled in Valkyrie's arms like a baby.

"I don't know," Valkyrie said quietly. The feelings were making her numb. She didn't like talking about this.

"You don't have to hate him," Nadia said. "I hate him for what he did to you. But you don't need to if you don't want to."

"I know," she whispered, tightening her grip on Nadia, who was still naked from the waist down. Neither of them cared. "I don't like thinking about him."

"How do you feel about it now?"

Valkyrie tried to think of what it was like, of how she felt about any of it. "I don't know. Just… overwhelmed I guess. It still scares me."

Nadia turned and held Valkyrie so they were hugging. Valkyrie held her close. "He'll never hurt you again. Ever."

"I know. But– it's not the point that he's dead. I'm just scared and upset anyway," she whispered, tears dripping from her face and onto Nadia's shoulder. "I've kept it in for so long. I don't want to think about it."

"It's good for you though baby," she said, kissing her cheek. "You don't have to, but it's good to get it out. I'm here for you. I want to help."

"I know," Valkyrie sniffed. Nadia wiped her eyes. "I just don't want to talk about it anymore right now."

"Okay, okay, we won't," Nadia said comfortingly. She smiled and Valkyrie smiled back a bit more shakily. "What to go to the movies?"

She shook her head, the smile dropping. "No. I want to stay here."

Nadia stroked her hair. "That's okay. We'll stay here. Thank you for talking to me."

"'S okay," Valkyrie said, holding Nadia close.


	163. First day in New York City

**Chapter 163**

Valkyrie and Nadia began their journey to New York early the next morning, having Fletcher teleport them to the nearest city to New York Fletcher had been to since he hadn't been before out of fear of being caught teleporting, getting taxis to the airport and then taking a plane. It was almost a five-hour flight from the state they were in but the journey was pleasantly boring. Nadia looked up things to do the entire time and Valkyrie worked out the logistics of where and when they could visit those places in the six full days they were going to have before travelling back on the sixth late at night. Today they'd have a half day.

Once at the airport in New York it was a nightmare getting a taxi and then a nightmare travelling to their hotel. Valkyrie had found a nice, but not super fancy, hotel for them. It had a double bed, a desk, wardrobe, bathroom and a small sofa area with flatscreen on the wall. All the furniture was simple but the room was large enough to walk around without feeling restricted.

"This is nice," Nadia complimented when she walked in. "Ooh, look at the view."

Valkyrie came over and had a look. "It's cool," she said. It looked out into the street which was packed with people and cars. It was busy and energetic. Not necessarily beautiful, but definitely different to what they were used to. "Should we hang our stuff up? There are hangers in the wardrobe."

Nadia did want to do that, so they spent half an hour settling in before getting hungry. Valkyrie decided to ask the person on the front desk what was good and they were recommended a Japanese restaurant, a pizza place and a mandarin buffet. It was only four-thirty, but neither of them had eaten in a while so they chose the buffet.

It wasn't far to walk. It was very hustle and bustle, and the buildings were extremely tall, but it was all very exciting to the girls. They held hands and stayed out of the way of everyone. On their way they saw a lot of different people and Nadia commented as they went that this may have been the most diverse mortal place they'd ever visited, and Valkyrie was tempted to agree.

"Good afternoon," the woman at the front doors of the mandarin buffet greeted them. "Table for two?"

"Yes please," Nadia smiled.

"Okay. I should warn you that the meal is not open for another half an hour. You are welcome to have drinks and wait," she said, and led them to their table. The place was packed already, since they were in almost the dead centre of the city, and it did seem a little strange that this restaurant liked to wait to let people eat but Valkyrie didn't mention it. They sat down and ordered drinks, nothing alcoholic since the drinking age was twenty-one and neither of them had a licence stating that, nor did they look it. They just got fizzy drinks instead.

"This is strange," Nadia whispered.

Valkyrie shrugged. "I'm so hungry I don't care. I just want these fifteen minutes to be over."

"Oh, look," Nadia giggled, ducking her head. The men behind Valkyrie had gotten up and, swaying like they were drunk, tried to get passed the staff to the food. They actually got to the plates and were taking food as the chefs were bringing it out to the middle of the room to put in the serving stands. The entire room watched as the bouncers took all three of them and were thrown out, their three very angry girlfriends following and then walked away from the men on the curbside, abandoning them. The room cheered before a bell went and they were allowed to get their food.

Valkyrie and Nadia went to the front with the crowds and ended up somewhere in the middle. Trying to be a good girlfriend for Nadia, since it was her birthday holiday, she let her go first. They chose very similar foods. They both loved dumplings, spring rolls and the meats. Valkyrie didn't actually know the names of what she was eating as it was all in a language she didn't understand, but it was seriously good.

"I'm so glad we got a table here," Valkyrie practically moaned between her bites. Nadia giggled. Nadia told her about the texts she and her friends had been exchanging all day, as well as some other places she had thought of to visit. Valkyrie just nodded and enjoyed the food. When they were done and had paid extortionate prices, they chose to go on a little walk to a nearby park. There were small snowflakes falling around them and the streets seemed to have cleared a little as everyone had found a restaurant or bar to occupy. It was like a lull, a short intermission in the activity where everyone was eating or hadn't left the house to begin their nightly activities. In an hour the streets would be filled again but this time with the early night goers and their numbers would rise over the evening.

Until they came out, Valkyrie held Nadia's hand and smiled at her, enjoying the cold air and soft crunch of light, fresh snow beneath their feet. They came upon a much busier street towards the tourist centre where there was a park, nothing massive but large enough to be hosting a small fair. There were a few small rides under marquees for small children, but mostly there were stands for various foods and drinks, music and little activities to win toys.

"Oh, Val, we have to go in!" Nadia said, giggling and jumping up and down like a child on Valkyrie's arm. The weight of the little ring in the little pocket on the inside of her jacket almost burnt her skin but she held her thoughts down and instead took her hand and they jogged together around to the front entrance.

"Five dollars each," the man at the front asked. "How old are ya's?"

They had to show him their fake I.D. cards which were now only a year ahead of their real ages. In fact, Nadia's claimed she was eighteen, nineteen in a few days, which she was very close to being able to discard. He gave them neon orange wrist bands and let them through.

"This is so fun," Nadia breathed, her eyes bright and wide, holding Valkyrie's arm. It made her feel good to have her girlfriend hanging onto her so cute and happy. She couldn't describe the feeling; it was just so good. "Should we get a drink?"

"We're not allowed alcohol," Valkyrie reminded her and then spotted a hot chocolate stand. "Oh my god, let's get a drink."

Nadia laughed at her as they skipped over into the line. There were about ten people ahead of them, all men and looking like they'd been sent to stand there by their families to order. They looked around at the people as they waited, stealing little kisses until it was their turn. Nadia chose a honeycomb chocolate drink with chocolate flavoured whipped cream, a flake and little strawberry chunks that sunk halfway into the thick cream. Valkyrie chose a white chocolate drink with raspberry sauce, normal cream, more sauce, and a flake also. The drink was proper melted chocolate, not powder, and was almost overwhelmingly strong in taste, while also seriously hot and melty. They kissed with their cream moustaches, grinned and licked their lips, and went off with their styrofoam cups to look around.

They found a rubber duck fishing game close to the centre and noticed there weren't many people surrounding it. The prizes were a bit rubbish, as expected, and they chose to have a go because it reminded them on when they were children. There was a little counter for their drinks to go on too. Valkyrie and Nadia had a few goes, Nadia catching two nulls and a low-level present one, where she chose a little peppermint candy cane, and then Valkyrie had her go. She was much more lucky, all three of her hooks got something – she had two small and one slightly bigger than small but not quite medium prize, but the person manning it seemed happy and let her trade it for a medium gift. She got them a tub the size of her hand filled with pink, purple and blue cotton floss.

"This feels right," Nadia smiled, taking a small chunk and putting it in her mouth. "And it's my colours. Mm, I haven't had candy floss in forever."

"Neither," Valkyrie smiled, sipping her drink.

"Want any?"

"No, I wouldn't wait to catch you bi-ness," Valkyrie teased.

Nadia pretended to humph but had a smile. "What, you're going to upset all of mankind. You used to say you liked both."

"I know, but then time went on and I realised the fault in my thinking. I mean, I'm not going to scream it and think it could _never_ change. Some men look very nice. But we all like things that look good, that doesn't mean I want to kiss it."

"Well, surely you only want to kiss me, all the time," Nadia said, looking up at Valkyrie innocently.

Valkyrie gave her a deadpan look. "You literally cheered me on to kiss your friend."

Nadia couldn't help the smirk. "That was pretty funny."

"Just funny?"

Nadia just shrugged and smirked. "Hey, will you win me a big teddy like a really good girlfriend?"

There was a ball throwing game for large toys. Valkyrie agreed of course. She didn't have to play fair. Rounds came with two balls and she had to hit some bottles down. Both of the first times she hit them with all her strength and they didn't fall, so she got another round. She threw the third time, and honestly was surprised when the bottles fell, she had been about to use her magic on the fourth go, but she managed it anyway.

"Good job, you've got a nice arm," the man at the counter said. He had a marine tattoo peeking out on his hand. "You want to try for the big one?"

'The big one' was a small selection of very giant toys. Nadia was immediately on her with the puppy eyes so she agreed to try. She just had to do the same thing but with more bottles. She did use her magic here – she had two balls. Failed the first time, won with a little help from Nadia the next. She knew what to do when Valkyrie gave her a look, they would not be pushed around by a fairground game. Nadia sent the bottles scattering behind the board they were on.

"Woah, good job," he said, a bit surprised. Valkyrie almost thought it was rigged. "What toy do you want?"

Nadia chose the largest one. It was a dark brown bear with a beige tummy and nose, and was about the height of Valkyrie and twice as large. Nadia giggled and grabbed the toy, leaned all the way back to keep it off the ground, and started trying to walk around with it.

It took some convincing, but eventually Valkyrie got the thing from her and convinced her girlfriend it was home time. Nadia pouted a bit but after getting a pick-a-mix, she conceded and Valkyrie led the way. It was very hard with the toy, especially with so many drunk people now milling around but it wasn't too bad. A half-hour walk back, a laugh from the receptionists on duty, a very strange elevator ride, and they got back to their room.

"Ah, this is nice," Nadia smiled, sitting on the bed. Valkyrie spent a few moments setting the bear on the sofa to look like it had an arm on the armrest and its legs crossed.

"So," she said slowly. "Want to try shower sex?"

Nadia laughed and raced to beat Valkyrie to the bathroom.


	164. Second day in New York City

**Chapter 164**

Valkyrie woke up smiling, tugging Nadia close to her in the warm bad. Light was spilling in through the windows and she could hear cars and chatter outside, making all the more peaceful lying and holding Nadia close, her breasts pressed against Nadia soft back, their legs tied together. Or it was until Nadia started to giggle and wigged out of the bed.

"Hey," Valkyrie complained groggily. "What're you doin'?"

"Teddy!" She giggled maniacally, hugging the giant thing.

Valkyrie huffed and then grinned. "You're adorable. You're acting like a kid, you know that?"

"Yeah!"

"You're turning eighteen, a legal adult. You choose now to be a child?"

"Yeah!"

They both laughed before getting themselves ready for the day. They had decided to do two things that day, starting with visiting the Statue of Liberty. They hadn't paid for any hotel meals, so once they were dressed and had adequate makeup for pictures and put on their lovely winter coats Ghastly had made them perhaps a month prior in preparation for winter, they left the building. It was only around eight-thirty but with all the commuters, the roads were practically at a standstill except every couple of minutes five or six cars could move forwards onto the main road. They headed down, knowing they had a long walk, Nadia researching the statue as they went.

"It's not just a statue, Val, it's a national monument!" Nadia stressed, reading her phone intently. One hand was on the device, the other was wrapped around Valkyrie's left arm for guidance through the streets. Valkyrie's hands were tucked in her pockets. Without the midday sun to warm the air it was bitterly cold. Big gusts of condensation surrounded Nadia's face. "We're also not allowed to bring umbrellas, backpacks, buggies or large backpacks. Do you think they'll search us before we go in?"

"I expect so, they wouldn't want anything happening to their precious lady," Valkyrie muttered, the cold making her ever so slightly resentful. "You do have the map on your phone right?"

"Yeah, it's basically straight all the way down. Where do you want to stop for breakfast?"

"We can go to a café and get black coffee and doughnuts?" Valkyrie suggested.

"Val, we're not on Brooklyn Nine-Nine," Nadia rolled her eyes.

"I'm well aware. It pains me daily."

"We should get croissants."

"Aww, then we will really look like lesbians, out for our brunchies!" Valkyrie grinned mockingly.

"You love brunch?" Nadia said.

"Well, yeah, I'm a lesbian. Come on Nadia, keep up. I really do need coffee though, I'm a _tired_ lesbian," she said, looking around. There was a fog over the city that wasn't set to clear until nearer ten, right when their boat should set off, which was good because their trip might be cancelled if it was foggy. They found a sandwich shop about half an hour into their walk and Valkyrie got a toasty and coffee to eat in, Nadia got a croissant with bacon and sausage inside plus a proper tea, not a herbal tea that Americans seemed intent on insisting was the same thing, and then they got fruit smoothies to sip on for the next forty-five minutes of their walk. It wasn't unpleasant and Valkyrie only had her shoulder bashed by one person and considering the number of people around she didn't think that was too bad.

Once they were at the pier, the weather had cleared nicely although no heat came down from the sun. It was an all go from their captain as the sea seemed calm and the wind wasn't at all bad considering how chilly and dark it still was. December really wasn't Valkyrie's favourite month, although seeing the staff in bright Santa hats attempting to keep them on their heads as they set off on their ride was entertaining.

It was too loud to talk on the way over, but that was good because the closer they got the more nervous Valkyrie became, that ring getting heavy in her coat again. She wasn't scared of the consequences of asking Nadia, she was just nervous of the action, of the idea of rejection. She didn't think Nadia would reject it at the time, so embarrassment was out, but it was still a bad thought to have. What if she thought about it after the fact and told Valkyrie she didn't really want to marry her after all? Plus it was so cold on the sea that Valkyrie would have much rather been in bed which didn't help her emotions at all.

Regardless of what she thought, Nadia was blissfully unaware. She grinned as they got off the boat and almost started jumping with glee.

"It's amazing up close!" Nadia was saying. There were a lot of tourists and they must have been the only ones not taking pictures. "Come on, I want to get to the front!"

Valkyrie had no choice but to follow. There was snow covering the grassy lawns and the trees had lost their leaves. In the pictures she had seen online, she had thought the little island the statue sat upon was much smaller, but in reality, the statue was just ignoramus. Another tourist group was going towards the monument from another direction and it didn't even look like they were first to arrive that morning, but Nadia still finessed their way to the front of the statue.

Personally, Valkyrie wasn't that interested in the thing, and thought it smelt a bit too salty and like something bad she couldn't put her finger on, but she supposed it was cool to be around something she'd seen so many time on television. Nadia was in paradise, a very cold and icy one. She almost tripped and Valkyrie caught her.

"Slow down sweet," Valkyrie whispered, getting her steady. "Do you remember if they're letting people in today?"

It so happened that they were, but only barely. They were allowed on the ground floor but the stairs had been tapped off with a guard keeping the area out of bounds. It was illuminated well and was slightly warmer inside, especially after waiting for half an hour to get in. Nadia took some pictures and Valkyrie took one of the two of them once they were outside with the statue in the background and sent it to the Idiots on their group messaging chat. She didn't wait to see the comments, but they did go and look around the grounds. It got very busy very quickly.

Nadia had also booked them tickets to another nearby island, Ellis Island, with the Immigration Museum. They hopped on a boat going the ten minutes or so over to it. Valkyrie was much more impressed with this place than the big metal lady. It was a brick building with white trims, red metal structure acting as a runway porch leading them in and was massive in size.

It was like any other museum inside but it was still interesting. They chatted quietly, as there weren't many tourists, about the clothes, items and information on offer. It was all mortal so Nadia learnt a little more than Valkyrie seeing as she had a far more mixed education between mortals and mages, but she still learnt something about immigration while she was there. It was hard not to take it with a grain of salt, but at the same time it seemed honest about its past functions. It had been the largest immigration inspection station in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and apparently processed twelve million immigrants. In the World Wars it was then used as a detention centre and was then mostly abandoned until it became a tourist site.

And she would never use that information again.

There was a lot more useless information than that, but Valkyrie became quite hungry so after finishing the main museum they went to a café for lunch which was cheese sandwiches and soup, a combination Valkyrie hadn't tried before but turned out great. They had another hot drink each and went around the grounds of Ellis Island, and the other buildings it had. She grew bored but Nadia didn't so they wandered around, took a guided tour, and then chose to leave.

After the boat back to New York City, they debated what to do. It was three forty-five, so Valkyrie kissed her, held her hand and said they better go towards their next tourist attraction, something she had kept secret.

"I thought we were going to the hotel after this?" She questioned. "It's an hour back to our hotel as it is."

"I know. But, I figured it would be beautiful on top of the Empire State Building when it got dark so I got us evening tickets. We're lucky too because the forecast says there'll be no clouds."

"Really?" Nadia grinned, although more sedately than earlier. "It's so sweet of you to do that."

"Hmm, well I knew you wanted to go so I thought I'd just book our tickets a little differently to how you wanted me to. Don't worry, it doesn't mess up any other plans."

"No, it's perfect, we'll have time to go shopping instead!"

Nadia prattled on a lot about how wonderful an idea it was and how happy she was and all sorts of other things. It was warmer now and the fog was gone but the temperature was set to go down rapidly. It was an hour over to the Empire State Building, yet they were still early for their entry time.

"We should get something to eat," Valkyrie suggested.

"But I'm not really hungry," Nadia said.

"We can get something small before and after," Valkyrie suggested. "We can try out the pizza."

"Ah yeah! Where's the nearest?"

It didn't take a lot of walking to find a small hole in the wall side street pizza shop. The slices were literally the sizes of their heads.

"What can I do for you fine ladies?" The man at the counter grinned. He was smirking like he owned the world and walked with his hips first, swagger in his step. He had an alright face, Valkyrie thought, but his smile was like a worse version of Fletcher with all the cockiness and not as much of the nice, pearly teeth.

"Erm, could I have the pepperoni please?" Nadia asked with a cute smile.

"Aww, what's that accent there, you two are Irish gals?" He grinned, getting a bag out. "Which one do you want? Here, this one's the biggest, you like that?"

Valkyrie felt Nadia hesitate for just a moment and then nodded, smiling up at Valkyrie. Valkyrie couldn't tell if Nadia was actually nervous or putting it on, and she didn't know who for if she was.

"And what do you want, my dark-haired beaut? Gar, you two don't happen to have boyfriends around the corner? You sure are fine to be walking around alone. You can eat in, it's warm," he flirted. Valkyrie was so stuck on the hilarity of being called a 'beaut' she almost didn't notice his offer, or the bad flirting.

"You have tables?" She asked, then looked at Nadia who nodded quickly. She was breathing air into her hands.

"Yeah, of course. I can set you up nice if you like. Just the two of you?" He tried with his version of a 'sexy-smirk' this time. Dexter did it better. So did Tanith, although she actively tried not to think of 'sexy' and 'her sister' too much. It was generally not a good frame of mind she tried to foster.

"Sure I think that's alright. I'll get the plain margarita," she requested. "And no, we don't have boyfriends," she added just to mess with him. Nadia laughed loudly.

"What? Two beautiful ladies like you?" He said in fake horror, his smile widening. Valkyrie cut him off by going through the door to the tiny restaurant area inside. It was packed but true to his word, the man, introducing himself as Christophe, found them bar stools so they could eat right at the counter.

"What are you doing?" Valkyrie whispered to Nadia, trying not to smile.

"Just having fun," she whispered back. "We can tell him at the end."

Valkyrie shook her head, knowing how well that may go, but let Nadia do her thing. It was kind of funny after all and Christophe wasn't that bad, just a quite forward.

"You like the pizza, yeah?" He asked once they were sat and had taken a mouthful. This was a New York-style they were trying. It was like a stone bake, flat with a nice sauce and lots of toppings. This one didn't have any herbs on top which Valkyrie preferred but it was still good in its oily way. She nodded, trying to snap the stringy cheese. "You girls here long then or just a little while?"

"Just this week," Nadia said in her lighter, girlier voice. He leaned against the counter in front of them. "It's a girl's holiday. Our first one together."

"Aw, nice, congratulations!" He grinned. His teeth were strangely white. "You're both Irish then?"

"Yeah," Valkyrie said as Nadia took another bite. "There's less snow here at the moment, but it's just as cold."

"Yeah, I'll bet. Why are you visiting over Christmas, visiting family, graduating school?" He probed.

"It's Nadia's birthday on Thursday," Valkyrie said, snorting a laugh when he gasped dramatically.

"You're a birthday girl?" He said getting way too much attention from the other patrons. He got two cans of coke out from under the counter and slid them over. Valkyrie didn't doubt it would still be on their bill. There was no better combination than pizza and fizzy drinks though, so she popped the tabs for them both. "Are you doing anything special, birthday girl? Going somewhere nice? Going out partying? Maybe, getting it on in your birthday suit, 'eah?"

Valkyrie's eyebrows raised at his bluntness. Nadia burst out laughing. "Oh you know I will!"

The guy didn't seem to expect that response but came back in for more. "Where you gonna be then? I wanna make sure I'm there too, I can bring a friend for your friend if you want."

"I'm going to stay in my hotel, I already have someone on my leash," she grinned, giving Valkyrie a naughty look. The guy didn't catch on while Valkyrie scoffed a laugh.

"Oh no, you had me trailing like a dog and you had someone already?" He moaned, grinned anyway. Valkyrie was glad he took it well. It would be a shame to have to punch him. "Tell me straight. What's he like? What's he got that I don't?"

Nadia giggled Valkyrie's favourite giggle and shook her head, putting a straw in her coke and sipping on it coyly.

"Be still my heart. Fine! Miss, it's a pleasure to meet you," he tried a second time, turning to Valkyrie and making Nadia laugh. "My name is Christophe. Please, be kind. Do you have a lover?"

"Yes," she said rolling her eyes. "She's right here."

"Aww, Val!" Nadia cried, stilling grinning.

"What?!" He shouted, his grin widening. "You both had me!"

"It was her idea," Valkyrie said, leaving her crust on her paper plate and wiping her hands of the grease. Nadia had eaten just over half the pizza and then the crust and left the rest.

"This isn't fair at all," he continued dramatically. "And I tried so hard, too."

"It was never meant to be," Nadia smiled.

It took almost ten minutes for Valkyrie to extract Nadia from the shop, practically pulling her out in the end. It was good pizza and Christophe had been fun company in the end and a good sport, but it was time to see the Empire State Building.

There was a giant line, but as they had prepaid tickets they got into the shorter, faster line. After giggling and kissing just a little in the line, they got to the front, got their passes and jumped into an elevator with a few other people up to the Dare to Dream Exhibit. While it was really good, Valkyrie and Nadia just wanted to see the views so they strolled through it rather quickly, hand in hand, and made their way up to the first observatory.

"Woah Val," Nadia breathed when they got up there. It was inside a room, windowed all the way around. All the lights were on in the buildings now as even at almost six in the evening it was dark from the winter skies, and they twinkled beautifully. Only a few dozen other people were up here with them. They went over to the window, Valkyrie's eyes big as she took in the beautiful view. "It's so amazing."

"It's gorgeous," she agreed. Valkyrie squeezed Nadia's hand, feeling her heart start to race. "Let's walk around."

Eyes stuck to the outside, Nadia and Valkyrie very slowly walked around the room, staring at the twinkling lights and many buildings. They stopped to look at the people below and try to work out what they were looking at, stealing kisses when they could. When they got to the start again, Valkyrie smiled, feeling calmer and more sure of herself, and took Nadia up to the much busier top level out in the freezing open, deftly moving the ring to her outside pocket, prepared for the big moment.

"Oh it's even better here," Nadia grinned, going to the rail. There was a gentle chatter, like a background lull, all around them. They could see for miles around them. The breeze was bitingly cold, but it was still amazing. "It's really romantic too."

"It is," Valkyrie smiled, leaning down for a longer kiss. She started to get ready to put her hand into her pocket, her leg almost buckled as she went to go down and then–

"Get a room," someone shouted, causing a group of men to start laughing.

"Oh Christ!" Some woman said scornfully.

Valkyrie sighed, straightening up and putting her hands at her sides.

"Don't listen to them," Nadia said quietly, putting a gentle hand on her elbow as a stronger, colder breeze flew by. "Why don't we go inside?"

"But we haven't even enjoyed the view," Valkyrie said, putting on a smile.

They both heard as that same woman muttered something horrible under her breath about them, getting herself a few abashed looks and glares. "Let's just leave," Nadia said. "We can get hot chocolate."

Feeling rather let down that her attempt to propose was ruined more so than the actual remarks they overheard, Valkyrie decided they may as well go since Nadia wanted to. On their way out a staff member apologised to them for the comments and promised the couple were being dealt with upstairs but neither of the girls cared or wanted to hear it. They had enjoyed the first observatory.

The hot chocolate they found was good, and they had whipped cream on top too. Nadia made sure to cheer Valkyrie up on the way to the hotel, and when they got there too.


	165. Honest chats

**Chapter 165**

Waking up on Wednesday was much more enjoyable for Valkyrie. She woke without an alarm at around nine and rolled over, squinting her eyes open to see Nadia. Her girlfriend had her lips parted slightly, hair a mess all over the pillow and over her shoulders and neck. She'd grown it out these last few months and it looked really good on her. Valkyrie's own was down to her shoulder blades.

Her phone buzzed, knocking her out of her tired musings. She reached around and grabbed it, squinted at the brightness and once she had that down, opened the message.

It was from Tanith, asking how the holiday was going. Being quiet, she laid on her back and text back, _'It's going well, nothing to report yet. How's it for you?'_

A few moments later, _'Disappointing. What's your plan? Laila is trying to hold everything. She got Erskine's phone and threw it, the screen broke. The boys are excited for you to give news. Solomon is busy. My nipples hurt.'_

Valkyrie tried not to laugh. Laila was a strong baby apparently, and it didn't shock her that everyone was getting excited for her to pop the question and report back. Lying back, looking at Nadia, she wondered what her reaction would be. So long as she said yes, and Valkyrie was fairly confident she would, there would be kissing and excitement, asking about the ring. Then just telling people, really. Sending a picture of the ring to her friends from boarding school, Valkyrie would be sure to read their reactions, she sort of missed them herself. They'd have to phone her family and tell them. What would Nadia want to do about her own family? It was so close to Christmas, it would be right to tell them. But just to send a random text out of the blue to inform them of the fact didn't feel right. They weren't on speaking terms, so it also didn't feel right to suddenly call and act like nothing happened before this. If they waited until they were in person it might be alright, but it equally could be awful if they took that as hiding big things from them and that wouldn't work in their favour.

Nadia took a deep break and rolled onto her back, stretching out like a cat. Smiling, Valkyrie text Tanith back. _'Tell Laila she's a good girl. Sorry about your nips, get some cream or something. I promise to have results soon. Have to go, Nadia woke up.'_ She put the phone back on her bedside and shuffled over to Nadia.

"Good morning," she smiled, kissing Nadia's bare shoulder.

"Hmm, good morning baby," Nadia said back, her voice a little husky from sleep. "You're so pretty."

Valkyrie kissed her neck. "You're beautiful. Do you want to go and get something to eat?"

"I haven't woke up yet. Still sleeping," she moaned, rolling onto her side and right into Valkyrie's mostly flat chest. "Hello boobies."

"As much as I'd love to go down on you right now, I don't think I can manage sex today," she said, stretching and pulling the covers back.

Nadia moaned. "I forgot."

"Come on, it's going to be a really good day still. If we hurry we can have a nice breakfast. I'll find somewhere on my phone."

"Oh, alright," Nadia grumbled and pushed herself up. "Did I hear your phone earlier?"

"Yeah, Tanith was texting me. Laila got Erskine's phone and managed to throw it so hard it broke the screen," she said as she picked out her clothes for the day and started dressing. "Did you know she's two and a half months old now? God, she's so old."

"Yeah, of course," Nadia said. "I was there for her birth; I think I'd remember details like how old she is."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "I just asked."

"Yeah, well. Ask better questions."

They got ready, talking and joking as they went, and then left their room and took the underground over to the area their day's activity was. Not far from the underground tunnel they found a nice café and after a half-hour wait for a seat, they were taken to a table. They chose waffles for breakfast, Valkyrie deciding to go out on a limb and try bacon, sausage and syrup on hers while Nadia decided to be a bit healthier and have a mix of fruit.

They enjoyed it but they were also a bit sombre because around the next block was the nine eleven memorials. It was in a park, or what was now a park, with a lot of trees. It looked hollow in winter, rather than beautiful, as they had lost their leaves. It made the two large squares on the left and right stand out that much more.

The two didn't speak as they went around. They held hands and walked slowly, reading the plaques, the names, the stories and taking it in. Neither of them had experienced anything so big, but it did bring back a lot of memories they had about the Sanctuary attack. This was so much larger that Valkyrie felt bad for even comparing it, but that was her only real comparison. Having been one of the only ones to survive the bomb outside of the safe room too, the memorial both emphasised how damn lucky she was to be alive and how… how small she felt. It wasn't quite guilt or confusion but just that feeling of seeing so much pain and suffering in one place and being a survivor that she felt like she didn't belong. Like she was being bad to even step foot here and have thoughts of being a survivor when others had been through something so much more.

Nadia squeezed her hand, feeling her unease. "You alright?" She said from their park bench. It was peaceful, even with the ever-present sound of cars in the distance. They'd been there for at least two hours or more already.

"Yeah. It's just a lot to take in at once," she said slowly.

"It is. It's bigger than I expected," she commented. "You don't look relaxed."

Valkyrie put her eyes to the ground as Nadia wrapped an arm around her own comfortingly. "I'm just thinking about, you know, the Sanctuary."

"About the explosion? We never really spoke about that," Nadia said quietly. "It all happened so fast and then I was so focused on you recovering and all the family issues it never came up."

"It's alright. I haven't thought about it much really, except a few times at the new Sanctuary in Roarhaven. I guess it's just seeing the impact of this place that made me think about it more," she explained. "There's just so many stories of all the survivors and victims."

"What are you thinking?"

"What do you mean?"

"It feels like you're going into your mind, somewhere you've hidden away. Tell me about it," Nadia said quietly, getting them to meet eyes. Hers were big and brown and beautiful, Valkyrie's sad and far away. "I want to help you."

Valkyrie sighed. "It doesn't feel right to do that. I'm just me, you know? I'm trained and built to deal with all this stuff. I'm a part of a suicide team, being in dangerous places with insane people that really could destroy the whole world is my speciality. So being blown up, I guess it's not really something I should talk about because it's going to happen a lot more times and it really is just going to be a part of my job. So many good, innocent people died. Their deaths are _worth_ more because they were paper pushers, the in-between people, the ones in the background. What right did anyone have in killing those innocent people? But that's not the case for me. If anyone is meant to get caught up in that, it's me."

"That doesn't mean you can't feel sad and angry about it," Nadia said, resting her chin on Valkyrie's shoulder. "It was really scary."

"Yeah," she said after a moment. "It was. I don't even remember it, but just going for the panic signal and it not working was bad enough. I knew we were fucked when that happened, even as I was thrown back from it. And Skulduggery and Craven fighting over the switch outside… it was less than two seconds. But it made a bigger impact than I thought it did."

"You sound like you're holding it in still."

"I don't want to cry. This isn't, you know, _my_ place. This is for these victims, for this city and its people."

"I don't think anyone would mind sharing."

Valkyrie smiled at her. "I'm still not doing it. I guess, if I wanted to get really deep about it, I am just really conflicted about it all. I want to say I got through it by a fluke and not think about it because it's not from anything I did, just pure accident that I lived. And on the other hand, I think about everything that happened and just knowing I was there when it happened, unconscious and unable to defend myself at all. It's an awful feeling Nadia. I'm not the weak one. I'm the one that is meant to stop that from happening. I failed to do that. I don't really know what I feel."

"No one is ever going to blame you for what happened that day," Nadia said firmly. "But I can imagine that just knowing you were there would be frightening enough. It scares me thinking that you were there at all."

"You were so good through all of it," Valkyrie said, thinking back. "From the moment you could be with me you were. It was really amazing."

Nadia blushed but didn't smile. "It was so hard."

"Tell me about it."

She let out a small chuckle but it lacked humour. "It was just a lot of stress at once. Being at the hospital and you being scared of Kenspeckle. Your family playing up, and the tensions between Ghastly and Tanith as well as everyone being both divided and against Skulduggery all at once. I was so happy when you opened your eyes and looked at me. But then we realised you'd have to go through a process to get back to us again and it was really, really scary. Civet thought it might take months or days, we had no idea. I'm so grateful it was soon though. On some days you acted like a toddler with the strength of Anton."

"God, I'm sorry," Valkyrie said, partly ashamed, partly embarrassed. "I didn't hurt you, did I?"

She hesitated. "Not very much. It's just, if you wanted to be read to, you'd get angry when we stopped and we didn't know you'd act out until it was happening. So once I was sitting on the floor with you and you just snapped. I only had a few bruises but more than once you had to be restrained in the bed. I – I had to leave the room. I felt so bad Val, but I couldn't watch you go through that."

"Hey, it's okay, don't be upset about that," Valkyrie said quickly. "I'm just sorry I hurt you. I'd have been happy if you'd just visited me every other day, you know what I mean? I never expected you to stand by me like that. It meant the world to me. It still does. You have to be the most loyal woman on the planet."

That cheered her up a bit. "It was the right thing to do. I think as well I just needed a bigger excuse to leave my parents. You being ill was just the perfect reason to leave them to live with you, and I'm really glad I did it," she smiled, kissing Valkyrie's cheek. "Do you remember anything from when you were, I don't know, not you?"

"Kind of," she said, screwing her nose up without realising. "I guess I remember vague things? Or maybe I just think I do. It's really weird, it's like a dream where you can't quite grasp the context or situation you were in but you remember this event or that? Like, I think I remember being read to, but I don't remember the book or what happened or who did it. So I'm doubting I actually remember it and I just think I do because I've been told that happened."

"That makes sense," Nadia nodded slowly. "The brain is really strange with these things. When you were getting better, some days you'd remember events from when you were eight or nine but you'd have the emotional capacity of a four year old and your muscle memory was an entirely different age too. Like, one day you couldn't hold a pen and the next you could suddenly copy a picture really well without anything happening but sleeping. Then you remembered how to read and write, although that took a bit longer to do. It was interesting to watch, even though it was scary."

"That was scary too?"

"I was scared – _we_ were scared that you'd stop progressing and get stuck with the mind of a ten year old for years, or that you had lost your recent memories and wouldn't know what was happening. We were prepared for you being a lot worse for a lot longer than you were," she explained, holding Valkyrie's arm tightly. "I thought I'd lose you."

"Aww, baby," Valkyrie muttered, pulling her close and tucking her into her side. If she was just a little taller they'd fit perfectly. Internally, Valkyrie wished she could grow a few more inches. Just enough to make cuddling even better. "It's okay now though, I'm back the way I was. If anything, I'm probably _more_ mature than I was. This was a wakeup call for us all on how we were acting. I mean, I wasn't being that bad but it's still good to grow up one day. This helped me think more clearly about the future, you know?"

"Yeah? What do you want in the future?" Nadia asked in a cute voice, looking up at her with a bit more hope and security now she was tucked under her arm. She was adorable.

"I want to have a house fit for us, which we're doing. I'm really glad we're going to have our own apartments and also communal areas. It's just a more sophisticated way to co-habituate I suppose."

Nadia laughed. "That's a weird way of putting it."

"It's true though," she defended with a grin. "We'll have a large place to grow and learn new things about ourselves and each other. After we've finished with the Spiders I want to get back into music or perhaps a different hobby. We'll have lots of room to do all that, and I don't know if I would have wanted to when everyone was spread out and we ran into each other all the time. We'll have more secure private areas now, and when we're not there everyone understands it's okay to be with us. It'll make us get on better too."

"Mhmm, I think so too," Nadia agreed. "Anything else you want in the future?"

"A family," she said, grinning bigger. "We have a family, but a little family just between us two would be nice."

"I want to be called Mummy," Nadia dibbed. "What will you get called?"

"Mammy? No, that's not right. I always said Mummy to my Mum. You'd make a good Mama though."

"Mama," Nadia tried out.

"It can't be shortened, so it would work for you," Valkyrie pointed out. "Eventually Mummy will just be Mum. I wouldn't mind that but I bet you would want to be a Mummy forever."

"Yeah, I'd be an over-obsessed parent," Nadia said with a look of faked self-disappointment. "I always wanted to be Mummy though."

"To be fair, most kids get picked on if they say Mummy for too long. It might be best just to be Mama to get your way."

She looked away to think for a moment, then shook her head and grinned widely. "We're going to have to argue over it when I'm pregnant one day."

Valkyrie grinned, the sudden vision of Nadia pregnant filling her mind. "I can't wait."

"Well you need to," Nadia said, flipping her hair. "Anyway, you're not getting any babies from me until you've married me, Miss Cain, so don't try any funny business."

Valkyrie laughed, trying not to panic the moment Nadia said 'married' because she didn't know Valkyrie's plan but that didn't make it any less worrying that she might suss it out. She went to her panic plan. "Hey, why don't we get out of here and do something fun?"

"Fun?" Nadia said, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah," she said, trying not to talk to quickly. Focus, damnit! "Like, let's not get upset about what happened. We should celebrate what we have, right? And move on so we can get to our future plans. You haven't told me yours yet."

"Well, I suppose that's doable," Nadia smiled after a moment. "You know what I really want right now? A massage. And a pedicure. I forgot my nail set and they need doing. You've never gone to a salon with me."

This distracted them both, luckily. They stood and started out of the memorial, minds on happier, better thoughts now. "Where are we going to find a nice salon in New York City?"

"I hope you're being sarcastic right now. Take me to lunch and I'll find one," she said, a small ray of sun brightening for just a moment to light up Nadia's beautiful face. She had to be the luckiest woman in the world, Valkyrie mused.


	166. Will you marry me?

**Chapter 166**

* * *

**Warning: NSFW - very NSFW... I think you don't care if you've got this far, but just in case you're at school or going to grandma's birthday dinner or something, here's your warning.**

**Also, this is dedicated to Baron Cryptid. Because it's NSFW ;)**

* * *

**Chapter 166**

Lunch was going to be another pizza place but Nadia felt more like pasta, so they found a nice Italian restaurant instead and got there right in time for a table. It seemed to be their luck on this trip involved always finding a table and considering the city they were in, Valkyrie was incredibly grateful. The three waitresses at the large restaurant looked stressed to say the least, but were incredibly polite. Their manager, also the bartender, wasn't doing anything but standing with his arms crossed. As it was the middle of the day, no one was even drinking yet.

"He looked like a dick," Nadia muttered, looking down and speaking barely loud enough for her to hear. Their waitress, that just asked for their drinks order, went to the bar – and had to go into it to make their drinks. "Like he has something better to do."

"Nadia, shush," Valkyrie said with a smirk. "We'll just leave a nice tip, come on. You should tell me about what you want in the future now."

"I am, I am," she said, with just a smidge of attitude as she watched the manager look his waitress up and back down, lingering on her backside when she bent over to get something under the work surface. To be fair, and Valkyrie was trying to be honest, the young woman was drop-dead gorgeous and had been blessed by the heavens in terms of curves, and _boy_ were they in all the good bits. But it was inappropriate. "Dick."

"Come on, baby, don't get upset. There's nothing we can do," Valkyrie said soothingly. "Just imagine him getting fired and take a deep breath."

"But I hate him," Nadia said, looking back at the table.

"Well don't go crazy or the waitress might think you're mad at her," Valkyrie told her, getting her girlfriend to sigh.

"You better give her a really big tip," Nadia said, begrudgingly taking a breath.

"Of course, who do you think I am?" Valkyrie grinned. The waitress, the pretty one, came with their drinks then.

"Is that your manager?" Nadia asked suddenly, gesturing with her head towards the man who was now looking at his fingernails.

The waitress looked over as she set the drinks down. "Err, yeah," she said, her Texan accent noticeable. "Is there a problem?"

"No, I just thought he had an attitude. He was looking you up inappropriately," Nadia informed her. Valkyrie took a sip of her coke.

The woman scowled and then carefully smoothed her features. "Thank you for telling me, ma'am," was all she said and then left towards a staff door.

"You just started something," Valkyrie said. "What happened to being good and just leaving a big tip?"

"I changed my mind. I'd want to be told and so would you."

"Yeah, but I assumed you'd have written a note and left it _with_ the tip."

She shrugged and smiled coyly. "You shouldn't have assumed. Anyway, it might be fun to watch if they start a show."

"God, you have an issue. This is the second place you've done this at now," Valkyrie pointed out.

"Aww, that pizza guy loved it," Nadia grinned and played with the straw in a drink. "And you did too. Am I allowed to say what all my hopes and dreams are now?"

"Go ahead," Valkyrie rolled her eyes, sitting back in the chair.

"Well, I want to work things out with my family and go on holiday with them," she started, keeping a smile on her face. "I want you and my dad to get along. I want to go on a safari one day and see big cats with you. I really want to hear you sing because Gordon told me you could."

"Oh God," Valkyrie laughed. "I can't sing, but I can play a few instruments. Or I could anyway, I might have forgotten."

"Well he said you could sing so we'll be seeing about that," Nadia grinned. "I think I have it all worked out. In the not too distant future, I want all our family and work-related dramas dealt with, plus move into the house and settle in. And in the more distant future after that, I want to have a few animals and become an apprentice of China's."

"An apprentice of China?" Valkyrie asked, surprised. "Why?"

"I want to, you know, do the work that she's doing," she said, using code for magic since they were in mortal public.

"I didn't know you had an interest in that."

"Yeah, I learnt a bunch at boarding school. But then I came here and it went on the wayside. But with you having your job and talents," code for magic, "all laid out I figured I should think about it. I probably wouldn't have considered it if it wasn't for the school and the fact you could probably convince her to train me. I don't want to be one of those half-proficient people. I want to be really good."

Valkyrie smiled. "Well, I'm glad you have a plan. It's going to take you forever though; China says that she's always learning."

"Exactly, that's what I want. I also wanted to have the time to do business management from home for your family businesses and assets, at least from a beginners level, and have animals, and help Gordon out if he needs it. You know, it gives me options. If I went into some of the other things I thought about I'd either have a useless talent or something very specific that limits my work options and I didn't want that."

"As soon as we get back I can talk to her to set it up. She always has apprentices so we need to tell her early so she can save a space, I'm sure. Is there anything else you want in a long time?"

She thought about it. "I suppose I've mostly thought about me things. Like jobs and pets. I want to learn a ton of things and travel a bit. This is like my twenty-year plan. Simple, nothing too much, open to changes and possibilities. I don't know, I haven't thought about anything outside of just me. I want a family like you but that's probably going to be after the twenty years I have thought out, and I'd want to get married first."

Valkyrie smiled softly. "You would?"

"Well yeah, my parents are married. Traditions in, you know, _the world_ , are different. In Ireland and Europe and America and places like that, those traditions are fading with modern culture and that's okay. More emphasis is being put on enjoying life and having a good long term job, and even in working out the right person to marry before settling. So getting married is actually seen as a bit weird for young people and you know how young is _young_ to _some_ people," she said, rolling her eyes. Valkyrie had heard some mages say that anyone under ninety was a child, so she knew what Nadia meant. "But in places like Africa and Asia, which includes most of my dad's side of the family, those changes haven't quite happened, at least to the same extent. I mean, everyone can do what they want at the end of the day. It's just that, usually, in families there is an expectation to uphold traditions. And some families have family traditions for those just in _their_ family. In my family, we expect people to be married before they have children. And to get married, the person in the family and their partner would need to spend a lot of time with the extended family so they become integrated, just so everyone knows and likes them."

"So would I have to get their approval to marry you first?" Valkyrie asked.

She considered it. "No, I don't think so. But _after_ we were engaged we'd be expected to go through the family traditions. Actually, my family is only traditional in some ways. In dress and religion, they have kind of strong opinions. Mostly in that if someone has a religious belief they don't expect everyone else to bow to that and follow it too, and that everyone tolerates each other's beliefs too. But in love and marriage, my family is known for the work they did a long, long time ago to change customs in our part of the world. Don't get me wrong, I couldn't just go off and get hitched right now, but I can choose who I want and marry them. I think that's why my Daadii and Dad are butting heads. Daadii wants me to be able to do what I want, but she also wants me safe. Dad wants me safe but he takes it too far so he sees Daadii as letting me run free even though that's far from what she wants. And since Dad is just scared for me, Daadii understands where he's coming from so she isn't getting that mad with him and trying to actually force him to stop. But don't forget that my Daadii is the head of our family and what she says goes. As long as she doesn't force him, he basically has permission."

"It's just a mix," Valkyrie concluded. "Some things are traditional, some things are more modern."

"Some things aren't deemed good enough to be a tradition and so they are deemed a load of rubbish," Nadia corrected. "At least according to my family. I think the difference between here and there is that Ireland and close by countries had a war that killed a lot of traditionalists. India and their close countries didn't have that, at least not to the same extent. So all the younger people in Ireland that didn't want to get married before a hundred," she whispered the number, "just didn't, and things changed. I think it was my grandfather's grandparents that caused a lot of the changes in India but my family is still known for it. They were involved in the legislation and stuff and some of it's the same as it was when they wrote it all those years ago."

"Aren't they worried what's going on with you is going to negate that? I mean, your dad doesn't want you with me, that goes against some of what you're saying," Valkyrie asked.

"A father and a mother, to a certain extent, should still be able to protect their child from a threat," Nadia said, pulling a face. "I like to think I know what I'm doing. But if I thought Laila was with some idiot who was going to get her killed, I'd be scared and upset and I bet Tanith would get involved, and Ghastly sure as hell would."

Valkyrie nodded. "I get that. If I thought Laila was going to be killed and ran away with someone out of the blue, I'd follow and drag her back for sure."

"Exactly. But I hope they can see how much I like you one day," Nadia smiled. "You're pretty great after all."

"I'll make sure they love me in a few years," she promised. _Before our marriage_ , she thought.

**.*****.**

"Yes, we can fit you in," the plain, professional lady at the salon front desk nodded, clicking away at her keyboard. It was dead silent in the welcome room. It was also made of some sort of beige stone all over, which extended to the actual desk. The waiting chairs were a bit nicer. "Since you are a walk-in, we have a ten percent discount, but you will have to mind that there may be delays between treatments. You can choose to wait outside your next treatment rooms, or would you rather hire a personal waiting room?"

"Personal waiting room, please," Nadia said quietly. Certainly. Like _she_ was the one paying. Brat.

"I can do that. In that case, we can do treatments such as nails to begin and end the day in your personal room where your facial's and massages can take place, as well as an approximate half-hour wait after getting your hairs done. All of this is subject to change if other guests take longer, but I can assure you that we will be sure to accommodate you splendidly during your wait. Is that acceptable?"

"That's perfect, thank you," Valkyrie smiled. "Is it okay that we didn't bring any other clothes with us?"

"Absolutely, we can provide you with gowns," she said without any expression. "Mrs Chandler will collect you momentarily to take you to your room. Can I take your details in the meantime?"

Valkyrie swallowed a cry at the four-figure price but thought about how much fun it would be, plus it would set the mood for tomorrow, plus it made Nadia happy. Why did she have to have a girlfriend? Why did she want to make her a fiancée? That would make her _more_ expensive! God, if this was just a normal spa day then a spa day for them, a bridal preparation was going to be as much as a wedding alone-

Mrs Chandler was with them then, a tiny, stick-thin woman with a real smile on her face. "Hello, madam and madam. Please, follow me," she said with a very pronounced New York accent.

They did, taking an elevator up to the fourth floor of the building and making their introductions. Mrs Chandler was apparently some sort of hostess cross middle woman to move people around and keep everything in check. Other versions of her were walking around in the same clothes, all very pretty and wearing smiles.

Their room was small but gorgeous. There were two padded massage beds and the colour pallet was dark bedroom blue and gold with champagne accents. It was rich and sitting between classy and gaudy, somewhere Valkyrie didn't entirely hate. They were instructed to strip, put on their 'robes' – dressing gowns – and follow her to have their nails done. She drew a curtain between them before leaving which they giggled at but didn't disrupt. They were enjoying themselves and this place wouldn't discriminate simply due to the fact that they were paying stupid prices and that meant they could do next to anything and the salon wouldn't say anything, so it made the assumption of them just being friends amusing.

Smiling excitedly and arm in arm, they followed Mrs Chandler to the other side of the building to have their nails done.

Valkyrie chose a pretty royal blue and champagne, inspired by their room. The artist didn't just do her nails in simple gel but made a swirling pattern of lighter and royal blue, and used a goldish champagne as a highlight colour as well as some very tiny pearls as decoration.

Soon after she had her toenails done as well as a full foot massage. There were a few other ladies and two men getting treatments there also and they were all talking so Nadia and Valkyrie were just enjoying it together in the corner. She picked out a simple clear gel with a French tip, nothing insane, but had a full and extensive foot exfoliation which she honestly had never gone into much depth with herself. By how long it took for her feet versus Nadia, it was obvious how much time each of them took to look after themselves. Although dealing with a bit of a calloused heel was hardly Valkyrie's priority in life. They were served drinks while it happened, nothing alcoholic but very fruity.

Nadia had, obviously, gone for something slightly more elaborate. Her toes were now a pale pink with white tips and a line of fake little gems at the trimmed cuticle for her big toes. It was both very extra and incredibly simple whilst being fairly mature with a bit of fun imbedded in the gems – which Valkyrie was beginning to see more and more was her girlfriend's style. Her fingernails were similar in their simplicity but were also more elaborate, at least to Valkyrie's somewhat limited ability to judge styles. At least, they were really pretty. It was a clear underlayer of gel, then white tips that faded down with a swirling design branching from the tips on each nail. The middle two fingers had some little crystals on the cuticle also. Her thumbs were the same except she also had a little gem on the outside corner of the end of her nails as well as the cuticle gems.

They complimented each other and tried each other's drinks and after Valkyrie was finally done they were taken straight over to an opening with the masseuse. Mrs Chandler, who procured herself as they were taken away, explained that there had been a 'sudden change' so now their stay would be 'more pleasurable', but not to be worried as it would mean they had more time for their couples massage now. Valkyrie hadn't cared but Mrs Chandler made sure to press how good it was before disappearing. She supposed the rich got upset when their plans were changes, or something like that.

They went to their personal room for the massage where a man and woman were outside. He was dressed in black shirt and trousers, whereas the woman leading them was in a black skirt and blouse. They stopped outside the room.

"Please remove all clothing and lie flat on the beds, then call us in. We shall begin the hot stone massages then," the man asked, bowing slightly to them. He was obviously higher up than the woman. "Do not worry about covering up, we shall bring towels when we enter."

They nodded, somewhat nervous but also excited, and threw their robes off and got on their beds. "This is fun," Nadia whispered.

"I've never done this before."

"It's okay, I promise. Call them in."

"We're ready," Valkyrie called, trying not to clench or not clench her butt cheeks. What was she meant to do here? Is there a butt-clenching etiquette? The man and woman came in and they pressed a button on the wall and the lights faded slightly and soft music of a piano and water came on. They had a wooden trolley each with a large vat on for the hot stones. Her nerves tripled as she took a deep breath.

The man came to her, which she tried not to get anxious about. She was the bigger, muscly one, she reasoned with herself. She needed not to be stupid. This was safe. This was good. She was okay here. Her mental talking got her more settled, and she finally calmed way down when the man – the masseuse – put the folded towel over her butt. She wriggled to get her top half comfortable and turned to Nadia.

She had her eyes half-lidded and wrapped around the top of the bed comfortably. The heat in the room rose with another button touch. She stared at her woman as the masseuse's explained how the hot stone massage would go. They were going to get slightly different ones to each other apparently. Like she had reasoned with herself, they observed that her body was much more athletic and would focus on her with larger stones, whereas Nadia would be treated more gently.

They were in there for an hour and a half, staring at each other, eyes relaxed. Her body went from relaxed to a new type of relaxed that made her feel like she was a puddle. Every pour felt open, every part of her body was relaxed. Her mouth was partly open and her arms were not in the pretty curve around her head like Nadia's, they were just kind of hanging. The heated, oiled up stones smelt amazing and the masseuse knew what he was doing. To begin, each warm stone made her tense slightly, and then as more were added her body learnt not to tense and to remain relaxed. She breathed and listened to the music, watched Nadia. She felt as if she dreamt about asking Nadia to marry her and how happy it would make her, and she smiled in her daze. At some point, the stones began to leave but she still felt their weights on her body. She was massaged by hands throughout but it was like it was just a feeling, not any person doing anything to her.

So much time went by but she was in complete bliss. She'd never been so relaxed in her life. It was _magical_ , even. But eventually, the masseuses had to go. They left them with a small word about having half an hour before their next treatment, so the girls were able to relax until then. It woke Valkyrie up a little but she was still happy.

"You're beautiful," Nadia muttered lovingly from her bed.

Valkyrie barely managed a moan. It was like she couldn't use her muscles. She didn't want to anyway. This was amazing.

Nadia giggled. "I love you."

Some half-hour later and Nadia had persuaded Valkyrie with some kisses to get herself up. They were back in their robes and the oils had soaked into their skin. Mrs Chandler took them to a different beauty room downstairs where there were three large medical looking beds with bright lights above them.

"Hello, ladies," one of the woman said softly as they entered. There were only two women there. "You are looking for massages today?"

"Yes please," Nadia said, practically floating to the speaking woman. "I forgot what we asked for downstairs."

"We were told there is one lady for package three and another for package five," she replied. "We have more than enough time to discuss options, however."

"I'd like that."

Nadia and this woman went at it discussing options. Valkyrie just sat down at the other lady's bed and passively sat there. This was a much better way to live, on a cloud with no decisions to make. Lovely.

"Okay, Val," Nadia finally said, turning to her. "How do you feel about getting your eyebrows done?"

"Hmm?" Valkyrie asked, not hearing her as she'd been watching the snow fall gently outside. "Sure, of course. I'll do it."

Nadia raised an eyebrow. "Usually you hate people touching your eyebrows."

"My eyebrows!" She gasped. "What about my eyebrows?"

Nadia rolled her eyes. "Getting your eyebrows waxed. Do you want it?"

The lady who was meant to do it took over to explain how she'd make sure she'd keep the shape Valkyrie had and that she'd just clean it up and nothing more. She thought about it and wasn't sure but decided that if it went wrong then she'd ask for all her money back and sat back into the chair trying not to look self-satisfied at her cunning plan. Various massages and oils were rubbed into her face and neck and she lazily smiled along the way, agreeing with whatever Nadia was chatting about and to anything the lady working on her suggested.

After, and without daring to look at a mirror at how red her eyebrows must look from the wax, they were done. Since they looked 'bad' they were taken through a special route so no one would see them to get to the hair salon. They were complimented on their new eyebrows by the male hairdresser and then came the hair questions. Valkyrie bit her lip, unsure of what she wanted and let Nadia go first. She chose an easy to manage style, just a few inches off so it was almost but not quite at her shoulder and then feathering it on either side of her face to make it softer. She had a few layers in it too, and he also put in a handful of very carefully mixed highlights into the inner layers to add some brightness. Since her hair was very dark brown with hints of red only in the lights, the highlight was just a lighter brown with slightly redder tones to bring those colours out. He started on Valkyrie while Nadia's 'cured'.

Valkyrie went even simpler. Just a straight, feathered and layered look, fairly short. Having perfectly straight hair, she couldn't do much anyway, whereas Nadia had some natural kinks to give it life. Her simple cut fit into Nadia curing time, plus she got to have her own hair washed which was fun. In the end, they loved their looks and thanked the man profusely.

They got to have another drink and mess about in the room for a while just relaxing, then it was time to go to dinner as they had been there for almost seven hours and it was getting very late. They left hand in hand, Valkyrie paying even more thanks to their add-on's and having to tip each person that worked on them individually – which was an automatic add-on, not something she just gave, and that felt incredibly crappy considering she had spent over a thousand on the treatments already – and then left. They decided to get takeaway on the way back and grabbed a Chinese.

"You're really pretty by the way," Valkyrie commented as they went up the elevator to their room at the hotel. "That look suits you. It looked more mature than the straight cut you had."

Nadia smiled. "Thanks. You look good with short hair. I like both, but this frames your face really well. It'll look better when your eyebrows aren't bright red though."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and bumped their hips gently. "I'll deal with it when we get upstairs. I can't believe you talked me into that."

"It took, like, three minutes max," Nadia laughed. "You'll take anything that make your eyebrows better."

"When we're older and have time I want to get that hair removal stuff China told me about. I'm getting it from neck down and also on my face," she said firmly.

"Same. I wish there were more beauty things in our world, it's kind of boring."

"Imagine our family's faces when we get back and have all this fun stuff done. I bet Erskine would have a field day going through all the nail ideas and getting them done every week. Maybe you should introduce him to it."

"It would be nice to have something to do with him after the house," she smiled.

The lift dinged and they went for their room, taking a quiet moment to get into their pyjamas and breath before sorting their food and eating. They got onto one small sofa together and snuggled up with the telly on and a thick blanket from the bed around them. Outside, it started to snow more and more heavily.

"I really love you," Valkyrie smiled after she and Nadia had finished eating, brushed their teeth and healing their eyebrows. "So, so much. I had a good time today."

"Good," Nadia smiled. "We're going to have a lot more days like this."

"You bet," she smiled, lowering her lips to Nadia's. Their tongues slowly danced, their tired, relaxed bodies easily beginning to hum. Without meaning to, Valkyrie pushed Nadia down against the armrest and slowly kissed her, open mouthed and messy with some kind of tranquillity making it easy to just enjoy the feel of each other. Nadia's body arching into her, the small moan she made when Valkyrie licked behind her ear driving Valkyrie on, the way she rubbed herself against Valkyrie's hips when she got between her open legs pooling heat in Valkyrie's underwear. Just the feel was amazing. She wanted that feeling she'd had on the massage table but with sex. Just to enjoy and feel. She didn't know how to describe it, and maybe she wasn't meant to. Something in her desired it and Nadia was happy to provide.

When she had worked herself up into something heady, Valkyrie scooped Nadia up and walked them to the bed, letting the blanket fall away, not stopping their breathless kiss. She was on top of her, crawling their way to the middle. Nadia had her eyes closed and only moved to take off her top closely followed by the shorts. She wanted to take her time today.

With the utmost care, she began to do that. Starting by tracing her face and moving to her neck, licking and nipping as she felt the urge. It just came from nowhere and Nadia kept her eyes closed and mouth open, breathing out sighs and moans as her body melted with her legs wide open. Valkyrie played with her breasts for longer than she had before and noticed a tiny birthmark the size of her pinkie nail under one and made sure to kiss it. She swirled a nipple around in her mouth while she rolled the other between her thumb and fingers. Very gently, she pressed her teeth around the perky nipple and Nadia breathed in deeply, pushing her breasts further into Valkyrie's lips, and let out a pleasurable sigh. She tested new urges slowly, letting Nadia's trust and sounds help her learn what Nadia enjoyed.

She trailed down her abdomen like she had forever, kissing, caressing and touching her body. The little piercing in her belly button glittered in the low lamplight, and her hips occasionally rose when she moaned. Her fingers made Nadia's skin jump when she tickled her pubic bone and only once she relaxed, as her masseuse had done, did Valkyrie continue. Down her thighs to touch and kiss, but not going near her feet when she saw the little uncomfortable frown forming on Nadia's face. Back up she went to where Nadia let her legs fall where they wanted and Valkyrie kissed Nadia's pussy.

Hot and wet already, Valkyrie enjoyed it slowly. Without thinking she did all the things Nadia liked but slowly, so slowly, building it all up. She tried things she hadn't had the confidence to do before. Kissing her clit and wrapping her tongue around the sensitive bud, getting the first little groan out of Nadia.

Moving down, she licked Nadia from top to bottom and probed around her pussy before pushing her tongue in to feel it. It was a turn on just to cause Nadia any pleasure. She pulled away to gently push a finger into Nadia, taking it slow as her pussy's natural lubricant covered her finger. Once she was all the way in, she pulled out and gradually went back. Listening to Nadia, she slowly felt her, going back to kiss and play with her clit regularly and adding a second finger soon after. She scissored her fingers and gently stretched her until she was ready for a third, being careful not to hurt her. The sighs remained but the moans were now groans, and the hip-thrusting became more dominant. Nadia let her know how fast and hard to finger her, setting her own pace, and she'd be a liar to say it wasn't hot to watch her girlfriend push her hips into her hand.

Nadia began whispering Valkyrie's name, asking for more or to lick her clit or to add another finger. Being ever more gentle, Valkyrie pushed in another, letting Nadia decide when she was ready to move, and only going at her pace. It was so good just to watch her find her own pleasure and bask in her own body. And when she asked for that finger to stop so she could have her faster, orgasm inducing pace, Valkyrie obliged, flicking her tongue quickly over her clit again and again, causing Nadia to make little cries until she orgasmed on Valkyrie's hand, her clit throbbing from Valkyrie's ministrations. Valkyrie continued to finger her and suck her clit as she repeated Valkyrie's name.

"Oh wow," Nadia breathed, her movements coming to a halt. Her clit still throbbed occasionally. "That was… different. Good. I like it."

Valkyrie moaned in agreement and pulled herself away. She wanted to keep going. Instead, she forced herself to sluggishly crawl to the bedside table and get the wet wipes and cleaned her face and hands, then got another to clean her girlfriend.

"You're enjoying this," Nadia smiled, eyes half-lidded and very sated looking. Valkyrie just smiled slightly and cleaned girlfriend. The wipes were thrown out of the way to the floor and one very important thought came to mind. Her turn?

"I can't move, baby," she said, eyes wide.

"Nadia," she moaned, reaching over and kissing her deeply. Thankfully, she was compliant after that, letting Valkyrie fall back and draping over her body like a silk sheet. She kissed her pink nipples, ran her hands over her muscles and made her way down over agonising minutes to her own pussy. It was so good her left leg started to shake without her meaning to, but she wasn't upset in any way, just becoming more and more excited as Nadia did whatever she wanted to Valkyrie's body. Instead of licking her, Nadia pulled back to push two fingers into Valkyrie to start, getting Valkyrie to open her mouth wide and gasp. The feeling was unthinkably good and Nadia slowly brushed the two digits in and out of her, a thumb flicking over her clit and making both her pussy clench and leg shake a little more.

The feel of her mouth pressing over her clit was so good she had to thrust up to meet it. The room had cooled and it made heat of Nadia's mouth so much better. She sucked, gently pulled and dared to stroke her teeth over the sensitive area, making Valkyrie jump in a strangely good way. Her mind went so blank she didn't hear herself rising in volume or realise as she slowly raised her hips higher and higher, or Nadia sitting up to get a better grasp of her hips and continue what she was doing. It was just something she had never experienced. Pleasure shot through every one of her nerves and her thigh muscles danced with each tingle, each thrust of Nadia's dainty fingers.

Nadia's name rolled off her tongue with a slew of swears as a pressure built and built inside of her. Nadia, without Valkyrie knowing how, got her down on the bed and Valkyrie barely opened one eye to lock onto Nadia's as she lined them up and rubbed her clit against her own. The view, the idea, the feel made the pressure burst without warning. She cried out loudly, something long and strained, continuing to push against Nadia as she tried to manoeuvre the new position. They did it badly but it felt good while Valkyrie still had energy. Then, like with her girlfriend, she had worn herself out and the pleasure met its end, and there was nothing she could do as her muscles went limp and she lay back.

"Oh god," she managed, putting an arm over her face. "Oh my god."

Nadia got off of her and sat on her knees beside her. "We need to do this again."

"I promise," Valkyrie smiled. "I don't think I can move."

"You need to though, you're stealing the whole bed," Nadia grinned, resting a hand on her stomach.

"Don't rush me," she smiled, closing her eyes and putting her hand over Nadia's.

**.*****.**

To say they woke up in a heap of dried mess would be perfectly accurate. Valkyrie woke first and got herself unhooked from Nadia and let her continue to sleep as she went to the bathroom for a much-needed shower. Her hair, surprisingly, was still shiny and bouncy from the shampooing yesterday at the salon so she tied it up and washed her body well, making sure to use a healing stone on a flannel for 'down there' as it turned out whatever wonderful thing that happened last night including a bit of rough play, which hadn't felt rough at the time, because she was a little sore. She thought back carefully, remembering most of it but through a haze of pleasure. It almost made her turned on again, but she had something in mind today. She had to propose. It was Nadia's eighteenth birthday and it _had_ to be perfect.

So, she got out of the shower and applied some makeup to make herself extra pretty. She'd shaved in the shower and now felt both beautiful and just a bit more confident than she had before. Last night had helped them pass through a line of sexual insecurities when they had tried out new things on each other based on what they thought would be good, rather than just the basics. She felt braver to show herself off to Nadia, and really wanted Nadia to do the same. When the birthday girl in question slinked up beside her, she was more than grateful.

"Happy birthday, baby," she grinned widely, feeling exceptionally cheery. "You. Are. Gorgeous."

"Hmm, so are you. But my mouth tastes nasty," she said, grabbing her toothbrush. "I'm not sleeping with sex mouth again."

Valkyrie laughed as she put on her mascara. "Sex mouth."

"Is there anything else you can call it?" She asked rhetorically.

Nadia took a long time in the bathroom, but it left Valkyrie time to order her birthday room service breakfast that she'd preorganised. Pancakes, fruit, little chocolates and muffins on a large trolley that she kept thankfully quiet. The door closed right in time for Nadia to come out of the bathroom in her dressing gown.

She gasped. "Valkyrie! This is beautiful!"

"Happy birthday!" She cheered. "I got your favourites!"

Nadia laughed and got on the sofa with her. "Oh, it's like when you'd visit me in my old bedroom and we had midnight meals together. I love it, Val, thank you."

"It's okay, I have a few little presents for you too," she grinned widely. It occurred to her that she might be having more fun than Nadia but she cast it aside. Today would be freaking perfect or else! "Let me get one."

She was almost tempted into going straight for the ring but restrained herself. She got the first little package she had packed away before going to New York City and brought it over to Nadia who was compiling plates for them both on the coffee table. It was already bright outside and through the small slit between the curtains, they could see it was snowing still. It was magical. "Here."

"You don't need to get me presents you know," Nadia said as she ripped it open. "Oh my God, is this a car key?!"

"Maybe," she grinned, eyes sparkling. "Just a little, teeny, weeny, small one."

"Oh my God, a car!" She practically shrieked and jumped on Valkyrie. "I can't even drive! This is the coolest present ever!"

Valkyrie laughed. "I thought you'd like it! I checked and it has a small enough engine for a first driver in Ireland to have, so you can start learning when we get back. I'm going to take my test too, but this car is just for you. I thought it would be good for you to have your own freedom, plus it's a really cool car."

"What type is it?" She asked excitedly.

"It's a Mini," she said, grabbing her phone to show her the pictures. "See, it's custom metallic purple and the top goes down."

She stared at it, grinned. "It's awesome! I never would have thought about getting a Mini, but it's perfect Val. I love the colour!"

"I'm glad you like it," she smiled and got a big kiss. "I had no idea what car was good to be honest, I just thought it would be fun."

"All my friends are going to be so jealous."

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and grabbed her plate off the side. "It _is_ a pretty cool birthday present."

"I meant of you," she grinned, sending the picture to herself from Valkyrie's phone, then sending it to her friends without any message or even response to the messages already there. They watched it buzz happily as they ate their breakfast, or brunch as that was more appropriate. Every few minutes Valkyrie thought about her plans and her heart would jump and she started grinning. Nadia was oblivious to the reason, just happy that it was her birthday and to have a car and the promise of other gifts.

"But they're not as good as the first one," she said as a warning. "This is your real present, and the holiday too. The others are just small little things."

Nadia was grateful nonetheless and kissed her a few more times before running off with her phone to call her friends and brag like the excited newly eighteen-year-old she now was while getting ready. Valkyrie took the time to get herself dressed and then got onto her phone again.

' _She loved the car_ ,' she sent to Anton, the only one who knew about it before then. She sent the picture over to her family individually.

She had a simple ' _Good luck_ ' from Anton back, for her plan later. Erskine and Dexter sent her a flurry of texts while the others sent just one admiring the car and saying to pass on their well wishes. She ignored them, because it was all silly things, and went to Tanith's.

 _'Asking today, I'm certain,'_ she sent her sister.

 _'OMG, what's the plan?'_ She had back.

_'No plan, just an idea. Want to mull on it. She loves the car.'_

_'I bet she does, it's a good colour,'_ Tanith sent. _'Want to know every detail later.'_

_'I'll call. It's snowing now.'_

_'Wrap up, don't back out now. Also, the Idiots are making a plan for you when you get back. I'm not sure what's going on but they seem smug,'_

_'Oh god. OK, I'll be prepared. How's Laila?'_

_'She slept the full night yesterday and woke me up at six this morning. It's looking up! My nips are bleeding still tho, so life still sucks,'_ she rightfully complained.

 _'So glad I'm backing out of this soon,'_ she teased, referring to her upcoming 'procedure'.

 _'Hey, you can still boob feed your babies, just not give birth. I googled it,'_ Tanith sent back within seconds.

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and decided to make that painful decision later in life. _'If you say so. Gtg, she's ready. Bye!'_

"Ready?" Nadia asked, getting her coat off the hook.

Valkyrie jumped up and pulled her own fleece and Bespoke coat. "Yeah, let's go!"

They went to the nearest underground to get their train over to the side of the city they needed. They had almost passed it on their first day when they visited the Statue of Liberty, but they took a different route. Plus, the train made it far quicker to get around which they wanted now that it was not just bitingly cold but also _raining ice_.

"It's old," Nadia managed out through her gritted teeth as they rushed up the front stairs to the entrance. "And cold."

"Just walk, less talk," Valkyrie demanded, hugging herself tightly.

At the top, they were welcomed by a line. Everyone inside was being security checked and holding them up. Valkyrie jumped into the line to get in front of two very large clusters of tourists coming at it from two angles and Nadia joined her just a few moments after. Without saying a word, they hugged each other for warmth.

It only took ten minutes for them to get inside the doors and feel a little more warmth in their skin, but it hadn't been fun. Temperatures were heading to the minuses swiftly. Still, it was a great view in the meantime. High ceilings and marble floors, the echo of hundreds of voices behind the doors. They were ready and excited by the time they had gotten through security and all but skipped in hand through to the museum.

They immediately joined the small mass circling the grand opening hall. Nadia was grinning all over and pulled Valkyrie along to see the dinosaur exhibit, and then to the wall where there were smaller fossils, and then up a grand staircase to begin the real thing. Valkyrie's stomach rolled with tempting excitement, telling herself to _calm down, get ready, not yet_ as Nadia read out the signs and asked for her opinions. They spent over three hours looking around at just the upstairs before the found an overpriced café to eat at. After a rushed sandwich and drink, a squealing and overexcited Nadia yanked her out of her seat and back to the last upstairs exhibition.

It was too busy to see anything exciting, but they knew it was on Ancient Egypt, so they decided they'd come back later and hope they could see the fun stuff. They went down the great stairs, Valkyrie practically itching, and Nadia flew through the content with all the speed of a fast-talking historian. She looked at every little thing and took none of Valkyrie's hints to go for a walk away from the crowd. Every time Valkyrie would notice a lull in the crowd she would grab Nadia's hand and then have her girlfriend just pull her off to the next thing she had seen.

While Nadia was studying the tail of Sue, the T-Rex, Valkyrie looked at the map on the wall. She judged by this time in the afternoon, those with children would start leaving, plus the weather was getting worse and that would encourage everyone to start moving, hopefully meaning no more should come in and should only be leaving. She was also risking the museum closing due to weather, though. She went up behind Nadia and pressed a kiss to her neck, getting her to turn away.

"Come on, I saw something on the map you're going to love," she smiled, getting a chance to pull Nadia along for the first time today.

"What is it?" She asked.

"It's a surprise," she grinned in a sing-song voice. "And upstairs too. We can see the Egyptian exhibit again."

"I thought we saw everything?" Nadia questioned, jogging to keep up with Valkyrie's exuberant pace.

"We missed a bit, I saw it on the map. But it's really cool, we need to see it before the museum closes."

"Do you think they'll close early?" Nadia asked worriedly. "I want to see the animals."

"We'll come again if we don't see it all, I promise," she got out between her butterflies. They got to the top of the grand stairs and she stopped to offer her arm like a gentlelady. "But you'll be glad you saw this."

Valkyrie led them through the museum and towards an abandoned area room that housed nothing. The whole wall was a giant glass panel with a good view of New York and the inches of snow on the balcony.

"Ah, there's nothing here," Nadia said disappointedly. "This must be an exhibition room."

"I guess so," Valkyrie played along, keeping Nadia's hand.

Nadia looked up to Valkyrie in perplexed confusion as Valkyrie led her to the large window. "Val, we don't have time for the view."

"But it'll only take a moment. I swear on my heart," she smiled, heart skipping again and again.

Nadia frowned. "What is it?"

"Nothing, just look. It's just so different and pretty when it snows. I hate the cold but it's the most beautiful time of year," she said, lowering her voice to almost a whisper and standing so they could both see the good view.

"Yeah, it is special," Nadia said with a hint of impatience. "Can we go see the Egyptian's now?"

"In a moment. I need to talk to you first," she began, trying to keep the grin off her face. Nadia just looked more confused but stood with her arms by her side and faced Valkyrie. "Since I met you at thirteen, I've known you were so special. You lit my life up and made me a better person from the moment I met you. I became more confident, less anxious, and I was so thrilled each morning when I woke up to your text messages. And now each morning I get to wake up to see your face and it makes me that much happier. I don't know how you do it, Nadia, but every day seems that much warmer with you in it," she grinned, reaching out to cup Nadia's face. Nadia smiled up at her, happy to wait now. "You got me thinking. What do I want out of life? A thirteen-year-old shouldn't be able to think those things, but here I am years later with the same pretty lady I met at a stinking Ball. I don't know what's going to happen, but I want you to know that I love you so very much. And I want you to have a perfect birthday."

"Aww, Valkyrie," she said quietly, holding back tears. "You didn't need to say all that. I know you love me."

"I know. But I want to make it official," she said and immediately knelt on one knee and whipped the ring from her pocket and presented it to Nadia. "Will you marry me?"

Nadia screamed and jumped on the spot, flapping her arms around. After a few moments of excitement, she stopped to hop on her feet and started to sob. "Yes! Oh my fucking god, yes!"

Valkyrie laughed loudly and got up. Nadia thrust her hand out and Valkyrie had the honour of putting the engagement ring on her wedding finger. It fit her perfectly.

"It's so perfect!" She blubbered. "Thank you so, so much."

"Of course. You're more than worth it," she grinned and two security guards came around the corner in time to see Nadia wrap her arms around Valkyrie's neck and kiss her deeply. "I love you."

"I love you too, future wife," she grinned, going back in for another kiss. The guards left, smiling to go tell their colleagues about the false alarm.


	167. Lilo, Marvin and Smith

**Chapter 167**

" _I know_!" Nadia screamed down the phone to Tanith.

Valkyrie shook her head and smiled, resting on the bed. They were going back tonight, or at least over to where her family was staying. Last night, after their engagement, Valkyrie and Nadia enjoyed an afternoon of shopping and talking all about what they'd love to do as a wedding and what they thought their family and friend's reactions would be – ignoring Nadia's family entirely, which Valkyrie's hadn't mentioned but had noticed – and then in the evening after a light dinner had seen a very bedazzled Santa float.

Then they had gotten back and watched a movie they had rented from the collection in the reception of the hotel, followed by sex, showers, and more sex before bed. They had been tried from their activities, and hadn't gotten up until midday, and then had gotten onto telling everyone about the engagement.

Nadia had wanted to do that part, and Valkyrie had happily allowed her to do all the work and had watched telly instead. Then packed… then ordered food, ate the food, watched a movie… and she was still talking.

Valkyrie looked over at her and smiled as she caught Nadia admiring her ring with a big grin as she and Tanith spoke about weddings. No regrets.

**.*****.**

"Tanith's looking at wedding dresses," Fletcher told them as soon as they got close enough. He was grinning widely and looked excited for them. "Congratulations, by the way. I thought you were going to wait a while?"

"Yeah, I changed my mind," she said, giving him a one-armed hug, which Nadia copied. "Have they only been talking about us the whole time?"

"That and the baby doing tummy time," he rolled his eyes. "She _almost_ rolled over yesterday, but not quite. Ready?"

They grabbed his offered hand and teleported to a living room where her whole family were sitting. It was a tiny, wooden, cabin place and she could feel the chill but it was a lot nicer than where they'd just been outside with its roaring fire.

There were screams of happiness all around, hugs, congratulations, and a very confused, wide-eyed baby. It was nearly overwhelming, so many bodies hugging her at once, but it was fun too. Luckily, they were all more interested in Nadia since she had the ring, so Valkyrie sat down.

"Now we can plan the wedding!" Erskine said, pulling out a notebook that looked like the one he'd used for the house except this one had a pink cover and lightly pink tinted pages. He'd had a lilac one for the house planning and another deep green for landscaping.

"It won't be for a while," she reminded him.

"It's going to be amazing!" Nadia said over her. "We'll need these next few years to organise it all! I definitely want it in Ireland, and all our family needs to be there."

"How many people is it on your side?" Erskine asked.

"God, at least two hundred including second cousins. Then I would like, maybe, fifty friends? I was trying to work it out earlier. That doesn't include plus ones on the friends either. Then Valkyrie's family and friends."

"We can't really have much of my family," Valkyrie pointed out. "Crystal will be there, and Gordon, and you guys. That's my family."

"And Pa and Skulduggery," Dexter nodded.

"Obviously. Wouldn't it be nicer to have a smaller wedding though? Maybe just close family and our friends?" Valkyrie suggested. "I mean, you have more family than most venues can handle."

Nadia hesitated. "I mean, it's kind of tradition that my family is there. I mean…" she trailed off, a calculating look on her face. "Unless… This might be a bit much, but maybe we could have two weddings?"

" _Two_?" Valkyrie asked incredulously.

"Yeah. One in India with just my family and yours, with all the traditions we need, and then we'll do a second smaller wedding with a western ceremony and a really fun reception for just close family and all our friends," she said, getting more confident as she went. "It would be hard to work it all out but I bet my family would love to organise the Indian wedding so we can focus on the Irish one."

"We'll need two dresses," Valkyrie pointed out.

"Oh, I'm sure my family will narrow our options for us," Nadia said with a look, but sat on the coffee table opposite her and put a comforting hand on her knee. "I know it seems like a lot but don't worry. Between my mother, when she gets a grip, and Erskine as our wedding planners, I'm sure everything will be breezy. And we'll use Tanith as our negotiator between what they want and what we want, so it'll go well. Well, not that well because my family really will just control the whole India wedding, but we'll have our Irish wedding here so we still get what we want."

"I don't even know anything about weddings. I've only been to like, three, when I was really little."

"Don't stress about it," Nadia said. "Trust me, we'll work it out. We have a few years to decide the details before we actually need to start finding venues and paying people."

Valkyrie took a deep breath. "Yeah, we do. I need to have this Spider war crap over before any wedding things, okay? And redoing the house was really expensive so it would be a good idea to recoup a bit."

"Absolutely. But I will be looking at all the magazines and every time we go past a bridal shop I'll be making sure to point it out. Oh, and I definitely want a dress. Are you going to have a dress?"

"Yeah," she said. She couldn't imagine getting married _not_ in a dress. That was probably the only thing that was exciting her, other than the idea of being married after the fact and getting to tell everyone Nadia was her wife. And maybe cake testing. "Can I choose the cake?"

"Sure!" Nadia grinned, happy that she wanted to be involved. "So long as it's in style."

"I can do that," she nodded.

The afternoon was filled with wedding talk.

**.*****.**

"Do you see anything?" Tanith asked casually, stirring her straw around her frothy hot chocolate.

Valkyrie looked at her, smiled and saw two men walking out of an alley through the coffee shop window. She leant forward and put a piece of hair behind Tanith's head, getting her to move just enough to get a look at a car that stopped on the corner just long enough to for the men to get in, and then it was driving off.

"They're moving."

Valkyrie and Tanith got up and left the shop, Tanith pulling her phone out and calling Dexter, giving details as the car left in the distance. Dexter was around the corner and stopped to get them within ten seconds.

"Did you get the registration?" He asked immediately.

She gave it to him, which was sent over to someone at the American Sanctuary – someone that was close with the Dead Men, Valkyrie had a feeling it was Saile – who put it in their database to hack into the mortal police equipment to track the car. It would take a few minutes and wouldn't work if their suspects weren't around speed cameras, but they wouldn't guess that the Sanctuary was using mortal technology. It was something they tried to keep quiet.

Dexter drove them in the direction their targets had driven in, going slowly and not trying to overtake traffic and get any attention on themselves. They had almost been seen twice searching for these three in the previous six days and didn't want to give them any more suspicions. They just needed that call…

They got it. It went on speakerphone.

"They're going onto Beaver Street, turn around and go down Arc Street and take the second left," they were instructed by some lady on the other end.

Valkyrie stayed quiet. She badly wanted to catch these people. Lilo Quanta, Marvin Kill and Anti Smith. Smith had a weird-ass name, Valkyrie contemplated for the thousandth time, and it was obvious why she only went by her last name. Marvin was as dangerous as he was distractible by all accounts but had evaded capture and that had ultimately left him with few options but to work for underground criminal organisations such as Griever's Down. Lilo was newer. Someone contracted. After they had taken down Samuel Griever's, he seemed to have been quick to take Marvin and Smith under his wing.

Which, as they had learnt this morning, was because Lilo was trying to take over Griever's Down for his own and was using Marvin and Smith to get to the correct people to take the moving basement. It was pure happy circumstance that they learnt this before he had gained control of it. They had come for some… personal revenge.

Dexter got off the main road and sped up, taking the second left and skidding onto Beaver Street. They couldn't see the black car. "Keep going, you want off at the highway, it's after the large shopping centre."

Dexter weaved, getting a lot of blaring horns, and got in front of a van off onto the highway. He was at the max legal speed before he was on the proper road.

"They're still on the highway," they were told, and Valkyrie leaned forward to see if she could spot the car. It took some time before they got a successful visual.

"There," she pointed, and Dexter slowed behind a truck. "Should we follow them again?"

"We lost them last time," Dexter said in a strained voice. He hated driving; this was Skulduggery's job. Her heart panged from the sudden longing to see him, but she remained focused.

"We should ram them," Tanith said in a hard voice. "Is there anywhere without a ditch on the side coming up?"

"No," the woman on the line said. "But if you get them off at the next exit, there's a building site you could go into."

"Do it," Valkyrie told Dexter.

They tensely continued down the road, waiting for the exit ramp to come up. It was much further away than Valkyrie wished it was, but then she was getting impatient now. Erskine was the only one moving, his legs jumping up and down with adrenaline from his seat in the back. When the ramp came up, their targets indicated to move into the middle lane, so Dexter stopped the car in the middle from changing lanes by coming up beside it.

They waited, and with a stroke of luck, their target sped up to overtake and with a smooth transition, Dexter rushed up and broke right, ramming the smaller car off onto the off-ramp.

Their target, as soon as Dexter gave them some room, sped away with a screech, their wheel plate falling off and side of the car scratched silver. Dexter matched them, slamming on the breaks when they emergency stopped, and then hitting it again when their target pressed on. They had to follow a road for five minutes, where there were no other ways off except a field on one side and a safety guard onto the highway below on the other. Eyes narrow, Dexter kept up his pursuit until their turning came up, a dirt road between some trees, and hit the car from behind.

They all felt the shock. The car in front tried its emergency stop trick again but Dexter had expected that and swerved to avoid the car, giving himself just enough room to slam right and push the car off the road and into the field.

It was bumpy, but the targets surprisingly chose to keep driving. The Dead Men followed as their prey went down the dirt road into the thankfully deserted building site. When they got to the end, surrounded by half-built office buildings and a large open space intended to be a parking lot one day, their targets turned the car in front of theirs and they both stopped. They could see Lilo and Smith in the front seats, Marvin peering between them.

Their targets started getting out of the car. Valkyrie cracked her knuckles. This would be a satisfying fight.


	168. Interrogation

**Chapter 168**

Taking their three new captives to their own house was a necessary risk. They couldn't take the chance of a Sanctuary spy getting in their way. Only three people outside of their household knew where they were, and they hoped to keep it that way.

Their house had a basement so they were taken, bags over their heads and still unconscious, down there and tied to chairs. Hands around the back in magic-restraining handcuffs, ankles and shoulders duct-taped to keep them upright and incapable of almost anything. Just to be sure, they also wrapped duct-tape around hands so they were stuck in a fist position to prevent any funny business where they couldn't be seen. They removed their bags only after that.

"Wake up," Valkyrie commanded, patting Lilo's face none-too-kindly. "Time to give up your secrets."

Smith started to frown before Lilo. Valkyrie went to her and patted her cheek too and her eyes opened quickly. "What–?" She started, looking around with wide eyes before suddenly glaring. "Aw, man."

"Anti Smith," Valkyrie started, towering over her. Smith looked up from beneath her eyelashes to glare. She was a good looking woman but her glare wasn't pretty. "You are under arrest for multiple homicides as well as working for high profile criminal organisations, and for kidnap, property damage and aiding in the kidnap of an infant. We are willing to bargain for information on Samuel Grievers criminal organisation as well as any high profile or lucrative criminals you know the whereabouts of that lead to an arrest, and more importantly, we would like to know more about any Children of the Spiders in America at this time. Are you willing to cooperate?"

Smith looked at her for a moment and then went to spit. Valkyrie slapped her, hard, before she got the chance to. By this point, Marvin and Lilo were starting to wake so she roused them and repeated herself for them.

"No way!" Marvin said immediately. "I'm not getting bossed about by some stupid, entitled, Irish kid! You don't have any authority over me!"

"Would you rather I make Anton stand up just for you? He would be pretty angry if he had to do that. He woke up on the wrong side of the bed today and hasn't had lunch yet," Valkyrie told him, raising an eyebrow. "We're only bargaining because there's a slim chance you can help us with bigger things. The moment you become useless to us we'll treat you that way. If you think that you and Smith will get away with helping Mr Quanta take over Grievers mantel then you're sorely mistaken."

Marvin wet his lips and glance behind Valkyrie towards where her family were sitting on benches waiting for results.

Valkyrie turned to Lilo. "Well?"

He was definitely the brains of the bunch. He glared at her but sat as high as he could in his restraints. "People are expecting us. When they realise we aren't coming, they'll come looking."

"Look where? At a small mortal worksite with, oh, no wreckage or cars at all? They'll look where you were when we started tailing you in town, or perhaps at any point over the last six days? How long do you think it'll take them to find you? By the time they work out that the Dead Men are even in the area, we'll have already left and you'll be rotting in prison. The question is, do you want a reduced sentence or not? Any one of your friends would rat you out in a heartbeat to help themselves."

"I don't name names," Lilo sneered.

Valkyrie punched him. His lip spit and he blinked a few times. "I think it's time we split you up and started our interrogations if you're not going to play nicely. Tanith?"

Tanith got up and practically skipped over to drag Smith from behind by her chair out of the main area and into one of the bare basement rooms. Anton also got up and took Marvin off since he seemed easily scared by the large man, and he'd have the patience to get around all his idiocy. Dexter and Saracen would be helping her. Tanith had already requested to be alone with Smith and they didn't ask questions.

"Let's start small," Valkyrie said, sitting in the chair Dexter brought her to be eye level with Lilo. "How did you meet Grievers?"

Lilo contemplated for a moment and then answered. "I met him at Grievers Down some twenty years ago in Thailand. It was brief."

"What led you to work for him?"

"A loyal client hired me," he said carefully, his eyes narrowed on her. "He owed Grievers a favour and was repaying him by paying me to do what Grievers wanted. It wasn't until a few years later that Grievers came to me with the work I did for him recently."

Valkyrie nodded. "How many people did you kill for him?"

"I'm not going to answer a question like that."

"We already have a large number of bodies tied to you, Lilo," Valkyrie told him calmly. "You use three different techniques to throw off investigators, but I worked out that it's all linked. It won't take long for the Sanctuary to keep adding to your pile simply based on that information, and then the psychics come in. You know they send in less damaging Sensitives to the criminals that cooperate, right? You may as well just help yourself."

He sighed and grit his teeth. "Over twenty, less than thirty. I didn't keep track. He mostly had me killing other criminals causing him and his employees' trouble or people that owed him money. Not civilians. No children."

"How long have you been working for him?"

"About two and a half years," he said.

"You worked alone for that time?"

"He paired me with Marvin infrequently. I met Smith three months ago."

"Why did you decide to keep them around after Grievers died?"

"Smith used to be used as bait to get patrons to talk. She was Grievers' spy. She knew everyone that went in and out of that place. Marvin isn't smart, but he's a good fighter, so I kept him too," he admitted through gritted teeth. "I thought it would help me."

"Help you take Grievers Down for your own."

He paused for a few moments. Valkyrie raised one brow and when he decided to arch one back instead of answering her, Saracen took a step and punched him in the nose. It audibly broke and he moaned. He was given a moment to adjust to the pain and then punched again. Valkyrie repeated her question.

"Yes," he moaned.

"You haven't been quiet. We've been intercepting and arresting almost everyone that's come your way this last week. You've been like a little criminal magnet. Still, we don't have many of the high up people. You will be helping us."

"I thought you Irish people only wanted to dance with Spider's nowadays," he said, trying a bloody smirk. They all heard Smith scream long and painful for a long moment before it was abruptly cut off. The sound bounced off the bare bone basement.

"Don't get cocky," she told him coldly, rubbing her knuckles like she planned on using them soon. "The Spider's are our primary concern but we've also been tasked with finishing the takedown of Grievers' organisation. But, as you said, Smith knows all about Grievers clientele. So perhaps you _should_ start with the Spiders. I think Tanith has Smith under control."

He grunted and looked down for a moment. "What type of sympathy will I be getting for helping you?"

"We can get you a reduced sentence based on how many other criminals tied to Grievers you can give us that leads to an arrest, and anything that proves you actually didn't do something," she said, sitting back and crossing one leg. "We will actively help you as the Sanctuary convicts you if you can help us with finding and taking down the Spiders. They owe us at the moment, and like you said, it's no secret we're interested in finding the American lot. Bear in mind, before you try to be a big, hard man, that you're looking at one hundred and fifty years right now. _And counting_."

He wet his lips now. "In Nevada, on the edge of Utah. There's a clan of Spiders there, well into the desert. Last I heard, old war criminals were heading that way from all over the country. I've been keeping out of it."

"We'll need a better address," she told him. She wanted to get excited but it would be more than easy for him to lie – she didn't want to get her hopes up. "Did you ever see who this Spider was that Grievers was talking with?"

"No, but he had a Spanish accent. Was well-spoken. I only heard from outside of the room," he admitted.

She nodded. He gave a vague but good enough address for them. She asked more questions along the lines of Spider information but he, unfortunately, didn't know much, nor of any other Spider hideouts. He was able to tell them of a few criminal hideouts outside of that which they could pass onto the Sanctuary, most of them dealing in drugs and illicit Signal work but not much else. They re-bagged him and when the others had given up everything, they were also bagged and all three shipped off with Anton and Erskine to visit Aurora and a psychic friend whom they could trust to verify all the information before Aurora would take them to the Sanctuary. They were lucky though – Smith told Tanith about the same Spider den, although she had been less forthcoming in her address and seemed to have gained some mysterious bruises all over her face. And a long cut along her forearm. Tanith simply said it had "mysteriously appeared" when Smith commented on her baby-weight.

"I think that was a success," Dexter said, stretching out over the sofa and both Saracen and Valkyrie. Laila was on his chest, doing some bonding tummy time. She was attempting to look up at Dexter but wasn't quite there yet, although it should be coming soon at almost three months old. Valkyrie stroked her head, shoving her elbow in Dexter's face.

"I think so too. We have a lot of work to do over the next month," she sighed.

"It'll be okay," he reassured her as he grinned at Laila and squidged her sides.

"I was impressed Lilo told us so much," Saracen said, sitting back and rubbing Dexter's feet. "I suppose he was glad to get himself out of a longer sentence."

"He's been locked up before," Valkyrie told him. "He apparently had a bad experience that led to him being given an early release as an apology. I guess he got scared."

"Well, whatever works. You are so cute!" Dexter said, making Laila squeal loud enough to make her and Saracen wince. Dexter laughed.

"Are you guys ready for dinner?" Nadia called from the kitchen.

"Yeah!" Valkyrie called back.

"Set the table!"

Being stuck, the table was left to Ghastly and Tanith, who were getting on much better since Valkyrie and Nadia got back. Tanith had told her, between her crazy wedding obsession that she claimed was driven entirely by hormones and no girlish fantasies, that she had spoken to Ghastly over the course of a few days and they had worked out a better way to get on. They both still had similar goals, likes and wants that had brought them together in the first place, even if their relationship was over. They wanted to live with Valkyrie and the others, they wanted to co-raise Laila, they wanted to help with the war and keep their family safe at the same time. Talking about their similarities had helped them both, and Valkyrie was happy for them.

Nadia came into the small living room, giving Valkyrie a smile. Life was still good.


	169. The Idiots do The Talk? Why?

**Chapter 169**

"Valkyrie?" Erskine called from the attic room. Valkyrie sighed and slid off her bed – just a sofa bed they'd opened next to a single bed so close that she, Nadia, Laila and Tanith may as well just share one massive bed. She followed the sounds of Erskine repeating her name in different tones up the stairs.

"What?" She asked him, crossing her arms sternly. Only the three Idiots were up here. And now her as well.

"Can I not just want to see you?" He asked innocently.

"I don't know, can you?" She raised an eyebrow.

He snorted a laugh. "Come in, we want to talk to you about something. Close the door!"

Valkyrie closed it with a sigh. She sat at the end of one of the two double beds in the room – it was the length of the whole house and quite a large space – and the men all sat at the pillow end with big grins. "This doesn't feel like a good idea," she said in a deadpan voice.

"Don't be silly, relax," Erskine said in a not-relaxing way. "We only want to talk to you, don't we Dexter?"

"Yeah, just a little talk," Dexter grinned. His smile was so wide he nearly reminded her of the Cheshire cat. She told him of the resemblance and the grin got worse.

"Look. Tell me what you want or I'm going to leave," she told them, crossing her arms again.

Erskine huffed. "Why are you so aggressive? Are you like this with Nadia?"

Valkyrie couldn't help the eyebrow that went up. "Nadia doesn't act stupid, unlike you."

"We only wanted to have a proper conversation," Saracen said, obviously trying hard to be the voice of reason. "Ignore them two, they're taking the piss. We actually do have something to say."

"And that is?"

"Sex," Erskine said seriously, clapping his hands together and pointing his fingers at her like he was in a business meeting. He was almost sprawled on his back and had his legs open to see her between them, Dexter on his knees like he'd pounce on her and Saracen hovering on his other side like he could just get up to assist her at any time. More likely to stop her leaving.

"Not a chance," she said with a shake of her head. "And before you argue, Tanith already did it! It was as intensive as it was intrusive. So there. You have nothing left to say."

"Like hell we don't!" Dexter laughed. "Come on, don't act like a kid. We know you have sex now, and that's okay! You're a young woman and it's totally normal. We just want to make sure you don't do anything stupid."

"I'm not doing anything stupid," she said, resorting to glaring at him.

"I'm not sure he said that right," Erskine said, shaking his own head and settling back a little to talk. God, they were actually, really _serious_. "What we want to say is, we care about you, and sex is normal, and you do that now. And because we care about you, and you do the normal act of sex, we want to make sure you're doing nothing stupid."

"That's what he just said," Valkyrie pointed out, fighting down a blush out of sheer embarrassment. It was different talking about sex verses talking about her having sex with Nadia!

Dexter looked at him. "I literally just said that."

He rolled his eyes. "Shut up. What Tanith told you as a sister might not be what we'd tell you as brothers."

She had a thought, hesitated to say it, and then decided to even though she didn't like it. "Well, that would make sense, except I'm not having sex with a man, so not really."

He shrugged. "Doesn't matter, we'd still give you advice. I bet Tanith mostly said about protection and the basic way things work, right? We wouldn't say that."

"I'd rather not get a play by play," she said, attempting some humour.

"Hey," Erskine said softly, sitting up. "Don't get anxious. I get it, it's sex, you're young, that's a thing kids get embarrassed about. But we're here for you and it's not embarrassing to us and we don't want to upset you."

"I know," she defended.

"Be honest. If Tanith spoke with you about this, would it be easier than us doing it?" He asked.

She hesitated. "I mean, probably."

"Is that because it's sex, or because we're guys?"

Valkyrie hesitated again and felt her shoulders shrink a little. Her eyes flicked to Saracen and she knew there was no point hiding it. "I don't want to talk about that right now."

"Honey," Dexter said softly as Valkyrie lowered her head. "Come here."

Valkyrie didn't want to, but she ended up awkwardly laying over the bed in Dexter's arms. Erskine and Saracen were half laughing at her between trying to be sincere. It helped take the edge off her anxiety though.

"I just don't like the idea of it, okay?"

"Okay," Dexter said like he was reasoning with her. "But. Are you upset because you are talking about sex with men, or the idea of sex with men?"

"I don't care. Both? Is that an option?"

He considered it. "I'll accept both."

"Oh, wonderful," she said sarcastically before pulling herself free to sit by herself. She was now in the middle and they sat around her. She was going to just have to power through this. "Look. I get you want to help me, but I actually spoke about all this with Nadia right before we went on holiday. So it's just a bit fresh. Give me time, alright? I don't want to get anxious about this stuff, but please don't force me to 'confront my past' or anything."

"Is there a past to confront?" Erskine asked, trying to look innocent.

She glared at him but told the truth. "Some, yes. As well as Caelan and Grievers Down."

His eyes flicked away a bit from her before he sighed. Saracen smiled at her. "Maybe we could just talk a little about some of it?" He asked.

"No," she asked softly.

"Just the easiest one. Whichever is easiest to talk about, and we won't mention it again," Erskine said. She went to snap at him but she made the mistake of looking him in the eye and saw his worry. His anxiety and fears. And she suddenly wondered if maybe, he might know what the anxiety she felt was like. Maybe he'd been mistreated like her. Maybe his abusers succeeded in their attempts, unlike hers.

Feeling guilty for fighting their help, she sighed and her anger washed away. "Just a little. Maybe about the vampire."

Erskine brightened a bit. "How did it make you feel?"

Despite the pressure of thinking of Caelan, his serious face coupled with the cliqued words made her burst out laughing. "Pretty shit honestly."

"Maybe tell us what he did?"

"I already told you," she said, a smile lingering for just a second before it fell. "I found me in the woods behind the house, he attacked me and he kissed me. I think he chased me for a bit too but I got away. It wasn't that dramatic, it was more what he said."

"I imagine what happened at Nadia's is more concerning," Saracen pointed out.

"Well, yeah. I basically had to offer myself up so he wouldn't kill Nadia and her parents. He probably would have ended up really hurting me, or even killing me, if it wasn't for Anton," she said quietly. "But again, it was just words. I was only affected by them at the time because there was a chance he could make it come true. He had managed it with other girls. But I knew I was also safe for most of the time he was obsessing over me because I stayed at Skulduggery's house with Tanith and you guys. And now he's dead so I'm not really worried about it anymore."

"Maybe you're not worried so much about him, but the threats that he said in general. If he can do those things, why can't someone else?" Erskine said levelly.

She shook her head of the thoughts. "Maybe. Probably. But I don't want to think about that because I don't want him to affect me and make me scared. I don't want to live like that."

"That's a good way of thinking," Dexter smiled.

"And I don't get nightmares about it anymore either. I am leaving it behind," she said. "Especially since Nadia came to live with us."

They paused. "You had nightmares about it? How often?" Dexter asked.

She shrugged. "Not often. Just once in a while. Not about him in a long time. Not since Grievers Down."

"Do you get nightmares about Grievers?"

She thought. "Not much, really. It's more the sudden reminder or thought in the day that triggers me thinking of it. But again, it's not often. Honestly. I know it affects me negatively when I _do_ think of it and that it's something I need to work on, but I really don't think of it that much. It's the same as all the bad stuff that's happened in missions. That time we walked in on some person being skinned alive, about Kenspeckle and The Diablery. I really don't think about it because I'm not that scared. I just sometimes get caught up in bad thoughts."

"And you're working on it with Nadia?" Erskine asked seriously.

"I swear. You can even ask her."

"Does she talk to you about her problems?" Saracen asked.

"Not much. But more than before. Mostly she talks about the people that she knew and about her parents, but nothing else. I think there is something but… do you know what's going on?" She asked suspiciously.

"We swore to say nothing," Dexter told her.

"Hey, I don't know!" Erskine cried.

"And you won't until Nadia tells you," Dexter told him. "It's for her to work on. But she talks to us sometimes. And she's talking to Valkyrie, or she is at least a bit and that's good."

Valkyrie just nodded. She would respect Nadia's privacy. Mostly because it was the right thing to do but also because she knew her brothers wouldn't cave. She would have to up her efforts to get Nadia to open up to her, it was just sort of hard when her entire method was based on no pressure and patience.

Erskine huffed. "Fine. No more bad talk. I want to talk about sex."

"You _always_ want to talk about sex," Saracen rolled his eyes.

"Only sometimes," Erskine snipped. "I've barely mentioned it today."

"We've been out all day."

"Shut up, Saracen. Just because you have a boyfriend."

"That has nothing to do with this."

"Just shut up!" Erskine huffed, swatting his shoulder. "Ask Cub about not fun stuff."

"Cub, what not fun stuff did Tanith tell you that you've not bothered doing?" Dexter asked, a spark in his eye.

She wanted to tell him to piss off but felt closer to him for them trying to talk to her still so she decided to go along with this to get it done. Because she couldn't _totally_ fight all three of them and get away if she wanted. "She thought gloves were a great idea."

Erskine pulled a face. "Oh _no_."

"That's only really needed when there are STD's involved," Saracen said matter of fact. "And with partners you don't know. Sex between multiple women lacks proper protection methods so gloves are actually the best way to deal with vaginal penetration without getting anything unsavoury on your hands. But as long as you are monogamous to each other, it shouldn't be an issue for you."

Valkyrie blush from the same embarrassment again when 'vaginal penetration' was mentioned. But it wasn't as bad as before but her face screwing up in displeasure wasn't so great. "Okay."

"Buuut," Erskine drew out. "You're young and young people are not always monogamous. Both of you might decide to involve someone else one day, which happens in long relationships, and I _suppose_ some protection is good, but glove are not a good look on anyone."

"Herpes is worse," Dexter argued.

"But going to a doctor is more effective and doesn't look bad at all," Erskine pointed out.

"Yes, for sorcerers. Mortals don't have as good doctor checking abilities as mages do. STDs can hide for years even from tests so if Valkyrie – Valkyrie, if you want to have sex with a mortal, use gloves if you do not know and utterly trust them, okay? Because STDs are for life, even in our world, and it's really shitty. But with mages, we are pretty open about sex so if someone catches something they tend to be open or else they aren't and their partner gets it and then they get thrown under the bus for it. No one likes those people," Dexter explained. "We have very good tests for STDs so if you want to involve someone else, tell them to get tested and that you want to see the results before doing anything. That way you are safe, and it's a very normal thing for mages to do before having sex with new people so it won't be weird to ask. We do it all the time."

"Okay," she said. Was a third party going to be involved with her and Nadia? She felt as if that was an important topic but decided not to bait the Idiots. They asked for more weird things Tanith told her. "Not much. She wanted me to get checked before anything happened but since nothing _had_ happened I never really did it."

"That just comes from years of always getting checks," Saracen assured her. "Yes, it is always good to check just to make sure you are healthy in general but being that it's both of your first times having sex, you don't have to worry all that much. In mage communities, we rely heavily on getting checks and treating what little we can – it isn't much better than mortals like we said, but it's mostly more of a preventative than a look for cures. Over so many hundreds of years we've been able to stifle most STD's by getting very regular checks and limiting the sexual partners we have. Some people find it hard not to getting checks right after a partner and then again before a new one. It's a habit Tanith was projecting onto you."

"A good habit," Erskine said firmly. "What other things did she say?"

"Not much outside of protection," she told them.

"So nothing about those weird sheet condom things?" Dexter grinned wolfishly.

Valkyrie grimaced. "Something about that, yeah."

"I assume you took a hard pass on that."

"I agreed to gloves to avoid the other options. It was one or the other and I chose the least offensive to see in my drawer," she admitted.

"As long as you get regular checks and extras if and when other people are involved, it doesn't matter," Erskine said freely. The difference in their and Tanith's ideas of protection was obviously quite different. Having an extra three-hundred years on Tanith might be where it was coming from. "Really, since nothing has happened yet, you're good. But you should still get regular check-ups just in case. You never know if you might contract cold sores, for example. That's a strand of herpes and if you have a cold sore and go down on Nadia, uh uh, no, you're both in for a bad time."

She wanted to be embarrassed… but she was relaxing now. Plus he was talking logically, it was hard to argue. She just laughed. "Got it. Do you have anything to say other than to get these checks?"

Dexter smirked. "Have you invested in a good nail kit?"

Valkyrie shoved him and he fell against the headboard with a roaring laugh. "You're a dick," she laughed.

"Sorry! I'm sorry, I couldn't help it!" He wheezed.

"I'm not sure I want to sit here anymore," she teased.

"Wait! I haven't finished!" Erskine said, sitting up again and smacking Dexter's leg hard enough to make him flinch. He didn't stop smiling.

"I get it," she interrupted quickly. He was going to say something way overboard on purpose and she didn't want that. "I know, really. Please don't say it out loud."

He cracked a smile. "Aww, you're so cute and little."

"Shut up," she rolled her eyes.

"But you are! You don't want to talk about sex and it's really funny!" He sniggered.

"Can I leave now?"

"What about shoving stuff up there? Yeah, that's a thing. Don't do it!" He told her passionately.

Saracen rolled his eyes. "No, dickwad. Only put stuff intended to be shoved up there inside. Because if you use something that's too hard or long you can cause yourself damage. Like hairbrushes."

"Yeah, like hairbrushes. Don't masturbate with a hairbrush because they might damage the cervix. Or anything with groves on it because dirt and bacteria can grow in the groves. And not anything that soaks in moisture because it'll dry out your vagina and get stuck. That's a really bad one, I saw that happen once. She sat herself on a bedpost and got stuck."

"I'm not going to – I've never even thought of – can you not!?" Valkyrie ground out.

They all grinned. "Don't do anything like a porn video," Saracen supplied.

"And never spit!" Erskine demanded. "If she isn't wet, don't force it. Don't just spit on everything, that's so gross."

"Just get some lube, that's the best way," Dexter added. "It'll help out massively. A good lube is the best thing you can own. Period."

"Oh, my god, period sex," Erskine said, falling on his back and throwing his hands up in the air in front of his face. "Do not go down on someone on their period without one of them female condom sheets. It's not okay! You can get very sick! Hands are fine though. And you know what, some people get most horny on their period so don't be squeamish either."

Valkyrie decided the conversation was derailing. "I think I get the idea, guys," she said jumping off the bed and walking around it quickly. They didn't follow.

"What about anal sex?" Erskine called out before Valkyrie slammed the door shut behind her.

"Oh my god," she groaned.

"They're," Valkyrie jumped a foot and swivelled to see Anton, "idiots."

"Anton! Oh my god! Yeah, they are," she said, hand over her heart.

"Nadia was asking for you," he told her. "She fell over in the kitchen and sustained a minor cut."

Valkyrie pushed passed him quickly and rushed downstairs, hearing Nadia's voice and bursting into the bedroom.

"Hi," Nadia smiled. "You okay? You look flushed."

Valkyrie took a deep breath, groaned, and flopped onto the bed.

"Hey, you nearly ruined my strawberries!" Nadia cried.

"Shut up and kiss me," Valkyrie said, turning on her back.

"No, not if you talk to me like that. What's wrong?" Nadia asked. "Did Anton tell you I tripped?"

"Yeah. Are you alright?"

She shrugged. "Yeah. I fell on a knife." She pulled her shorts up almost to her hip and showed off the very small cut. It wasn't even a centimetre long and barely red, so it didn't seem to have gotten below skin level. "It's not that bad. But I wanted to know if you wanted some strawberries with me. Here, I saved you the biggest one."

Valkyrie smiled softly, backing up on the sofa until she and Nadia were snuggling with their backs against the wall. "I love it. Thanks, baby."

"S'all right. I just love you, you know," she smiled again, kissing Valkyrie on the nose. "Here, I'll feed you."

Valkyrie watched Nadia select a large strawberry, pull out the green leaves and hold it up to Valkyrie's mouth. She bit into it and juices dripped onto her collar next to her fading scars. She almost smiled but the saw Nadia's serious look and took another bite of the large fruit instead.

"I love you," Nadia whispered.

Valkyrie swallowed. "Did you pretend to be in pain to get me alone?"

"Is it so bad I want alone time with my fiancé?" Nadia whispered, getting onto her knees and straddling Valkyrie, leaning forwards so their bodies touched all over. "Here."

Valkyrie took the final piece of strawberry into her mouth and leaned over to grab the bowl. She selected a small one, pulled out the green with one hand, and raised it to Nadia's lips, watching her beautiful eyes. Nadia was obviously getting off on this food thing more than Valkyrie, but seeing Nadia getting hot was enough for her. Still, she didn't feel inclined to do anything even though she could feel the slickness between her legs. "Why do you need my attention so much today then?"

"I don't know," Nadia smirked. "Maybe it's all the fun we had on holiday. I miss it."

"When we get to Ireland and our new house, we can be like that every day."

Nadia giggled, looking away to get more strawberries. "No one will hear us," she grinned.

"Well," Valkyrie smirked, giving her the 'Dexter smile'. "We'll see about that."

Nadia giggled, resting one hand under the curve of Valkyrie's breast and putting another strawberry up for Valkyrie to eat. "You're bad."

"Thanks. Do you want to know what the Idiots were talking to me about?"

"What?"

"Sex," she smirked, taking the strawberry and eating it while Nadia laughed. "It was bad. But I guess not awful."

"So they didn't try and give you _techniques_?" She asked, a hint of smile on her lips.

"Nope."

She sighed. "That's too bad. Four hundred years of experience and you didn't take their advice."

She scoffed. "Yeah, no. I don't care about any reputations, I'm not taking technique advice from my brothers. And anyway, I think I'm doing a decent job already. Or are you trying to say you're unsatisfied?"

"Would I have faked an injury to get you alone if I was satisfied, Miss Cain?" Nadia whispered back meanly.

Valkyrie breathed a laugh and captured Nadia's lips in a kiss. They both tasted like strawberries. Hands on Nadia's waist, it didn't take a moment for Nadia to get out a high moan and grind her hips on Valkyrie's legs. Nadia rested a hand on her arm, feeling the muscles and squeezing, her tongue dancing with Valkyrie's. Just as she was reaching between them to undo the button on her shorts, Valkyrie smiled and gently pushed Nadia back.

Nadia scowled. "But I brought you strawberries."

"Strawberries don't make me horny."

"I'm right here!"

Valkyrie smirked. "I just got down from a gross conversation with the Idiots, can I not have five minutes? Talk to me."

"But I don't want to have good communication in a loving relationship, I want to be fingered," Nadia huffed dramatically, but quietly, and shimmied off Valkyrie's lap as Valkyrie burst into laughter.

"You're such a twat," Valkyrie laughed, reaching over and kissing her on the nose.

Nadia smiled softly and ducked her head. "I love you."


	170. Wild Tree Trip

**Chapter 170**

As a family, they knew there was one big American tradition that they wanted to take part in as a part of their holiday time – getting a Christmas tree. None of them were Christian or necessarily cared for many of the big traditions, but since living with Valkyrie they had always had a tree and decorated it, usually had a lot of treats as well as a roast dinner on the day, plus all the presents. This year had to be smaller what with the massive money lose thanks to the house renovation, plus Valkyrie's own spending on Nadia's birthday car, and the fact they were in a different country, but that didn't matter to Valkyrie, Tanith, Nadia and Erskine – it was Christmas and they needed a tree!

Solomon had gotten back from his most recent trip to the Necromancy Temple right in time for the festivities. In spite of that, him and Anton chose to stay back to go food shopping. "Sounds like a plan!" Erskine had joyfully said before ushering everyone into the car. With the same big grin on his face he told Valkyrie, "Suckers, I hate food shopping! They got the wrong end of the stick here."

Valkyrie had laughed at how certain he was but it faded by the time they had arrived at the massive tree farm three hours away. If she had to listen to Fletcher and Erskine plan 'eye spy' any longer they were both going to be dead.

"Thank god," Nadia muttered, stretching. Valkyrie smiled at her and kissed her lips.

"You're so cute," she whispered, pulling her away from the car so Tanith could manhandle Laila out of her car seat and into a wrap.

"Get a room, lovebirds," Tanith told them. Valkyrie and Nadia giggled as they watched Tanith struggle and then whoop when she got her baby free. Laila looked around with big eyes. Being in the area they were, it was about fifteen degrees Celsius and they were happy in their jeans and shirts. Well, Nadia had worn a short sleeve top and decided it was too cold, so she had stolen Valkyrie's light jacket. But that was just expected.

"We do have a room," Nadia said just loud enough for Tanith to hear. "But the walls are thin."

Tanith grinned and laughed. "I know. I'm between you and Dexter and Saracen. Between you four and Little Miss here, I get no sleep."

They all shared a laugh as they went through the field acting as a car park. As they got to the front entrance, they had to wait for a tiny Prius with a tree larger than it strapped to the top go past before they could get in.

"How big of a tree are we getting?"

"Six foot," Saracen said. "We measured before we left."

"Smart," Valkyrie nodded. They paid a small fee to enter.

"There aren't many left," Nadia commented.

"How many types are there?"

"There's three I think," Dexter said, looking around at all the families. There was a group of maybe fifteen children chasing each other with branches knocking into everyone. They skirted around them and went deeper into the farm. "I think we'd only want Douglas or Noble Fir though. They're the nice ones."

"What's the other type?" Tanith asked.

"I don't remember," he said, looking around. "There's no signs."

"We can still see everything though," Valkyrie pointed out. Almost all the trees had been chopped, leaving big gaps to look between. A lot of the remaining trees were either quite short, incredibly tall, or looked to be falling apart. One of them had even been half chopped before being abandoned and was now almost brown. "I hope we can find one today."

"We have to! There's nowhere else to get trees for miles," Erskine said. He gripped onto Dexter's forearm and pulled him forwards. "Come on, let's find some good ones."

The rest of them followed behind as a more sedate pace, watching the families, and trying to spot a good tree.

"Val?" Nadia said quietly. "Is Erskine acting a little bit weird lately?"

"He gets very sentimental around Christmas," Valkyrie told her. "And it's been a shit year. It's been a shit last few months really. Us getting engaged and Christmas is bringing his childish side out way more than usual, but he's stressed about the things that happened, so he's just a bit, you know, manic. And his childish side generally means hanging off of big strong men. You know, the norm."

"Obviously," Nadia said, raising an eyebrow.

"He just needs time. As soon as we have the house completed, he'll have a place to feel settled and cope a lot better. He's not incapable of dealing with the stress, but he needs a home base more than most people. Dexter is the opposite; he likes to move about and get in the action to cope with stress. Staying away from Ireland is going to make him stir crazy."

Nadia nodded and changed the subject. "What type of tree do you want then? I don't actually know the difference. My parents had real trees but they just sort of arrived at the house and our butler put the decorations up."

"That's kind of sad," Valkyrie told her.

Nadia shrugged. "I didn't know most people put decorations up together, so I never cared. It was always really pretty. Honestly, I still don't care about putting up the decorations, I just like the aesthetics."

"You sound like a teenager."

"I am a teenager. We need to get some nice ornaments today too."

Valkyrie nodded. "And tinsel."

"No tinsel."

"Yes tinsel."

"We are not putting cheap tinsel on our beautiful tree."

"I don't know if we're even going to get a beautiful tree," Valkyrie said, looking around. "It looks like everyone got the same idea about better ones being at the back and they're all gone."

"We're not at the back yet," Nadia said, obviously trying not to pout. "I want a nice tree."

"I'm not sure if I can promise that. But it's nice weather at least."

"Not very Christmasy though."

"Hey, why are you getting upset? It's just a tree, next year we'll make sure we get one before this. It's not the end of the world. Oh, you know what, we could start growing our own, that'll be fun," Valkyrie said comfortingly, putting an arm over Nadia's shoulders. "We're going to have an awesome Christmas dinner, so it'll still be a great day. There's no use getting upset over it."

"I know, I'm sorry. I guess when we moved in and decided to do up the house I sort of had grand plans for Christmas' and I just want that right now. I don't want to wait for the nice things anymore."

"I get that. Trust me, it'll go faster than you think and we'll still have a nice Christmas. It just won't be as aesthetically pleasing as you want it to be."

Nadia cracked a smile. "I guess I can live with that."

"Yeeeah, you've kind of got to," Valkyrie joked, getting her girlfriend to laugh. "It looks like Erskine's found something."

They got closer and saw him and Dexter were turning around and around looking between two trees. There was a snapped red and white tap between the two, obviously meant to be splitting up the two sections, and the trees were different looking. Both were just below six feet, nice and wide. They were full and pretty and didn't look rubbish like the others they'd walked past. Not perfect or quite as tall as they wanted, but certainly very nice trees by any standards.

"This looks hopeful," Valkyrie commented.

"They can't decide which looks better," Saracen explained, watching them with his arms crossed and a smirk on his face. They were arguing about colours and smells and how many decorations they could fit on each.

"Well, I like this one," Valkyrie said, pointing to the very full and green one. "It looks like a fancy tree."

"But this one has a great _colour_ ," Erskine said with exasperation, holding both hands out to the other tree. "And it's meant to be one of the fanciest you can get. And there're only less branches because it lets us have more ornaments on it, and when we do that it'll be really full and sparkly. This other one won't have almost anything on it."

"Yeah, but the Douglas," that was the one Valkyrie liked, " _smells_ like a Christmas tree and the Nobel doesn't!" Dexter said, holding his hands out imploringly to Erskine. "And why would you want a bluish green when you can have a perfect green?"

"Because it's way more fun and Christmas is about fun, not having fancy stuff!" Erskine said, stomping his foot.

"He does have a point," Tanith agreed.

"Even if I wouldn't let go of this Douglas, you'd need a better Nobel than that," Dexter said stubbornly, crossing his arms. "That one looks okay over here but the back is already falling apart."

"But that will be against the wall so it doesn't matter," Erskine argued. "We're not putting it in the middle of the room."

"Oh my god," Valkyrie muttered, looking between them as they started to argue about the smells again. "Right," Valkyrie said, putting her hands up and silencing them. "Let's just take a vote. Stand next to the tree you like best."

Valkyrie and Nadia went to the Douglas, while Tanith and Ghastly joined the Nobel Fir team. The two groups started down Saracen and Fletcher.

Saracen sighed and went to the Douglas, getting cheers from them.

"It's up to Fletcher," Tanith grinned. "Four on each side."

"No, you have three," Valkyrie frowned.

"Baby likes this tree, don't you sweetie," Tanith said, ticking Laila's neck and getting her to squeal and kick her legs excitedly. "You love this tree so much."

"Fine, it's up to Fletcher then," Valkyrie said, looking at the boy. Fletcher was looking between the two groups with big eyes and a lot of worry. "If you come to our side, we promise to protect you from the Nobel's revenge," Valkyrie told him seriously.

"Hey, that's not true, we wouldn't do anything to you," Tanith said. "If you come here we'll make sure you get the best food on Christmas day."

"That's a lie, I've lived with her and I know she'll lie and take all it for herself," Valkyrie said back. "She's a pig."

"Oh no," Fletcher said under his breath and rubbing his brow nervously.

"Well, we'll let you put the star on top," Tanith said.

"What?!" Erskine almost screeched. "No way!"

"Fletcher, come here and I promise I'll stop them fighting _and_ you can teleport home instead of driving," Nadia said firmly.

Like a cat to milk, Fletcher was on their side before Erskine and Tanith had stopped bickering enough to notice. Valkyrie high fived Nadia.

It was dictated, by Dexter, that Erskine and his group had to go and get the people at the front to buy and cut down the tree while their group could stay with the tree. They waved the losers off.

"That was fun," Nadia said with a smirk.

"They're going to kill me later," Fletcher said, shaking his head and them immediately brushing a hand over his hair.

Nadia frowned at him. "No, they won't. God, why don't you just cut your hair shorter? Surely it's easier to spike if it's shorter."

"I like it long though," Fletcher countered, the other hand going up to check it more thoroughly.

"Yes, but it would look better and be easier if it's shorter. And I've been meaning to ask, what product are you using? Because I'm worried it's damaging your hair," Nadia crossed her arms to look at him. Valkyrie and Dexter looked between them in amusement.

"I don't know, just a generic wax I think. I use hairspray too now it's getting longer," he said somewhat defensively.

Nadia nodded. "That's okay. I'm just worried that you're stripping the hair of all its healthy oils. You need to let your hair rest. You wash it every day, right?"

"Yeah," he said.

"That sounded like a lie," Valkyrie chipped in helpfully.

"Fletcher," Nadia started. Fletcher looked like he might wilt under her unimpressed expression. "Look, I know you like it spiky but you need to wash it every day! It's really unhealthy for your hair otherwise and it could get really dry and become damaged. I was told that if you used too much hair spray, your hair could get so damaged it'll fall out. And you need to get it trimmed regularly too or you'll get split ends."

"I do wash it every day," he said quickly. "But I fall asleep without meaning to sometimes, that's all. It's not that bad."

Dexter chose to step in. "Aw, leave Fletcher's hair alone! We all make mistakes." Fletcher winced. "I think I have a picture of the Dead Men from the sixties and our hair was insane back then. Mine was almost at my hips and Anton was just starting to grow his out. Erskine had a buzz cut at one point but I think that was a little after that photo. I think him and Saracen actually had mohawks at some point."

"We need to see those pictures," Valkyrie grinned.

"I'll find them when we go back to Ireland. God, and the clothes we had!"

Dexter reminisced with them for a while before the tree-man and the rest of their family got back and he had to stop his stories of hundreds of years past. The tree was skilfully cut and the bottom bagged properly. Erskine had recovered and was already planning on what he wanted on the tree, and helped Dexter in carrying it back – Fletcher had to go too because Dexter and Erskine wanted to show him how the car ties worked as 'man bonding'. Nadia, Tanith, Saracen, Valkyrie and Ghastly went into the small café where Ghastly was stared at a lot and caused someone to drop a plate. It was a small little room, and quiet enough with the staring for the one person who looked away from Ghastly to be heard when they made a rude comment about Tanith breastfeeding in the café. The elderly women went very pale and looked away quickly when she got five mean glares. Ghastly angled his body to give Tanith more privacy from the nosy people.

They ordered hot chocolates and American sugar cookie which Nadia and Valkyrie had never had before.

"What are these made of?" Nadia asked, taking a bite out of one with pink frosting.

"They're normal biscuits," Dexter told her, putting one in his mouth whole. "Goob d'ough."

"Here's your hot chocolates," a young woman said, coming up to their corner table with a tray of drinks. She looked straight down and didn't dare look at them.

"Thank you," Ghastly said, and she took a shaking breath and almost ran away with the tray.

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. "Weirdo."

"Hey, did you get an update from the builders recently?" Tanith asked as she tried to adjust Laila without flashing her _entire_ breast. Laila was fussing and pushing her arms up and everywhere, making Tanith's life difficult. Tanith easily stroked Laila's head and she started to calm down and drink again.

"Yeah, I got an email," Nadia nodded. "They had to stop a few weeks ago because of the bad weather, but the snows been clearing up in Ireland for a little while now so they want to get back to work after their holiday, which ends on the second of January. As long as it doesn't snow again, they'll keep going on the extension and possibly get it done by the end of that month, and then it's just another month of touching up the exterior and doing the inside. They have everyone available on the job so it's going quickly. Plus the house was repointed last time you guys did renovations, so that's a massive chunk of work already done."

Dexter nodded and picked up his fifth cookie. "I don't think it'll be done by the time we're all, you know, back together after Valkyrie's _operation_."

"Your mouth is covered in pink," Valkyrie told him.

"Are you gonna lick it off?"

"Do you want me to?"

Ghastly put his head in his hands and they all got a laugh. Valkyrie threw a plasticky, cheap napkin at Dexter. "You're right, it won't be totally done, but they should have downstairs finished so we'll have to act like we like each other and pull our beds into one of the ballrooms for a while. They'll finish the upstairs before going to the library, but then the carpenters will have to do it up so we'll still have to wait. I guess if they do it one apartment at a time we'll just have to move in as things are ready."

"If they do your apartment first, can I move into the spare room?" Tanith asked.

Dexter gave her a look and put his hand out and waved it around in an unsure gesture. "I'm not sure that's a great idea. Two young women, just moving into their own place together. Months of being surrounded by family. Do you really want to expose you and baby to that?"

"I don't think I'll care," Tanith said bluntly. "I'll be too sick of the rest of you."

Nadia was blushing massively but Valkyrie just shook her head. "I think I'm just going to let Anton take the room."

"Anton has his own house!" Tanith retaliated.

"Yeah, but he doesn't annoy us," Valkyrie said, eating a small stray marshmallow. "Let's not talk about that though, I'm going crazy talking about the house all the time. Have you heard from Pa?"

"He seems stressed," Dexter said, frowning at his drink. "As soon as all this stuff is over, I think he'll be on his way out."

"That's probably the bit where the job gets easier," Ghastly pointed out.

Dexter shrugged. "He seems pretty upset though. Coping, but tired. With Elder Crow gone things are tough. He did mention someone in a friendly country coming to visit though," he said, trying not to say anything that would give away what they were talking about. "He seemed to think they might be willing to become an Elder."

"We've never had a non-national Elder before," Ghastly said, frowning himself.

"Pa seemed pretty happy about it though. I expect it's a friend from the war, but he hasn't told me anything important in case of interceptions. It's probably someone that will just be with us through the hostilities," he whispered the end of that sentence, "and will retire as soon as things settle. Seemed like a good idea to me. Plus it would as good as secure us an ally country if things go bad. He said there had been secret meetings between our people and this other country, so we're as good as set, anyway. He also said they found a spy from a different foreign country a few days ago but won't say from where."

"Things are happening then," Valkyrie sighed.

"Hey, don't worry," Dexter smiled. "It's Christmas and we'll be home soon. Just focus on Nadia and your training. That's what's important right now. We'll focus on the rest."

"How is your training going?" Ghastly asked with a serious look. He always avoided that topic when at all possible – even leaving the room – because he was so worried about the Magic Keeping risks.

"It's going well. I still have to do a lot more but Norma is really happy with what I'm doing and so is Solomon in terms of actual skill. Our 'talents' are very similar when it comes to basics, and since he was teaching me before I have a bit of an idea of what I'm doing, but style and all the little branches of what's possible are completely different."

Ghastly grunted. "At least your learning."

Valkyrie smiled softly, knowing this was extremely hard on him. He wanted to be supportive. But he was a stubborn man and being supportive of something he totally disagreed with, with it being someone he wanted to protect, was incredibly difficult for him. "I think Solomon wants to take me over there soon for some experimental training. Just to see how much more I can do. I'll probably go over the weekend with him and then come back by myself and leave Solomon to keep researching. If we have time, that is."

"Sounds good," Dexter told her, finishing the last of his drink and taking all of the last of the cookies in his hand. Tanith wiped at Laila's spit-chin and they were ready to go.

Since Erskine had taken over the tree, Valkyrie and Nadia sort of wandered to the edge of the trees to look at some expensive ornaments they couldn't get this year since they'd probably be broken before next Christmas, and listened into Erskine talk to himself about colours. Tanith and Saracen were talking, and Dexter had Laila and stood with Ghastly and Fletcher by the exit. A small swarm of people had arrived and it was nice to be with her girlfriend out of the way.

"It's nice not to be working," Valkyrie said, smiling.

"Yeah," Nadia nodded, crossing her arms uncomfortably.

"What is it?"

Nadia didn't say anything, just looked away. Confused, Valkyrie went to ask her if it was about the Christmas tree again when we heard some boys laughing. Listening hard, she heard them whispering together but couldn't make anything out.

"What did they say?" She whispered to Nadia softly as a family went past them.

"They're insulting us."

"How?"

Nadia went to say but the family moved on and it was quiet again so she didn't speak. The only thing that did that to Nadia, other than talk about her family, was when people made comments about her sexuality. Trying not to get frustrated or angry with the kids who made the comments, Valkyrie suggested a walk. It wasn't hard to notice they were being followed because the boys didn't even try to hide it.

"Would you like to cause some trouble or just leave?" Valkyrie asked. After the homophobic lady when they went on their first day out in America, and also the girls that attacked Valkyrie years ago, anything to do with being told her sexuality was wrong just made Nadia close up in fear of being shouted at or attacked it seemed, and Valkyrie realised she needed to try harder to make her feel comfortable. It wasn't fair that her girlfriend was made to feel insecure or unsafe over something that was so natural and happy. It barely even made her mad, she just felt really upset... and small. She wanted to wrap her and Nadia up in a blanket nest and cuddle in their home.

Nadia thought about it for a moment. "Maybe a little trouble?"

Valkyrie grinned, throwing all negative thoughts out of her head, and walked towards the entrance, drawing the buggers out by holding Nadia's hand. They both heard the giggling and childish insults about how 'gay' they were, but Valkyrie steadily ignored them. She walked straight past Ghastly, Dexter and Fletcher who were waiting for them. The boys walked past Tanith and Saracen. As soon as the boys passed with their stupid remarks, her brother and sister stalked so closely behind the boys it was creepy and in no way stealthy. Valkyrie gave Nadia a smile and walked past her other brothers and sat on the bench on the other side of the exit to watch the show. She didn't need to do anything to these idiots with a family like hers.

The boys very suddenly noticed that they had made a mistake when Valkyrie crossed her arms, turned to look directly at the boys and glared in a way she usually only mustered up for the nastiest of criminals. They all stumbled but tried to pass it off and turn around – where they found Dexter, Saracen, Tanith and Ghastly surrounding them in a semi-circle with their arms crossed and glaring.

"Do you have something to say, kid?" Ghastly growled.

"N-n-n-no sir!" The middle one stuttered in a high-pitched voice. The other two shook their heads and repeated it.

"Really? Because you were being pretty vocal a moment ago," Tanith said. Fletcher looked on from behind her brothers with baby Laila in his arms. She looked at her mothers back for a moment and then looked away contently, happy to hang in Fletcher's arms. Fletcher didn't seem to know what to do, especially since this was probably his first time holding the baby.

"We didn't mean it!" The tallest said after a moment of open-mouthed fear. "Really! It was just a joke!"

"Do you think we're having a laugh?" Dexter asked in almost a whispered, puffing up like an angry cat. "You insulted my sisters, and that means you insulted all of us. Do you like following teenage girls around? What did you plan on doing to them?"

"Nothing!" They all said immediately.

"Really? I've never heard of three young men following girls around for nothing," Ghastly growled, puffing up as well.

"Did you do it," Saracen said with absolute calm, "because you watched your father drink as a child? Or because your mother threatened to leave him and abandon you? Or perhaps the time you two accidently watched that disgusting video together pushed you to recreate it to cope – and pulled in your brother to make him suffer too."

The three stared with complete horror. Valkyrie honestly just felt bad for them now and couldn't help but look away and cringe. She squeezed Nadia's hand and gave her a smile rather than watch the boys. Trust Saracen to just _know_ how to fuck up these kids' day.

"I know what you are thinking," Saracen said in a way that truly made it seem like he actually could. He might be able to for all they knew. "I know what you," he pointed at the older one, "were thinking about my sister. Don't. You. _Fucking_. Dare."

The boy stumbled back.

"You two," he addressed the younger ones, "need to not follow him. He'll get you in trouble. Understand?"

They just nodded quickly.

"Good. Go back to your mother, tell her what you did and apologise for being who you are. Go," Saracen told them in a dark voice.

They were gone immediately and Valkyrie had to frown at Saracen. "That was more than harsh."

"You don't know what he was thinking," he told her simply and walked out of the exit. Valkyrie and Nadia stood but didn't follow him.

"I just kind of thought you'd tell them to stop being stupid and scare them a bit, not that. They're just stupid kids," Valkyrie said somewhat defensively. "Bringing up their home life was a bit… you know. Crap."

Dexter sighed. "Yeah, it was a bit rough." He pulled her into a tight hug and then brought Nadia in. "But Saracen always knows. Maybe they'll be so shocked they'll never do that again."

"That wasn't really about what they said about us," Nadia said in a small voice. "Was it?"

They were all silent for a moment. Fletcher awkwardly moved towards them, holding Laila. He looked uncomfortable. "Hey," he said with fake cheeriness. "Happy Christmas!"

Valkyrie forced a laugh. "We don't need this right now."

"Let's go home, work out, train Nadia to kill men, and watch a movie," Tanith said somewhat sarcastically. "I'm not sure this trip could be any more ridiculous."

"Yeah," Fletcher said, looking down at Laila. After a small moment, she looked up at him with big eyes. They held contact for a moment and then Laila looked back down and at the group quietly like she understood the meaning of the universe.

"Let's think about food!" Valkyrie tried. "We all like food! And Christmas involves a lot of food!"

She got a few smiles, thank god. She was lucky that Erskine came bounding towards them and they had to put on a very happy front for him as he needed more problems even less than them, so they kept it from him. He came and told them about the reindeer at the very small nearby town and soon it was like the incident never happened as they laughed, stroked the animals and enjoyed spending time with each other.


	171. Buying special Christmas presents

**Warning: NSFW**

* * *

**Chapter 171**

Christmas Eve crept up on them before they expected it, which was embarrassing because it was a very important date, and as a collective, they realised that none of them had gotten a single present for the others – including Valkyrie for Nadia, which got her a ribbing. Although it was the day before Christmas, they chose to all go out first thing in the morning to shop. To make it easier, though, they only needed to buy one present per person as between them they'd still have a nice pile, plus it was easier to eventually take home.

"Should we all split up then?" Valkyrie asked from her seat next to Nadia in the car. Fletcher was on her other side being grumpy because they hadn't let him teleport them. They were in California so it wasn't snowy or really all that cold, meaning there were a lot of tourists and people all around where they were going, and it would be just as quick to drive as to teleport and then walk the few miles in. He still didn't like it and was sulking. To be fair, his moods had been swinging back and forth between doing alright and absolutely miserable, so this wasn't that unusual. Myra's betrayal and impending Sanctuary decisions for her future weighed on his mind a lot.

"It would make sense," Tanith nodded. She was in the back of the car with Laila in her car seat between herself and Ghastly. Dexter drove and there were two front passenger seats for Saracen and Erskine. Anton and Solomon were taking a taxi in since there wasn't enough space, and the two of them much preferred the quiet.

"Does anyone have present requests?" Dexter asked, looking back. "'Cause if I get the wrong thing and you hate it there's no time to take it back."

"It'll be fine, Dex," Valkyrie said. "Honestly, I think we should all stick to getting very, very small gifts and do something nice when we get to the new house. I wasn't the one that decided we need to declutter and go through every single item we own, but since that's happening let's just make it easier on ourselves."

Nadia made a huffing sound besides her. "Well, it makes sense to go through our things before it goes back into the house. You don't need to be so moody about it."

"I'm not moody, I'm just dreading it," she corrected, knowing she was annoying Nadia further. Last minute present buying was apparently stressful for Nadia. "I don't want to think about that right now. Do _you_ have any special requests?"

Nadia gave her a small glare but then thought about it. "I don't mind. No jewellery, I have way too much of that. No clothes either. There was a book series I liked the look of."

"Dibs!" Dexter practically screamed.

Laila woke up and started crying. "Dexter, you dick!" Tanith shouted to the front.

"Sorry," he said quietly.

Laila cried for a solid twenty minutes but at least they had arrived at the giant shopping centre by then. It looked more like an airport. Tanith breastfed the baby while the rest of the stretched, and then Solomon and Anton joined them. Valkyrie rounded everyone to give them the rundown – anyone who didn't care about surprises were welcome to make requests, but except for that everyone had a budget and had to only get one small item per recipient. Dexter got the name of the books Nadia liked and a few other requests were taken and written down. Valkyrie had no requests and wasn't given any either, so she needed to work out something nice for ten people! But even as she took Nadia's hand and they gave each other a small kiss on the walk to the building, her heart throbbed painfully. She really missed Skulduggery. He should be with them and it hurt that he wasn't.

"Oh, look at this!" Nadia immediately said, pulling her off to the first home décor shop they went passed.

"Oh God," Valkyrie muttered, before smiling prettily and following along.

Nadia pointed out everything she liked and wanted, and Valkyrie followed nicely like she was meant to. A full two hours went by before she had got it out of her system which was longer than Valkyrie thought it would take. They left the home area of the multi-story and got a milkshake each before going to a jewellery shop.

"Do you think this is a good idea?" Nadia asked with a frown as she sucked on her straw.

"Maybe," she smiled, looking at the children's section. "I just want something as a keepsake, not to wear right now. But I can't decide between a necklace or a bracelet. Fuck, this is giving me flashbacks to buying your ring. That was a nightmare."

"How many places did you go to?"

"Err, four? Not many really, but it was stressful. I found it in a vintage shop right before we gave up. I'm glad we went there though, none of the new shops sell rings like yours," Valkyrie said absently as she looked over the selection. "Aww, that's nice."

"The locket? I think you're meant to put some of her hair in there to keep."

"That would be nice. I mean, it's more of a Tanith thing, but I bet Laila would like it too. She could switch out the hair for a picture if she wanted to wear it later," Valkyrie said, nodding. They paid for it before moving on. The whole 'budget' thing didn't apply to her goddaughter.

Going around, Valkyrie and Nadia found all their presents and bumped into a few of their family members as they went but kept their bags hidden from each other. Erskine got a build-a-bear voucher he could use later and apparently in any country which was useful, Dexter and Saracen had a joint gift of a nice bottle of brandy, Solomon got a nice fountain pen, Ghastly got a pincushion that looked like a tomato. Anton was harder to choose, but Valkyrie got him some very nice cufflinks, and Fletcher got a satchel from both Valkyrie and Nadia since that was expensive and it was hard to buy for him. Nadia got Laila a first Christmas bauble after texting Tanith that it was alright to get for her, as well as her own assortment of other gifts for the other, which included something for Tanith. So in the end, Nadia still needed to buy for Valkyrie, and Valkyrie had both Tanith and Nadia left.

This massive place also had two present wrapping sections which were great because they didn't have any wrapping paper at home nor time to do it. The one they went to was packed with mostly men and there were a few tables for wrapping. They waited in line and then had to pay the fee to hand wrap or have someone else wrap. They both chose to hand wrap and got in after half an hour or so.

After their timed wrapping and labelling experience, the two had a very late lunch and decided to split up to buy each other presents.

Two bags in tow, Valkyrie headed straight for some Victoria's Secrets look alike. She had to show her ID to get in which made her nervous.

This place looked more like a sex shop than a lingerie shop. Trying to not look like a kid, Valkyrie awkwardly went around the side and hid from the employees so she could look at the things without an audience. Maybe she should just buy this online and get Nadia something else for Christmas? Then again, the clothing area was nice and didn't make her feel as, well, threatened. She just wanted something a little different and exciting, something for fun. Not any of the toys, they were more than intimidating and she could honestly say she didn't know what half of them were, where they were meant to go, or if they should even really look like that. She could definitely imagine Nadia in some of the clothes though, she thought Nadia would like a few of the outfits.

"Valkyrie."

Valkyrie practically screamed when she jumped and turned on the person who said her name. Tanith was smirking and had her arms crossed.

"Where's Laila?" Was the first stupid thing that came out of her mouth.

Tanith kept smirking. "With her father. What are you doing in here?"

Valkyrie spluttered and stuttered. "What are you doing in here?" She hissed accusingly.

Tanith snorted. "Oh, calm down. It could be worse, you could have run into Dexter, or worse, Anton."

"Please don't do this to me," Valkyrie breathed, closing her mind against the images of Anton and sex. It was just wrong on so many levels.

"Are you trying to find something for Nadia then? Or just for you?" Tanith grinned, getting close and looking at what was in front of Valkyrie. It was a bunch of bra's. "Well, that's not exciting."

"Please don't do this," she said again.

"Come on."

"Oh god you're doing it," Valkyrie sagged, wishing she was smaller and better at hiding. Stupid recent growth spurt! What type of woman was over six foot anyways? She didn't deserve this.

"What are you looking for then?" Tanith asked, trying to keep quiet. Valkyrie appreciated that as much as she hated Tanith right now. "You have to have some idea. Clothes or toys?"

If Valkyrie could get any redder she'd be on fire. "I don't know," she mumbled to the floor.

"If you don't talk to me I'm going to buy what I like, put it in a gift bag and make you give it to Nadia without knowing what's in it. Do you want that?" Tanith threated with a small smile. Valkyrie shook her head. "Well, then, talk to me."

"I really don't know," Valkyrie insisted. "I was just looking to see."

"Hmm," was all Tanith said before dragging her around the clothes. "Well, if you want clothes then you should get something that flatters Nadia. Always buy your own bra's and underwear, and only buy lingerie if you're absolutely sure they will like it. Okay?"

Valkyrie nodded her understanding.

"Good. Nadia is quite short," Tanith said absently, looking at some of the clothes. It was all sheer and in mostly black, red or white. Some of it was long, some with bras built in, and some with lots of straps rather than material.

"She's your height," Valkyrie said. "But much narrower."

"Are you calling me big?" Tanith asked as she turned and looked at the racks – literally – behind her. She moved down the aisle.

"Yep," Valkyrie said, trying desperately to pretend this was normal.

"Thank you. I don't think Nadia would like red," Tanith replied. "Black or white seems more her."

"I think black," Valkyrie nodded.

"Okay, that's something," Tanith nodded encouragingly. "I'm assuming neither of you has anything like this?"

Valkyrie just shook her head. This was worse than The Talk. Valkyrie would much rather have The Talk. She could even contribute how little of what Tanith had told her to do she had actually done, which would probably drive her mad.

"Alright, let's not go too crazy then. You know her cup and hip size, right?"

"I think so," she said uncertainly. "I think it's thirty-two D and her hips are like, a size ten? Her trousers are size ten. But she was complaining some of them are getting tight so I don't know."

"Okay. I think she should have something like a babydoll lingerie. Like this one." The babydoll was a built in bra, or at least an area for breasts sans any padding in some cases, with a sheer material going down to the butt with a separate pair of nickers. There were a few items that would cover the breasts and some that definitely did not. "What do you think? It's not always the sexiest and doesn't show many curves but for a first-time thing it's nice, it's cute, it's still kinda sexy."

"Sure," Valkyrie choked, nodding too quickly, completely unable to think of Nadia. She wanted to see her in it, but associating Nadia to this conversation was too personal and made her embarrassed. It was just – this was her actual sex life they were talking about. Not some hypothetical thing that may or may not happen. Other people would one day walk into this shop and buy the stuff around her and go home and use it. It was incredibly personal and it was a lot to deal with by herself and now her sister was trying to help her. It was just a little much.

"Which is your favourite?" Tanith demanded.

Biting her lip, Valkyrie looked at the rack and tried to decide. The ones with the bows were not her thing and she doubted it was Nadia's. The sheerer ones were what she liked. There was a white number that had a layer of lace going over the top of the breasts, wrapping around the shoulders and around the back sort of like a dress, with thin white straps to keep it up as the lace was loose and meant to hang off the shoulder. The sheer material was synched under the breast and flowed to just above the crotch – currently Tanith's as she held it to herself for size comparison – and had the same lace to partially cover the area, which went all around the hem. There was also a pathetically small piece of string that was meant to be a thong, which she didn't care for at all. "It's okay. Good. I think Nadia would like it more than the others."

"Some of these are a bit cutesy," Tanith commented, before going over the sizes and picking one out. She tested its length on herself to be sure and double-checked the breast size before handing it to Valkyrie. "This should fit her. I know I said not to buy her underwear, but these ones won't fit so just get her some matching one's in a more likely size."

Valkyrie did as she was told and by the time she got back to the till where Tanith was waiting, she had her own bag and a smirk. Even the cashier was trying to hide a smile.

"What are you doing?" Valkyrie asked suspiciously.

"Oh, nothing," Tanith grinned. "Are you ready to pay?"

Not having many choices without having an audience, Valkyrie paid and she and Tanith left together. The moment they were outside Valkyrie instantly felt more comfortable.

"That was fun!" Tanith teased her.

"Yeah, no," Valkyrie grinned. "And you know, you're the only one I haven't got a present for now! So ha."

"Get me something nice," Tanith grinned. "Like lube."

Valkyrie went to hit Tanith, but she'd already skipped away. Trying not to blush anymore, Valkyrie sighed and went to wander before she found a shop that made her giggle to herself. Tanith would get a laugh out of this!


	172. That's a big bitch!

**Chapter 172**

Valkyrie woke slowly to little kisses on her neck. She smiled, feeling Nadia's hair on her bare chest, and turned over to pull her closer.

"Wake up," Nadia whispered. Valkyrie cracked open one eye just a little and saw she was grinning excitedly. "It's Christmas."

"Mmm, no, not yet," Valkyrie moaned turning the other way.

"Hey," Nadia said just a little louder. Valkyrie heard footsteps in the attic room above. "You can't just turn your back on me! It's Christmas!"

"No it's not."

There was a quiet moment and then Nadia practically dropped on top of her with a grin. "But I'm naked."

"No you're not."

"I am. See," she grabbed Valkyrie's hand and put it on her breast.

Valkyrie hummed, leisurely rolling her nipple between her fingers. "Still not getting up."

Nadia giggled and got off the bed. Valkyrie smiled and watched her walk around the tiny room to get her clothes from the suitcase next to the door. They had barely more room than that. "Do you want your presents?"

"No."

"Really? I got you a good one," she said with a sneaky look.

"Unless you're going to get on my face, I don't care," Valkyrie said, pulling a pillow over her head.

They heard a muffled laugh through the wall from Tanith, getting them to laugh as well. The house soon filled with movement. Valkyrie and Nadia got into the pyjamas right before Saracen barged into the room, followed up by Erskine who tackled Valkyrie onto the bed, breaking one of the slats underneath.

"Erskine!" She cried from under him. He rolled off laughing hysterically. Nadia took his hand and pulled him up – then shrieked when Valkyrie jumped up after him, picked her up and threw her over her shoulder. "Presents!"

Nadia laughed and shouted to be let down, so Valkyrie threw her onto the sofa. Erskine and Dexter came bounding down the stairs a few moments later, followed by the rest of the family at a more sedate pace. Valkyrie pulled back from Nadia in time to grab Erskine and stop him from toppling them both over onto the coffee table. "It's Christmas Val, we need to open the presents!"

"Dexter help!"

Dexter picked Erskine up from around the waist and moved him to the other side of the room. Anton arrived and patted Erskine on the shoulder, calming him down in an instant, and they all gathered around the minuscule living room. Erskine placed himself at Anton's feet next to the pretty tree he had decorated himself, in a way Nadia didn't like as she had made sure to tell Valkyrie – Erskine had a very haphazard way of decorating Christmas trees and Nadia preferred something more 'elegant' – and demanded they had presents immediately.

"Alright, let's see!" He said and snatched up the nearest. "This one is for Solomon, from Valkyrie. And this blue one is to Saracen, from Tanith…"

The presents were handed out quickly and they opened them as they came. Valkyrie got a book from Solomon on magical theory, Erskine got her and Nadia matching bracelets with a rainbow charm on them, Dexter bought her a collection of nice chocolates. Ghastly and Anton had gone halves and found a few tops and some new pyjamas for her to match her new height and build. She had a little chocolate snowman on a stick from Laila, Saracen surprised her with a really pretty photo album, and Fletcher gave a note to her and Nadia as a promise to chauffeur them to any locations of their choosing for a day so they could visit family, places or go on dates. Fletcher's was a surprise, but Valkyrie actually felt touched he'd be willing to give up his entire day to let her and Nadia enjoy themselves.

Tanith gave her a look and announced that hers was more personal and wanted to give it to her later. That got Valkyrie some looks, and Saracen tried to hide a smirk around his cup of coffee. Nadia, blushing, said she had done the same but followed it up quickly that it wasn't what it sounded like. She got some laughs too but that was just at her own expense. Valkyrie thanked her and handed her a 'fake' present, a chocolate reindeer the size of Nadia's forearm, so she wouldn't have to say the same about her own present as that was too embarrassing. She was sort of looking forward to it as well though.

After a lot of presents and photos just for Laila, the family moved onto cooked breakfast. Laila sat on Nadia's lap and played with her new crinkle books, rubber ducks, rabbits and other animals by either attempting to shove them straight into her mouth and then directly into Valkyrie's, or staring at them in fascination before dropping them to the floor as if they never existed. At closing in on three months in a few days' time, that was about the only play with toys she could manage. She would rather swat people's hands right as they tried to eat something messy anyway.

They spread out between the dining room and living room to eat. Valkyrie and Anton got to escape to the kitchen to prepare the turkey that Anton was having to precook as the oven was about half as large, and as powerful, as a normal one, and then they all had to be roped into peeling potatoes and cutting the carrots and parsnips for roasting. The brussel sprouts were prepared as well, and they were just using stuffing from a packet but they got it out so they wouldn't forget. Fletcher had bought it especially from Ireland so it would taste like a normal Christmas too. Someone washed the plates ready for their dinner and after all that, they got to spend some time to themselves.

Nadia wanted to get changed into something comfortable, so Valkyrie went with her up to their room.

"So, am I allowed my present yet?" Nadia asked with a little smirk.

"Am I that obvious?" Valkyrie asked sarcastically. "I'm a little worried you won't like it."

"I'm sure it's fine," she said, pulling out one of Valkyrie's old tops. It had fit her at the start of this trip but she had grown at least an inch inches upwards and a little around the shoulders and hips too. No action in the chest department, unfortunately. Nadia, with her gained weight, had developed wonderfully womanly breasts Valkyrie's hands just about managed to hold. She swallowed and ignored the feeling between her legs, as well as the anxiety Nadia's chest may have been larger than the cup size of her gift. She remembered Mrs Keena wasn't much bigger than Nadia, possibly smaller, but Nadia had a fairly different body shape compared to her mother so it was hard to know what size to predict she'd be left with. "I got you something too. Do you want it?"

"Me first," she said, and reached under the bed for her little present to Nadia. She took a deep breath. "If you don't like it, it doesn't matter. I just thought it might be fun."

Nadia gave her a little frown, but smiled as she took the gift anyway, wearing just Valkyrie's oversized top and shorts small enough to be pants. She stood in front of Valkyrie as she opened the paper and then tried to hide a smile when she opened the white, plain box lid and saw the lingerie. "What-? Did you get me underwear?"

"No, not exactly," Valkyrie rushed to say. "It's just a little something – I didn't want it to come off as weird or anything, and you don't need it – I just figured it would be fun –"

"Stop," Nadia said, pulling the dress out and throwing the box and white thong on the bed. She held it against herself. "It's actually really pretty." She swirled and held out the bottom corner like in a curtsy to see how the fabric swayed. "I like it."

Valkyrie relaxed into a grin. "I'm glad. I was really worried about it."

"I just hope it fits, it's kind of small." Valkyrie elected not to say she had tested the size on Tanith. Nadia gave Valkyrie a look that was practically smouldering. "Maybe I'll try it on tonight and we'll see."

Heat shot straight through her. "I'd like that."

Nadia grinned and folded the dress into the box in record time and hid it under Valkyrie's pillow away from prying eyes. "Want your present?"

"Yes please," Valkyrie grinned giddily.

Nadia pulled a book out from the behind Valkyrie's bedside table. It was in newspaper to protect it. "I know it isn't pretty, but I didn't get it when we were out."

Valkyrie took it carefully and pulled the newspaper off of it. It was a scrapbook, like the one she'd been gifted a few years ago. "I remember this, you gave me one when we'd been together for a year, at Christmas. I was fourteen."

"Yeah, I know. This one is from then until now. I started it months back," Nadia said, sitting beside her. "Open it."

Inside was photos, handwritten messages and little pull out cards with poems, songs and personal sentiments from Nadia to Valkyrie. There was a list of all their dates and the special moments they had together, and Nadia had neatly written a long letter over a double spread that said about their breakup and how much the time had changed them for the better and how she never stopped thinking of Valkyrie. It was a beautiful and personal piece that brought tears to Valkyrie's eyes. Sniffing a little, she continued on and saw some little hand-drawn pictures of house plans and lots of pictures of what Nadia wanted as their bedroom and little sentiments of what she wanted to happen in their futures. Spread in between were more intimate drawings and messages that reminded Valkyrie of when they were younger and just working those things out. Right at the end of the thick book was some sketches of New York City, a detailed log of the day of their engagement, and finally on the last page of the entire book, the simple words 'Merry Christmas'.

"Aww, Nadia," Valkyrie tearfully said, "this is really beautiful. Thank you so much for making this."

"It's okay baby. I remembered how much you loved the last one, so I had to do it," she smiled. They lent in and gave each other a small peck on the lips, feeling how special the moment was.

It was broken when the fire alarms went off and everyone downstairs groaned loudly.

Giggling to themselves, the girls got changed into clean clothes and went back downstairs. Valkyrie brought her book down with her and put it on the table. Erskine, Fletcher, Saracen and Dexter poured over it and made happy comments about how cute she and Nadia were and tried to embarrass Fletcher with some of the little intimate comments here and there. Laila was in a little elf onesie and got lots of attention from Valkyrie while Nadia helped Anton to get things under control in the kitchen.

"Hey, Valkyrie?" Fletcher asked from the other side of the room.

"Yeah?"

"How tall are you now?"

Valkyrie paused as she changed Laila's nappy and then answered. "I'm not sure, a bit over six foot now? Maybe?"

"Naa, it's more than that," Erskine nodded certainly.

"I don't think so," she argued, strapping Laila's clean cloth nappy on. Tanith ran off with the dirty one and the bag of other reusable nappies to wash – it was impressive how someone like Tanith, that being a fairly utterly anti-domestic, always on the go, ex-assassin type of women, could adapt to childcare and washing nappies so well. There was no rest from chores with a baby. "I think I'm about Solomon's height."

"Solomon!" Erskine called loudly. Laila screamed just as loudly in reply as her onesie got popped back up before trying to mash her knuckles into her mouth. "Come here!"

Solomon came through from the dining room a moment later. "Yes, Mr Ravel?"

"How tall are you?" Fletcher asked, frowning up at the man from his place on the floor. "In feet."

"Six foot and barely half an inch I believe," he said nonchalantly, taking a seat. "Why do you need to know?"

"Valkyrie thinks she's shorter than you but we think she's taller," he accused, turning to Valkyrie.

Dexter stood up. "Well, stand next to each other," he told them. "Then we'll know."

Signing, the two of them stood next to each other. It became quickly obvious that Valkyrie was the taller one.

"You're way taller!" Fletcher exclaimed.

"By how much?" She asked.

"A good two inches," Dexter said. "I'm pretty sure you're Skulduggery's height."

Solomon looked at her, then judged her up and down. "No," he said firmly. "She's six three. Skulduggery's six two."

"Oh god," Valkyrie muttered as Erskine and Fletcher stood quickly to check against themselves to see if they thought she was really that tall. "Does it really matter?"

"Yes!" They both said at the same time.

"You're too tall," Erskine told her.

"That's not true," Tanith said.

Erskine frowned. "Wait, how tall are you?"

"Five foot five."

"What about you," he asked Nadia.

"Err," she hesitated. "I don't know?"

Some arguments commenced and Ghastly's measuring tape was taken custody to end the fighting. Nadia was just barely five feet, five inches and a half. Just taller than Tanith by half an inch.

"Ha, Tanith's the baby of the family!" Valkyrie laughed, pushing the attention off of her.

Tanith's face soured as Erskine laughed and Fletcher tried to hide his mirth. Even Dexter and Saracen were laughing as they watched how annoyed Tanith became at the information.

"I liked you more as a kid," she told Nadia.

"Sorry," Nadia grinned.

Tanith gave her a calculating look. "I suppose you're only taller because Valkyrie rubbed off on you."

Valkyrie and the Idiots guffawed that that. Nadia went red and then flicked her hair. "Shut up, Tiny Tanith. You're just jealous because you'll always be the smallest."

"Hey, I still have time to get a girlfriend that's shorter than me," she rebuked.

"I thought you were never dating again? That insecure about your height? Or just getting lonely?" Nadia said with a twinkle in her eye.

Tanith had to look away to hide her smirk. "Your jokes are rubbish. And anyway, it doesn't matter what you say about me now because this is just the fuel I need to bring Valkyrie's present out here right now!"

Valkyrie wasn't sure if she went pale or red but she shouted to please god don't. A commotion went on, getting worse when Fletcher got butt-hurt over being just under six foot tall, until Anton came in and clapped his hands to get their attention. "Dinner… is ready."

They found stools, blanket boxes and all available chairs to squeeze around the small dining room table to eat together. They had a big spread with the golden turkey already half calved in the middle of the table and all the vegetables piled high together just to fit them in around all the plates. Valkyrie and Nadia had to share one plate and the same chair just so they could all fit. Sprouts, roast potatoes, gravy, broccoli, leek, roast parsnip and carrots, pigs in blankets and stuffing. They would of had more but there was no possible way of cooking it all. Anton got a big thanks from them all.

Valkyrie stuffed herself silly with roast dinner before sitting back in her chair. It was nice until Nadia, who was in her lap, sat back too and crushed her stomach. Having helped with a lot of the prep earlier and so out of having to clean, Nadia and Valkyrie went upstairs to nap.

It had been ten minutes and Valkyrie's eyes were just starting to flicker closed when Tanith's Cheshire grin poked its head around the bedroom door.

Valkyrie groaned.

"Oh, stop being so dramatic," Tanith laughed, coming into the room. Nadia covered her face with her hands but didn't move. "It's not even that bad."

"I don't want it," Valkyrie told her, throwing an arm over her eyes.

"Hmm, no, I think you do. You just don't want to say it out loud," Tanith smirked. "You don't have to even open it now. But when you get over yourselves, you'll be thanking me. I promise."

Tanith as good as sashayed out of the room, leaving the plain white bag with its handsome black straps at the end of the bed. She closed the door behind her.

There was a moment of silence in which Valkyrie could already feel sleep pulling at her but Nadia's curiosity was stronger. Valkyrie listened to the rustles of the tissue paper being removed and some silence followed by a box being opened. Nadia was quiet.

"What is it?" Valkyrie groaned quietly.

"…There's a book," Nadia said after a long moment. There was a loud pat on the bed as the book was thrown next to Valkyrie. She grabbed at it blindly and looked at it.

"Oh my fucking god," she whispered to herself and dropped the book.

"Yep. 'The Complete Guide to Strap-On Sex'," Nadia read very quietly. "Do you want to see the thing?"

"The thing – oh no," Valkyrie gasped, making herself sit up. "She didn't."

"She did," Nadia said through a quiet, embarrassed laugh.

"No!" Valkyrie opened the lid of the box. Inside was a sunflower yellow strap-on dildo. "Oh my god. Why did she buy that?"

"I don't know!" Nadia laughed, covering her mouth. They both stared at the dildo and then looked at each other and couldn't help but smile embarrassedly. "Is it too early to say I'm glad?"

"Nadia!"

"What? You can't say you haven't thought of this, can you?"

"No, I really haven't!"

"What?" Nadia grinned. "Weren't you curious about it?"

"About what? The thought of using a strap-on has literally never entered my mind," Valkyrie whispered to her defensively. It wasn't Nadia's fault, she was just embarrassed about the idea because it came from Tanith and she was sure Tanith was sitting next door trying to hear their conversation. "You've never said anything about this before."

"Well, we've never spoken about it, just the normal stuff," she shrugged. "Do you want to talk about it now?"

"No, I bet Tanith's listening in," Valkyrie said, putting the lid back on the box. "If anyone finds this our lives are ruined."

"No, they're not. You're meant to be the confident one, why are you getting upset?"

"I'm not upset, I just didn't exactly plan on getting a strap-on from my sister," Valkyrie said before bursting out laughing. "It's just so weird."

"But we'll talk about it later?" Nadia asked. Valkyrie promised they would. "Good. Because I have a few things I'd like to do with it."

* * *

**Tanith 5'5, Nadia 5'5.5, Saracen 5'7, Erskine and Fletcher 5'9, Dexter and Ghastly 6, Solomon 6'0.5, Skulduggery 6'2, Valkyrie 6'3, Anton 6'5**


	173. Please someone kill this boy

**Chapter 173**

Finding a car that fit a baby's car seat and ten adults, most of which being muscular, and thus wider than the average person, was a challenge. So instead, they chose two family rental cars. Over the course of five agonising days, Valkyrie and her family gritted their teeth and kept themselves from murdering Fletcher out of sheer frustration. They stayed on the road, barely parked, and took shifts sleeping just to get into Nevada as soon as possible.

Considering they wouldn't have to have a road trip if Fletcher had visited Nevada before, they weren't exactly best pleased with him anyway. It wouldn't have been as agonising if they didn't have a three-month-old with them.

Somehow, the very grace of God seemed to shine on the absolute idiot of a boy, as he pushed them just hard enough to have them grind their teeth and pull out their hair, but not enough to actually commit a crime. Only Nadia cracked once, smacking Fletcher hard enough to bruise him, when he tried to throw something at Erskine instead of hand it through the car and it fell on Laila causing her to cry. She had been unmarked, thankfully for everyone as there was no doubt her father would have killed all of them if Laila had been bruised. He had to beg and stay quiet for the rest of that night so that they wouldn't tell Tanith and Ghastly, who were having a break in the other car.

On the outskirts of the giant city of Las Vegas, her family found a motel to stay in. Nadia was sent in to buy their rooms, just two nights, and then they brought in their bags. They'd had to shed some of their gear and put it in a storage unit Fletcher had. Everyone was sharing a bag to make it easier. One day they'd go on a real family road trip but those five days had been hell. Poor Laila cried for hours each day and continued to wail for half an hour after they got into the motel before she passed out asleep. Tanith pushed her hair out of her face, continuing to pace and worry over the baby.

Their job over the next two nights was to deal firstly with a threat of a mortal-eating group of goblins, and then to take on some of the New Year's Eve terrorism and end of the world missions. These tasks had come from the Sanctuary themselves. Solomon had joined them on their road trip of hell and was going to help them through it too, which Valkyrie was glad about. She'd barely seen him since they got to America.

There was a light knock on the door and Valkyrie pulled herself off the bed to quietly open it.

"Laila's asleep," she whispered very quietly.

"Okay," Dexter whispered back, leaning in. "Me and Solomon were talking and thought we should go out to test your skills a bit. To check up."

Valkyrie nodded quickly. "I'll get ready now."

She closed the door gently and changed into some shorts and a sports top. It was only just coming up on twelve degrees, being as it was the middle of winter in the desert, but she knew she'd work up a sweat. Nadia had barely slept the entire car ride which honestly had been miserable for them both as Nadia wasn't quite as pleasant a person when she hadn't had enough sleep, so Valkyrie left quietly. She did love her, but five days of barely sleeping, being constantly annoyed and worrying over deadlines had stressed Nadia out too much to let her be a nice person. So a little break to work off some steam was just what Valkyrie needed while Nadia got herself back under control so they could go back to being happy together.

"Oh, man," Valkyrie groaned, ducking her head. She practically stomped up to Dexter and Solomon. "Does he really have to come?"

"He promised to be quiet the entire way," Dexter told her immediately.

"I won't be annoying, I swear!" Fletcher grinned.

Valkyrie glared at him. "You're already annoying me. I thought I escaped you."

"Nope," he smirked.

She turned to Dexter. "Are you really going to let this happen?"

He sighed. "Saracen said if I didn't get Fletcher away from him for a few hours he was going to kill Fletcher, break up with me, and move away forever. He seems pretty serious."

Valkyrie grimaced. "Nadia's angry too."

Solomon hummed. "It's been a long few days. Come on, we'll walk out of the city a bit."

Fletcher opened his mouth to complain but Valkyrie smacked the back of his head and he shut up. They weren't in a nice area. There were syringes and shards of glass on the floor, the butt of a large knife but no blade, and the very few cars they saw were beaten up and old. The air was nice on Valkyrie's skin though. She held her arms out and looked at the faded scars on her wrists. They were darker than the rest of her body but not pink, shiny or obvious like they used to be and she felt much more comfortable with them out, plus she had never noticed anyone else see them anyway. The ones on her stomach were also very faded, but she could easily imagine someone thinking they were shadows or multiple surgery scars as opposed to her being tortured. She no longer felt any need to worry. She didn't think anyone would ever notice unless she clearly pointed them out.

Solomon went straight to an abandoned building at the end of a long, worn down street and lead them through the chain-link fence, around the back of the building, through a thorny entanglement of vines attached to half-dead tropical trees and stopped when the brush cleared just enough for them all to spread out comfortably.

"I thought you said we were going to the desert," Valkyrie grouched.

"The desert is out there," Dexter told her as he wrapped his knuckles in tape. "This is the closest we can get without getting caught."

"But it's not the desert," she complained.

Solomon sighed. "Valkyrie, dear, while I would love to accommodate you, I simply do not have the patience today. Fletcher I would like you to move over there and keep an ear out for us. Dexter, I would like you to sit out for now. Are you ready?"

Valkyrie looked at Solomon from across the clearing and got in position. There wasn't much space between them, which meant she had to be even quicker than usual.

But Solomon chuckled. "Not quite yet. First, let's just see what you can do before we test your magical combat abilities. We don't want any accidents after all."

He told her exactly what he wanted and Valkyrie provided. She could bring her magic to her skin where it was white, danced and spat dangerously without hurting her but certainly gave a shock to anyone who was unlucky enough to experience it touching it – that being Fletcher. She could make it appear on a single place such as one hand or her thigh although that took effort to maintain. She could shoot it easily and melt the large rocks around them. She could hit moving objects with enough power to obliterate it or to just knock it back.

"Am I doing okay?" She panted, wiping beads of sweat from her forehead. They'd been at it for nearly an hour.

"I think so," Solomon frowned. "How about we spar?"

Dexter sprang up to face her. Valkyrie, so exhausted, just frowned for a moment and then gasped to herself. "But what if I make a mistake and kill him?"

"You won't do that," Solomon said certainly. "You know what happens if you do, so you won't."

"I know what I'm doing," Dexter said more comfortingly. When she turned to him, he gave her a wink.

"Alright," she said, holding her fists up.

Sparing with Dexter was always intense. He never went easy on her. They started out throwing magic and avoiding each other, using the trees and boulders as cover and a way to move. Valkyrie's mind focused only on the battle, only on subduing her opponent. She tried to trip him up, tried hitting him with low doses of her magic, tried to do anything she could with just her magic to push him back. And when he finally got close to her, she went to defend and was caught off guard when he punched her instead of using his magic.

She took the hit, taking only one step back before she launched herself into it and began grappling. They were such similar heights and almost even in strength, but Dexter was still the superior fighter by a long way. She waited for him to get a hand in her hair to force her onto her knees and pulled magic to that area and to her hands to zap him with enough power to make him gag and fall. She rolled away from him and hit him again while he was still down, then jumped on his back to hold him on the ground. After a moment of being dazed, Dexter shook her off in one swift move, got on top of her and held her down, giving her small but painful stings all over her body.

She cried out and Dexter stopped.

"That was good," Solomon said neutrally. "Valkyrie, you've gotten better. But you're nowhere near ready for what you need to do for the procedure you want."

Valkyrie closed her eyes to restrain herself from looking at Fletcher, who was still not in the know and never would be. Though he would be insane not to suspect something was going on, just as he may know Laila's name, or just about what it was. "I have time. I'll keep training."

"I know. How could you have done that better?"

Valkyrie sat up and looked at the floor, focusing. "I need to get better at knowing how much magic is the right amount to use. Like, I had to stop and think for too long on if what I was trying to use was going to just trip Dex up, or if it might singe him, or knock him out. I was getting worried about killing him and that made me lose focus."

"What about at the end?"

"I took a lot of hits to get close enough to fight back. That could be dangerous with someone I don't know or if the person had a weapon. I also failed to physically subdue him, which I should be able to do when my magic should be stronger than his. That was stupid."

"It was."

"It's hard though. Because I don't want to test my magic out again and again to see how much power I'm really using! It's all well and good testing and guessing on objects but what if I need to use it to protect someone, or safely stop something happening? I'm great at high powered attacks but the lower velocity is really hit or miss."

"You've only had this magic a few months Cub," Dexter said soothingly, offering a hand and helping her up. They were both covered in sweat and sandy dust. "You spend five years learning everything you did before, so it makes sense that you don't have the same skill in this magic after just months of practice. You've come on more than most people could in a really short amount of time."

"But it's not good enough," she said simply. "I have to be better."

"You will be. But you can't get upset over it or you'll raise the bar too high to ever reach," he said, brushing her hair out of her face. "We'll keep practising. You're getting it already." She gave him a small smile and Solomon set them up again.


	174. Hehehehehe hehe, Ryaaaaaaan

**Chapter 174**

The thirty-first of December, New Year's Eve. Bright and early, four in the morning. Even Nadia was going to have to help them today by taking care of Laila so both her parents could work.

As soon as they were awake, they split up. Anton, Saracen and Erskine were one unit and took on the brunt of the 'bad' work, mostly to do with larger groups and genuinely world-ending problems. They were a good unit as Saracen could give them an idea of what to do, Anton usually scared enough of them to make them hesitate, and Erskine was more than competent at fighting as well as using his control of air to break them into anywhere they needed.

The issue of Anton's gist still hadn't been sorted or even properly spoken about. None of the family spoke about it without Anton as it felt wrong, and Anton shut down any conversation that even vaguely suggested they might start asking him about the gist. It would have to be dealt with, but it was hard when Anton wasn't interested in talking. At the very least, no one but them knew about the situation, and since he rarely used the gist anyway, no one would notice and use it against him. He still scared everyone that looked at him, making him more than enough of a force.

Solomon and Ghastly had similar jobs of simply finding and arresting all the many maniacs, druggies and drunk mages that got a little too excited to be safe around mortals. Fletcher was all over the city picking people up at designated drop off sites and back to the American Sanctuary, probably the most important job of them all as it made them a thousand times more efficient and safer.

That left Valkyrie, Tanith and Dexter as a second unit to take on other very dangerous criminals. Valkyrie had just placed her sixth criminal in shackles when the mid-morning light started to really shine. Dexter took their next call.

"Foe's gang was spotted," he told Valkyrie and Tanith when he finished, coming over to them. They were chugging down water some Sanctuary workers had passed them. "They were the ones that took the remnant and kidnapped Valkyrie a few years back."

Valkyrie remembered being at Scarabs old castle but not much about the criminals. She'd been focused on Scarab and Murder Rose, both of whom were now dead, as well as the zombies that attacked them, and didn't think she interacted with the gang after that fight, at least not while being conscious. "I never followed up on what their powers are," she admitted.

"Samuel is a vampire, and a strong one too," Dexter told her as they got in their car. Driving was alright in the early morning but they'd have to abandon the car when they got further into the city now it was daytime. "Obloquy is the creepy Sensitive dude that made you feel like you were in pain. And Mercy is an energy thrower of some kind, I actually forgot how exactly. Foe is just an energy-thrower, similar to myself."

"Great," Tanith rolled her eyes, getting her phone out and calling Nadia. She'd done that already a few hours earlier. Going back to work for long hours after the whole Myra thing was not a fun time for Tanith, but Valkyrie was proud of how on her game she'd been. A few more weeks of training and Tanith would be in as good a fighting shape as she'd been before she'd gotten pregnant. Except for the lactating. She'd had to pump breast milk every few hours and had no plans to stop yet. It was okay to see her do it at home as it felt very comfortable and normal in their home, but watching her wrangle her seat belt and two pumps at once in the back seat while trying to call Nadia was still somewhat disconcerting. Or maybe weird. Or maybe Valkyrie was just the bad one for thinking it was weird and it was normal, she didn't really know.

"How far is it?" She asked Dexter instead.

"The Clark County Public Library," he said. "It's on Flamingo Road."

"That's fun."

"I thought so too. It's a good hour away from here."

.*****.

They got a follow-up call in the car – this boy she spotted through the library shelves, Ryan, was of great interest to Foe's gang and it seemed as if they'd followed him not just across America, but actually from Ireland. So their job was to get Ryan out safely.

She struck up a whistle and rounded the corner. He was cornered against the shelf by Foe, Mercy and Obloquy on all sides, and Samuel not far behind. Her eyes wandered from one to the other and stopped when she looked at the boy.

"Hi," she said, putting on a smile. "My name's Valkyrie. Are these people bothering you?" Ryan didn't do anything other than look scared. She turned to Foe. "I'm part of library security. We've had some reports of overdue books in this area, and I'm going to need to ask you all some questions. We can do this here or downtown – where we'd actually have more space and access to a coffee machine."

Foe, Mercy and Obloquy looked around nervously. They didn't try to threaten her but Valkyrie knew they were more than capable of killing Ryan at that very moment and there wasn't much she could do about it.

"You really want this to happen?" Foe asked, his voice low. "Here? In a public place? Where all these innocent people might get caught in the crossfire?"

Valkyrie shrugged, taking her hands out of her pockets and wandering just a little further down the aisle. She was getting close to them now. "I'm just looking for a way to spoil your day, Vincent. The choice is yours. Stick around and get beaten up and thrown in a cell, or leave, now. Immediately."

"Sure," said Foe, standing back from the shelf and taking Ryan with him. "We'll just be taking Ryan with us."

"Ah. Well, see, now we have a problem."

"That's too bad."

"That's just what I was thinking."

Valkyrie moved, just two steps, and thrust her hand out. White magic shot out and slammed into Foe, causing him to fly back into Mercy. Valkyrie grabbed Ryan, who was stunned and hadn't seemed to follow what happened and ran with him. The hair on the back of her neck stood up and she ducked as red energy flew over her head. Ryan shrieked and almost fell to the floor like a dramatic lump so she snapped at him to "Keep moving!"

She had to get to the exit and then get far away. She heard when Tanith punched someone and then Dexter's energy, and then she yanked Ryan's arm so he didn't get fried by Mercy. She stopped when Mercy, a perfect picture of rage and beauty, opened her mouth and vomited out red energy in her face. Before she knew what she was doing, Valkyrie shoved Ryan aside, ducked and rolled, then tackled Mercy. There was a grunt and the energy stopped, but Mercy took the moment of stillness from Valkyrie as a chance to grab her hair and pull viciously. Valkyrie slammed her forehead into Mercy's nose and flipped them over, gaining the upper hand. It didn't take a moment for her to grab an arm and swing herself back to pop Mercy's elbow out of its socket.

While Mercy howled, Valkyrie jumped up and grabbed Ryan's sweaty wrist, pulling him along. She felt lost and didn't know the way out. She hesitated, standing in the middle of the large building with its rows of books, and Ryan chose to find his spine and rushed in front of her, deftly repositioning her grip to be around his hand.

"This way," he said and pulled her.

They hadn't been going for more than twenty seconds when he led them to a bland old painting on a dead-end wall.

"Idiot," she snapped as she heard the sound of punching somewhere else.

"Sorry," he said pathetically as she retook control.

"I thought you knew where you were going!"

"I thought there was a door here."

She went around a corner and came face to face with Obloquy. The Sensitive that caused her, and Anton previously, to be in extreme pain. He took a step forwards and she took one back, already feeling a ringing in her ears and a pressure in her skull. She launched into an attack, throwing energy at him even though she knew it was too powerful to use on another human, but he was already moving. She tried again, more measuredly, as Ryan jumped onto her back and tried to force her to go back around the corner, but she threw him off in time to throw another stream of energy that got him skirting to the side and down a different aisle. She turned to Ryan quickly.

"If you see an exit, you run to it. Understand?"

He nodded.

Obloquy dropped down beside her and before she had a chance to do a thing, he grabbed her by the arm and tossed her.

She flew through the air and just got a hold of herself to land safely, rolling to her feet with a pained hiss. She took off running, seeing the tails of Obloquy's coat on top of a bookcase stalking Ryan from above. She had to cut him off. She ran quickly, using the last of her energy and adrenaline to get to them on time, throwing white shadows at him and actually hitting him this time – he fell to his knees and shook like he was electrocuted.

Ryan stopped in front of her and Valkyrie took his shoulder and pushed him out of the exit he had successfully led them to, and out into the street. The car they had illegally parked on the side of the road was still there and Valkyrie opened the back seat and ushered Ryan in, looking over her shoulder. She jumped into the front passengers.

"Seatbelt," she ordered.

"Does it drive itself?" Ryan asked, staring at the steering wheel with an awed expression.

"Don't be thick," she told him, rolling her eyes. Why did Foe's gang what this pudgy little kid? She understood that with Fletcher, who was also a stupid kid, he had been an annoying but very useful young teleporter, but this kid seemed to be a mortal as far as she could see, and as far as all their information they'd gotten from the Sanctuary. A mortal with enough money and fear to push him to get a plane to America when he started being hunted by magical mercenaries, but nothing very special by any accounts.

Tanith and Dexter came sprinting out of the exit together, jumping into the car and taking off quickly. Ryan shrieked at the speed they started off with, but Valkyrie was happy to leave that place behind her. She texted the Sanctuary clean up unit that was trailing behind them, cleaning their dirty work, about the mess.

.*****.

Their ride through the traffic to wherever Dexter was taking them was interesting for sure. Ryan seemed very confused, looking between Tanith and Dexter with awe, obvious attraction and a little upset. He didn't seem to be comfortable looking at Dexter because Dexter was hot enough to make him blush and that didn't seem to be the reaction Ryan wanted from himself. And Tanith was a beautiful blonde woman with all the breasts and curves a young man could want, but she was also pumping said boobs and that was also making Ryan uncomfortable. He spent a long time staring at Valkyrie instead but that was annoying so she told him not to as she explained that magic was a thing and that they were a team designed to keep mortals like him safe from bad guys.

"You're just going to have to accept some things," she ended up telling him, taking a deep breath. "As it is, we're your best shot at surviving what's going on right now, alright?"

"Okay?" He said, unsure. His eyes kept flicking over to Dexter who had finally noticed Ryan's uncomfortable interest and had started to smirk. Ryan put his eyes on his lap and seemed to make an effort not to look up. "But all that went on in the library. It's going to be all over the news."

"Actually," Valkyrie said, "it's not. We have people for that sort of things, magic people called Sensitives. Sometime in the next few minutes, some nice Sensitives are going to turn up at that library and convince everyone in there that what they saw didn't actually happen. And they'll believe it. See, some Sensitives can see the future, and some can read minds. And others can convince you to believe anything they say to you. Another Sensitive was a man called Deacon Maybury. Which is where you come in."

"I've never heard of him," Ryan replied, glancing at Tanith as she pulled her shirt back up. He missed the view, and lucky for him too because Tanith would have hit him for trying to sneak a look at her breast.

"Of course not," she said, trying to be sympathetic. She could still feel the lingering effects of Obloquy's magic and stared rummaging around her pockets for a numbing leaf. "I hadn't either until about an hour ago when we got a call about those people trying to hurt you. Those people being Foe's gang. They told us about you and that it's believed Foe's gang killed Deacon's brother, Davit. They were sextuplets, apparently. Six identical Maybury's. Only four now though."

"This Deacon Maybury, he's dead too?"

Dexter pulled up the hand brake as they settled into the city traffic. "Deacon was a Sensitive who worked for the Sanctuary, our government. That's who we work for, except in Ireland, usually. Sometimes we arrest criminals that are so evil or messed up in the head there just isn't any redemption. Deacon had the power to do a procedure where, if the criminal's mind was weak enough, he'd enter their thoughts and make a new personality. The old one would be subdued and the new personality would give the individual a new life and chance at a future. Usually, he gave them no knowledge of magic so they'd be less dangerous. Generally he did it for the very mentally sick or badly abused people, or genuine medically accepted psychopaths. It's controversial at best and I don't think anyone really knows how to feel about it."

"But he got bored," Valkyrie interjected before Dexter could start making a debate of the subject. "Deacon's friends say he wanted more money and power, so he fell in with the wrong crowd, Foe and his gang. They're bad people and involved in a lot of crap I'll spare you knowing about. We usually deal with people who want to end the world, that's what I've been specially trained to deal with since I was twelve. Some criminals want to take it over, some want to change it. Foe and his gang are in a special little category for people that want to utterly obliterate it. They're suicidal idiots."

"Nihilists," Tanith provided.

"Idiots," she repeated. "The Sanctuary think they want to set off something called the Doomsday Machine, Ryan. It's as stupid as it sounds. Some genius went ahead and built a genuine world-destroying bomb so that if the Faceless Ones ever came back to our planet, we could destroy ourselves and the Faceless so no other planet has to deal with them."

"Faceless Ones?"

"Don't complicate it Val," Tanith said, rearranging all the little plastic baggies of milk she had in the freezer bag at her feet.

"Sorry. Don't worry about that Ryan, just know that this Machine is shit and not good news for any of us. Foe's gang have actually found this Machine and they hid it. Which must have been hard because it's apparently as big as a house."

"Why didn't they just set it off?" He frowned.

"They didn't have the key. They've been looking on and off between other projects of mayhem for the last few years, and after Deacon joined them, he seemed to have found it. He hid the key, shaped like a clasp, to sell to the highest bidder like _another_ fucking idiot."

"Cub, calm down," Dexter said soothingly, putting a hand on her thigh. She took a breath and put the leaf in her mouth. "The thing is, Ryan, after Deacon hid the key, Foe and the others caught up to him and he fell in a woodchipper."

Ryan winced.

"Yeah, pretty bad. They now have to find that hidden key and supposedly no one knows where it is. Except, since Deacon died, they've been chasing you around, which leads us to believe you know something."

"I did find a clasp," he said, frowning worriedly and looking between them all. Valkyrie's eyes bugged and she turned in her seat to take the stupid thing. He continued hurriedly. "But it turned to dust in my hand when I touched it. It's gone!"

"Show me your hand," she commanded. He did and she saw the pretty picture the clasp had left behind, burnt onto his skin. "I'm afraid that clasp must have absorbed itself into your skin. It imprinted on you. You are the key now. That means Foe and co will be all the more desperate to find you because they need you to activate the Doomsday Machine, not a key. I'm sorry Ryan, but you're going to have to stick with us until we have them in shackles, alright?"

"Okay," he said quietly. He blushed darkly when Tanith grabbed his wrist to look over the pattern.


	175. Bad hair day

**Chapter 175**

As the next step in their mission, they decided to go to the Maybury Las Vegas family apartment. The brothers had bought it together, but really, only Deacon used it. Or that's what his brothers told Dexter. Since they knew Foe's gang were in America with them, they sent one of the other Maybury brothers to go check on Deacon's apartment in Ireland while they checked the American one in hopes of some extra hidden clues that Deacon may have left in America to conceal his footsteps.

"I find it incredibly unlikely we'll get anything here," Valkyrie muttered to Dexter's back. The apartment complex was quite nice despite it not being in any sort of celebrity part of the city, but the stairs were narrow and the building smelt sort of musty. For such an expensive city, Valkyrie supposed the tall, clear windows and the thin but spotless stairs was pretty good going.

"His brother just text me that Deacon was in America only three days before his woodchipper incident in Ireland," Dexter said, turning back to grin at her. "They found the plane tickets. So actually, we may well be on the right track."

"Alright, Detective Vex," Valkyrie said, her own hopes lifting as well as her smile. "How you doing, Ryan?"

He was breathing heavily from the three flights of stairs they'd already walked. Another three to go. "Okay."

"Good to know."

They got to the sixth floor and went directly to the apartment. It was trashed. Papers were all over the floor, the sofa had been slashed over all its cushions and had most of the stuffing pulled out. All the pictures and other artefacts had been damaged or ruined. Valkyrie sent Dexter to the bedrooms to search and Tanith helped him while Valkyrie took the small office nook.

"What are we looking for in this mess?" Tanith called out.

"Foe secured the Doomsday Machine somewhere," Valkyrie called back. "We need to find out where. Maybe we'll get lucky and discover Deacon was an avid journal-keeper or some shit like that. At the very least, if nothing takes us to the Machine, there might be some name or reference that'll bring us closer to that."

The bookshelf above her chose that moment to fall on her head and books spilt over the floor. She swore and jumped back, glaring at the mess.

She looked up and caught Ryan smiling at her. She just tutted, at her own misfortune and that of Ryan finding humour in her hour of absolute need and went to talk to him for a moment while she looked over the papers on the floor. "I hate looking for clues," she said.

"Isn't that the biggest part of being a detective?" Ryan asked, still looking at her with more and more obviously admiration.

"I prefer the bit where I hit people," she said, turning her back on him to stop seeing the expression on his face. The kid must only be fifteen or sixteen, a little pudgy but not large by any means. Just small enough to still be healthy by any person's measurement but not so small as to avoid being bullied. Which may not have been too bad except that his face was not the most handsome, and that wasn't too bad either, except he obviously hadn't washed it even with a splash of water in a while, and he didn't seem to have brushed his hair recently, or perhaps his life. The uncaring, slumped way he stood didn't help. He looked desperate for a bit of attention, maybe even a compliment, and on one hand she'd love to give that to the kid so he'd be a bit more confident, and she was sure Nadia would want her to give him some advice about upkeeping his appearance too – but he looked the type of desperate-for-a-compliment where he'd decide Valkyrie was his one true love if she dared. She tried to think of a middle ground. "Perhaps I just have a violent nature though. We could all do with being a bit more peace-keeping, like you."

There was a pause from Ryan. "Why am I peace-keeping?" He asked with a frown.

"Well, you did sort of scream a lot in the library and were pretty terrible at the violence stuff. So I figured you were peace-keeping," she told him, keeping the smile to herself as she started rummaging through the drawers in the living area.

He spluttered a bit and wrung his hands. "Just because I don't go around getting into fights every day doesn't mean I can't fight."

"Hey, not being good at violence is nothing to be ashamed of," she said, not helping the grin she sent him. He went very red. "If there were more peace-keeping people in the world there'd be less need for violence from people like me. I'd be more than happy being pushed out of my job because everyone loved each other. I'm not sure what I'd do, but I'd still be happy about it."

He didn't say anything again for a moment and then he let out a shout. Valkyrie's head snapped over to see Ryan holding a hand over his heart and a little middle-aged lady in the doorway.

"Hello there," Valkyrie smiled charmingly – she could almost put her brothers to shame with her smile now. "How are you? Come in if you like, it's alright. Who are you exactly…?"

"Francine," the woman said, a little flustered. Tanith abandoned her looking but Dexter diligently keep going. Francine looked between Tanith, Valkyrie and Ryan. "I live down the hall… What are you doing in Deacon's apartment?"

"You know Deacon?" Valkyrie asked. Or maybe just one of Deacon's brothers using his name since they were all identical and mostly the real Deacon came here so it helped to stay conspicuous, but still. Francine followed her into the room and sat on one of the undamaged wooden chairs as Tanith checked the hallway and closed the door.

"Well, yes," Francine said, frowning at Valkyrie and then at Ryan. "He's my neighbour and he's a good man. If you're robbing him then I must say–"

"I promise, we're not robbing him," Valkyrie soothed quickly. "However, there is some bad news. Mr Maybury was already robbed. Myself and my two associates are investigators, and this is our young student-shadower for today. We're doing our best to find whoever damaged Mr Maybury's property."

"Oh," she said. "And Deacon, is he okay?"

Valkyrie hesitated. "Actually, no. No he's not. Unfortunately, he was killed."

"He's dead?"

"He is. It was not here, and we don't think this robbery has anything to do with his death. It was of… natural causes." If slipping into a woodchipper was natural.

Francine slumped and moaned about how awful it was. "Oh, Lord, why did you take him," she cried loudly. She turned to Valkyrie, grasping her hand. "Tell me, how did he die?"

Valkyrie hesitated again. "He fell. Into a woodchipper."

Francine gasped and then burst out crying. "Oh, no, Deacon. My poor, poor Deacon!"

"I'm very sorry for your loss," she said, putting a hand on Francine's shoulder. "I'm sure he was a great guy."

This did nothing to sooth Francine and Valkyrie was starting to feel quite uncomfortable as Francine started blubbering and asking her god questions. She turned to Ryan and he took a step forwards, a sympathetic look on his face.

"You obviously love him very much," he said.

Francine released her. "I did."

"I'm sure he loved you back."

"Did he ever mention me?"

Ryan's eyes widened and he glanced at Valkyrie who had moved around the other side of the woman to keep searching. She smirked at him. "All the time," he lied, nodding at Francine too much. "Yes. God, every time I spoke to him he was all, Francine this and Francine that and… ohh, how I love Francine."

"He said that? You knew him?"

"Yes, I met him at the place I'm working, shadowing these… people. He definitely said those things."

Francine gasped dramatically and Valkyrie rolled her eyes and she shuffled through a dresser. "I knew it. I knew he loved me. All those long silences. All those awkward moments. I should have told him I felt the same way. Then we could have – then we could have…"

She started sobbing again and Valkyrie couldn't help the sarcastic thumbs up she sent Ryan's way.

"Did you talk to Deacon much?" Tanith asked. "Did you tell each other about your days? Confide in each other?"

"With a love like ours," she warbled, "we didn't need words."

"How inconvenient," Valkyrie muttered into the drawers.

"Francine, we're looking for something Deacon actually left for us, as well as clues as to who did this. We worked with him, you see. He left us a mobile house. Do you know of any places he'd keep that, perhaps a warehouse?"

"Well, I overheard him on the phone once talking about paperwork for a warehouse cluttering up his files if that helps."

"It does," Tanith said, a frown on her own face as she immediately turned to help them with finding the papers. At least they had a good chance of finding something here then.

Ryan spoke with the lady some more and agreed to help her back to her apartment. A good five or six minutes went by and Valkyrie was starting to get antsy about Ryan being gone, so she went down the hall to go check on him and knocked on the only other apartment this side of the floor, calling Francine's name.

She knocked again when she heard no answer. "Francine?" She tried again. "Is Ryan in there with you?"

A little something sparked in her gut as bad news and she gestured for Tanith and Dexter to come over, as they had been looking out Deacon's door to see if she was alright. She tried again and then heard the sound of something like flesh on flesh, so she kicked the door open just as Ryan was thrown against a window and bounced back in, shattering the glass. All four of Foe's gang was there and no Francine.

She jumped straight into the fight just to get punched so hard by Samuel she folded mid-air. She shouted for Ryan to run as she staggered to her feet and faced the vampire again. Ryan stumbled out of the room and she'd barely been grappling with Samuel for ten seconds when he tossed her through the wall, chipboard and plaster exploding into the hall. She rolled to her feet and noticed Ryan standing at the top of the stairs dumbly. "Run!"

Things happened very quickly. Obloquy came striding out of the apartment with his eyes locked on Ryan, making him double over in pain. Valkyrie, feeling the ache in her muscles even with her protective clothing, pulled herself around the bannister and pushed her arms out, slinging twin jets of energy into him. He was hit hard enough to be thrown and then writhed on the floor, and she noticed Mercy behind her at the same time as Ryan shouted, but wasn't quick enough to avoid being hit by the red energy coming from her mouth.

She was thrown back and the stream kept coming, singing her hair badly. It didn't hurt but she still let out a short scream right before Tanith tackled Mercy to the ground. Valkyrie patted her hair out and watched the ends fall to the floor. It was less than shoulder length! Her hair!

She growled and looked up at Mercy with pure malice. She'd ruined her fucking hair!

There wasn't much she could do right then though as Obloquy had stopped spasming and looked like he was trying to stand back up and Ryan had grabbed at her sleeve. He pulled her down the stairs to the fifth floor and she acted on automatic, putting her hands against the glass and letting out just a tiny amount of energy to shatter the glass. It fell away.

"Come on," she said, feeling the back of her hair was still shoulder blade length. This was worse than it all being ruined, now she had to go out of her way to have the rest cut! She growled again and grabbed the drainpipe, lowering herself down to ground level.

She looked up, wanting to shout at Ryan for taking forever, but didn't get a chance as Tanith had jumped out the window and grabbed Ryan's waist, holding him as she ran down the side of the building. She jumped the last bit, almost making Ryan pee himself, and then set him right.

"Okay?" Valkyrie asked him.

He just sort of whimpered.

"Oh, no," Tanith suddenly said, eyes wide. She grabbed at Valkyrie's hair and some more fell off. "Oh no, this isn't good at all."

"It's Mercy's fault," she growled, fists balling up.

Tanith tutted. "Well, I might have broken her nose."

"You should have cut it off."

Tanith snorted a laugh as Dexter came barrelling out the front of the building. They jumped into their car and started off quickly, Valkyrie slouching and crossing her arms angrily as Tanith told the cleaning unit behind them what to expect.

"They'll have some fun explaining this one," she sighed, putting the phone away.

Valkyrie grunted.

"Aww, it's not that bad Val. You know, when it's all cleaned up, I bet you'll look good with short hair," Tanith said supportively.

"We'll have to cut off the burnt bits soon though," Dexter said. "No offence, but burnt hair makes me sick."

It did smell pretty bad. They drove a fair distance and then Valkyrie switched seats with Ryan so Tanith could cut off the ends and the back so it was all the same length with Valkyrie's flip-blade. It came out a bit shorter than a bob with no layers or anything to make it look nice. It did not suit her at all. She looked stupid. She had an obnoxiously short bob. She glared at herself in the mirror.

"Nadia's going to hate it," she said, closing her eyes and putting her head back.

"No she won't," Dexter said.

"I'm going to look like a butch lesbian."

"That's mean to all the butch lesbians."

"Are you saying my hair is so bad that I'm offending people with my existence, Dexter?" Valkyrie asked, glaring at the back of his head.

He let out a laugh. "No, I meant you hating your hair and liking it to an entire group of people is offensive. You're going to look great Cub, I promise. I'm sure we can find a hairdresser that can fix you up before we go back to the hotel. And if I'm honest, you look more like a really cheap Karen."

"Oh my god," she just muttered, covering her face with her hands. "I only had it cut a few weeks ago."

"You'd look good as a butch lesbian," Tanith said suddenly, and Valkyrie looked at her. Tanith burst out laughing. "It's not that bad!"

"Well, maybe it isn't, but it's not what I'm going for at all!" She practically shouted. She felt herself go red. "I hate it. I hate everything, but more than anything I hate Mercy."

"Aww, I think you like her," Dexter grinned.

"I think you think she's really pretty and you have a crush on her," Tanith continued.

Valkyrie glared at them. "I fucking don't. I hate her. And you know what, I want a haircut before anything else fucking happens, if anyone sees me like this I'll be mocked."

"We can't, we have to go to that Crasis dude," Dexter told her.

"Who?"

"He's the only guy I can think of that could have made Mercy look like Francine. He's retired now, but he did a lot of work in the war and he relocated around here some fifty years ago. We'll visit him and see if he worked with Mercy, and if so, why."

"At least you're shaping up to be a competent detective," she grouched, pulling out her phone to look up some salons she could run into. There had to be one. Even on New Year's Eve, there had to be one.


	176. Dexter and Tanith: Turned Detective

**Chapter 176**

They found a hairdresser on the way to Crasis' house. He lived way out on the outskirts and they had to get Fletcher to take them over that way and then get a taxi, but that far out they were able to find someone decent with time available for her, at least. It only took half an hour, but it did look a lot better. It was just very… boyish. She'd always had such feminine hair, always mid-shoulder blade or longer except when it had been ruined by a criminal. And very suddenly it was short. She was encouraged, between Tanith and the hairdresser, to get an undercut. There was no other hope for her anyway, the burning had gone up the hair to almost the skin, so if it wasn't cut out it would fall out likely the next time she showered anyway. So she was left with an undercut.

The bits on top were long enough to sort of flop – her hair was very straight and flat like Gordon's so it really was just a sort of flop, there was no other way to describe it – but not long enough to tie back. However, since the damage was mostly at the back, the top still had enough hair to be left down with a side parting to give her a very androgynous bob-like cut, or be tied back in a man-bun. Neither looked right on her, she hated the whole thing, and she wanted to cry, but at least it looked intentional. That was what she told to herself as she pretended to love it for the stressed-out hairdresser's wellbeing, who believed she'd accidentally set herself on fire with a sparkler.

The one thing that had make it better was the hairdresser had called over the barber from the other side of the shop and he'd put some mousse in it and now it was sort of messy and that did look good. The only issue there was that any time she got into a fight it was going to get ruined, and she actually had to upkeep it, and honestly, she still kind of hated it, but it was better than it was. She still hadn't told Nadia.

Dexter had to ask around a lot and pull more than one personal favour to get the address of Crasis, who they found out had married a mortal and wasn't using magic anymore. That had shocked Valkyrie, but in the last half hour of their taxi ride, she supposed she understood. If Nadia suddenly lost her magic and was going to age and die a mortal death… she'd probably give up her magic to be with her. She'd rather live and die with the woman she loved than live on hundreds of years without her. That just made her heart ache for Skulduggery. To lose a wife, a person so loved, would kill her. To lose a future baby she could have with Nadia – she took a deep breath and shook that thought away. She wouldn't think of that. She had to focus on Ryan and then go crying to Nadia tomorrow morning when the mess of New Years was officially over.

"I should warn you," Dexter said as they watched the taxi drive off where it had dropped them off right outside Crasis' house. "The Dead Men didn't really get on with Crasis in the war."

"What does that mean?" Tanith asked.

"It means Skulduggery and Crasis butted heads a lot," Dexter told them. "Crasis wanted to be involved in tactics more since we used a lot of his time and effort in our plans, but Skulduggery never liked his ideas and since Skulduggery was making plans on behalf of the Dead Men in those instances and it didn't involve anyone other than us, he always got his way. And Crasis never really liked us a whole lot for it."

"Ah, no one likes Skulduggery," Valkyrie said with a shrug. "We only want to know what he did. I doubt he doesn't want help if Mercy forced him into anything anyway."

"What's the Dead Men?" Ryan asked her when Dexter went and knocked on Crasis' door.

"It's a group of people that did very difficult missions in a war you don't know about," she said and pushed him towards the door.

When Robert Crasis opened the door, he looked at Dexter and his jaw clenched. His eyes flicked over Valkyrie and Tanith while Ryan stayed out of the way. "Can I help you?" He asked them.

"Hello Robert," Dexter said in his kind voice. She'd only heard him pull that one out on very, very special occasions. "We'd just like to have a word, if that's alright?"

Robert considered him for a moment and then opened the door. They were let into a hallway but he opened another door to his immediate right and ushered them into the large double garage that he'd turned into a workshop of sorts. There was sawdust everywhere, and some flecks of resin and plastic. It smelt strongly of varnish, and a drying six door wardrobe stood by the garage door.

"This reminds me of your place in Venice," Dexter tried with a smile, putting his hands into his pockets to look extra sweet.

"Before it burnt down," Crasis responded. "Vex, I don't mean to be rude, but I was really hoping never to see you again."

"You know why we're here," Valkyrie stepped in.

Crasis shook his head, the muscles in his jaw tightening. "All I want is to be left alone. I'm out of the game but people… people keep pulling me back in. After years of not being involved in any craziness, it's suddenly one after the other and I just want to be left alone to grow old."

"We appreciate that," Valkyrie said politely. "We're not asking you to do any magic. We just want to ask about the people that did."

"Well, that's Vincent Foe and his idiots. Deacon Maybury, the twat, had mentioned what I did for the Sanctuary, and they remembered. Of course they remembered. So they came in, threatened me, threatened my wife, my kids… What could I do?"

"We're not blaming you," Dexter said softly.

"So I did it. I turned the woman, Charient, into a frumpy little woman. It wasn't my best work but it would have held for a few hours I expect. I'm sorry if anyone got hurt, but I have to protect my family first and I knew you Dead Men lot were in the area anyway. I figured you'd not be that bad off."

"We weren't," Valkyrie said. "But you should know, Deacon's idiocy caught up with him and he was killed not long ago."

Crasis looked at her for a moment, saying nothing, and then swallowed and looked at the floor. "That's a shame," he said, eyes drifting down. "He was… I'd like to say a good man but I'm not so sure. He was the one to introduce me to Sarah, my wife. He had asked her out and she laughed so hard she fell over. And when we met it was like love at first sight. So I owed him. It's a… it's a pity I won't be able to repay him."

Ryan chose to open his bottle of coke and it fizzed out over the floor, making them all look at him. He looked up from the mess he made and blushed. "Sorry."

"Perhaps you can repay him still," Tanith said, leaning against a table. "Maybe one of Foe's gang said something when they were here we could use? They have the Doomsday Machine hidden somewhere nearby–"

"They have the Doomsday Machine?!" He said, a little panic in his voice. He took a deep breath and put his hands out. "Deacon was working with them and knew about this?"

"As far as we can tell. He found the key and tried selling it instead of handing it to them and got himself killed. We've found it but they know and now it's something of a race," Valkyrie said darkly.

Crasis looked between all four of them before glaring at the floor. "Then it's a good job Deacon's dead or else I'd kill him myself. I did hear something, actually. I heard Obloquy complaining that there were always people around when they were checking on 'it'. They didn't say what it was but I assume now it's the Machine. Mercy was meant to stay quiet while I worked but she kept moving and joining in on the conversation and joked that if their car broke down they'd have to take the monorail to the end of the world. I told her to be quiet so I could work, but I should have let her keep talking."

"You wouldn't happen to have a map of the city would you?" Valkyrie asked. "Or know where the monorail stops at?"

Crasis grunted and left them alone for a few moments before coming back with a large picture frame which he set on the table Tanith had lent on. Valkyrie saw a white marking pen and took it over to the frame. "Can I use this?"

He took it from her and drew where the monorail stopped, which was in seven places.

"The Machine will be in a public place," Dexter said.

"These are all heavily populated places," Crasis said. "Especially on New Year's."

"Where are these stops?" Tanith asked.

"The M.G.M Grand Hotel and Casino, the Paris tourist trap, Caesars Palace resort which is next to that Flamingo park, Harrah's casino and the Linq Hotel, The Convention Center, Westgate, and finally the Sahara," Crasis listed, pointing to all the spots. "It's a tourist area though, there are hundreds of places they could fit the Machine between any one of those spots."

"It is a lot," Ryan said from besides Crasis, putting his bottle down and looking at the map with a fake serious expression.

"Could you take your bottle off the map please," Valkyrie asked, getting a little ticked off at him.

"Oh, sorry."

"The heaviest populated areas would be here and here if they were going to do this today. They'll have the most stuff going on. It won't be in either of these places because they'd never get to the Machine, and they'd never of had a moment to stash it there let alone get in to set it off. They're full of security," Dexter said.

Crasis circled them. "This area in between those could work."

"But the Convention Centre could be more ideal," Valkyrie said, pointing to the little circle Ryan had made on the map.

Of course, Ryan chose then to choke on his drink and spray his spit all over Valkyrie.

There was silence as Valkyrie stood up straight, wipe her face of spit and then gave Ryan the meanest look she could muster.

"Sorry," he squeaked, putting the lid on his coke and continuing to cough and splitter.

"Maybe you should get some air," Dexter told him.

"Okay," he wheezed, almost running for the door.

"There's a bathroom under the stairs," Crasis told her, and Valkyrie stalked off without a word.

She had a long chat with herself in her head about how she should not murder little boys before going to the toilet and scrubbing her face a second time with water, glaring at her hair each time she remembered its new problem. She took a long deep breath.

She exited the bathroom and decided to go see Ryan outside. Not because she wanted to kill him, but rather because she was actually concerned someone else might turn up and kill him. Also, she kind of wanted to kill him.

"How're you doing, Ryan?" She asked. Her voice was softer, less angry than she expected it to be.

He looked over at her and looked away quickly. "Oh. I'm okay. I'm really sorry I spit on you."

"I'm clean now," she said, sitting on the short, brick front garden wall in front of the house. "Hmm, why do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"You keep looking away from me. Is there something you want to say?"

"What? No, no, sorry," he said, glancing at her and away. She smiled. "I just don't want to stare, you know. I don't know how long to look before it's weird so I try not to look at anyone for too long."

She chuckled. "I guess. You're an oddball."

He looked deeper into the ground.

"But that's okay. We're all oddballs really. You're coping pretty well you know." He looked up as she got a text and he was quiet as she answered it. It was Nadia, sending her cute messages and asking how the day was going. She gave her a text back and put it away. "Have you had any calls from your family? I thought you'd be asking to go home."

He coloured up and looked away. "Why would I? You're not that much older than me."

She snorted a laugh. "So?"

"I'm fifteen. You're, like, seventeen, right?"

"Yeah?"

"That's only two years difference," he said hotly, kicking at the ground and glancing at her every so often. "We're practically the same age and you're treating me like I'm a child. Fine, okay? You have no interest in me. I'm used to that. But don't stand there and talk down to me like you're so much better than I am."

She gave him a long look, eyebrows raised. She folded her arms and leaned back enough to regard him better. He just spat on her and now she was apparently talking down to him? She was trying to be nice through all of this. "I'm not talking down to you or treating you like a child. I promise you that."

"But you expected me to want to go home like a kid."

"Yes, because you suffered a shock. You learnt about a lot of crap and you ran away from home to America to get away from this group of terrorist who specifically want to kill you. Why would you not be scared and afraid and want to go home? Tanith and Dexter are my adoptive siblings, in a way. I hug them. I've slept in their arms before when I've been that upset. I know strong, war-hardened men who hold each other at night to keep nightmares away. It's got nothing to do with age, it's just that times are shit and you deserve to have someone help you. Usually, people turn to their family at times like that. That's all I meant by what I said. What does that have to do with any interest of any type?"

Ryan was actually looking at her now and he looked more upset and embarrassed. "Oh."

"And the only time you have acted like a child is right now," she told him. "I don't particularly like petulance, Ryan. I don't respond well to it from anyone older than five."

"Right."

"So what does this have anything to do with some interest? I've been trying to keep you alive since I met you, haven't I?"

"Err, nothing," he said, looking away again.

"Don't make me ask you again."

He winced. "I don't know, I was just – I thought you saw me as a, you know, kid and… I was just saying that while, obviously, you'd never, like, go out with someone like me, that's still no reason to talk down to me. Which you weren't doing, and I apologise again for thinking you were."

She looked at him a moment and her mouth turning into a grin – he fancied her. That's why he was all embarrassed. "Ryan, that is very sweet. But I'm afraid you're not really my type."

"Sure. Yeah. I get that."

"It's not that I'd never date someone like you, it's just that I couldn't."

"Sure. Yeah, absolutely."

"Because I'm a lesbian."

He stilled for a minute. "Oh. Right. I guess, the jokes in the car…"

"I was being serious. In fact, I'm actually engaged."

"Oh. I – I'm sorry, I didn't know."

"Don't apologise, it's fine," she said, smiling at him. "I don't want this to be weird, alright? It's okay to have crushes on anyone you like. Just don't take out your unrequited feelings on me by getting angry at little things like me worrying for you."

"I won't. Again, I mean. I'm sorry."

"It's fine."

Dexter and Tanith came out of the house, both with big grins. "We've solved the mystery!" Dexter announced.

"Am I out of the job?" Valkyrie smirked.

"So far you may as well pack up and go home right now," Tanith grinned.

"Oh really?"

"Yep. You were right about it being at the Convention Centre, but we know exactly where it is because we are amazing detectives," Dexter smirked. "We'd better go back to the pickup spot so Fletcher can take us there."


	177. The end of Ryan

**Chapter 177**

Getting to the Convention Centre was a pain and a half and they had to throw the Sanctuary off of them multiple times as they insisted that they must have finished with their assignment because they had finished all the other assignments quickly. Even Ryan had pulled a face at that logic.

Once at the Convention Centre, Valkyrie followed Dexter and Tanith through security, having left all their weapons behind in the car, far away. A massive building like this had a lot of security and Valkyrie found it hard to believe that a bomb the size of a building had been brought in – that was, until they snuck out the back side and went over to the North Hall, a little out of the way of the main building, and they all saw the building work. It had all been abandoned for the holiday, which surprised Valkyrie considering how much money this construction must be costing, but she was very grateful. They just had to disarm the bomb and have it destroyed before Foe's gang did the opposite.

There were four halls, so it certainly took some time, but Valkyrie was the one to find it, Ryan practically stuck to her hip as she walked around. She pulled the tarp off the box, which was built into the back of a stage with room for performances before the grand finale of setting off the Machine. It was a monstrosity of a box but also a lot smaller than Valkyrie had been led to believe. It must have been the height of a lorry, and slightly wider in width but not massively. Very metallic and almost crude from the outside, very simple. It almost baffled Valkyrie that this box was enough to destroy the entire world, but she still pushed Ryan further behind her body, just in case he tripped into the control panel and ended them all.

"You found it," Tanith's voice echoed into the dark room. All the blinds were closed and they hadn't turned on the lights. "It's smaller than I expected."

"Same. We should call the Sanctuary to have them disassemble it. Maybe Kenspeckle would be willing to help."

"He is a genius," Tanith said in a sing-song voice, pulling out her phone to speak to the Sanctuary.

"Is this really it?" Ryan said after a moment of silence when Tanith had left the room.

Valkyrie looked over the Doomsday Machine, taking Ryan off the stage and down to the open floor. "Seems like it. We'll find out when it's taken apart, I suppose."

Ryan screwed his face up. "But… what if it isn't? And Foe's gang are somewhere else? Ready to, you know, capture me?"

"You can't think like that, Ryan," she said quietly, looking at the floor. "Right now, Nadia and Tanith's baby are at our hotel, alone. There's nothing Nadia can do to protect them both, she's not a fighter at all. She's a sweet girl, suited to being at the home and looking after her friends and family, maybe running a business and some employees. I'm not being mean to her, it's just that she's a home girl, strong in a lot of other ways, and that puts her in danger because people could seriously harm her and the baby to get to the rest of us. If I think about that for too long then I'd never be able to leave her alone. And that's not fair to either of us."

Ryan looked at her with a bit lip. "Has she been hurt before?"

"Yes. Recently. We're training her to be stronger but she'd never want to be at the level she'd need to be to stand against people like Foe's gang. Any one of them would have her dead in less than five seconds. They could have done that already and I wouldn't know for hours because I'm here with you instead, or any other mission. She knows the risks of dating me and so do I but – well, what else can I do but not think about the bad bits and focus on the positive?"

Ryan didn't seem to know what to say back to that so he just nodded. Tanith came back into the room and told them the Sanctuary was on the way and Dexter followed her, having already gotten Kenspeckle's agreeance to take apart the Machine.

"That wasn't so hard," Dexter grinned, stretching and putting his hands on the back of his head, showing off a sliver of waist and a trail of hair. Valkyrie caught Tanith looking and shoved her.

Tanith went to fight back when they all heard a laugh ring out. Valkyrie sense something behind her and spun around to see nothing but the Machine. There was another laugh, this time from somewhere else and Ryan squeaked, grabbing Valkyrie's arm. She pushed him off.

"Who's there?" Valkyrie asked the dark.

"You don't recognise me?" The voice giggled. "Not even Sword Girl?"

Tanith growled. "It's Springheeled Jack," she said simply.

Valkyrie knew, vaguely, who that was. Something not human, but certainly humanoid. It considered itself male and could jump to extreme heights and lengths but seemed to be the only of its kind. It thought and acted like a human, bar the psychopathic tendencies, but its face… it was said to be naturally slightly green, hideous, possessed claws and he always wore a hat that never fell off, much to Tanith's aggravation.

"Come out, Jack," Valkyrie called. "We would like to talk to you."

"So you can just arrest me again?" He called back from somewhere else.

"Well, I've never arrested you before, have I? I'm sure Tanith can restrain herself for a little while," Valkyrie replied.

There was a good thirty seconds of no sounds at all. Valkyrie, Tanith and Dexter were ready to fight or bargain and were getting antsy, when they realised there was a scuffle somewhere and three people fell into view from behind a tarp. Remus Crux, Springheeled Jack and that idiot, Vaurien Scapegrace. On the other side of the room, a tut, followed by Mercy, Foe and Samuel. Obloquy wasn't with them.

"You found the Machine, then," Foe said, ignoring the three men that were standing themselves up. Valkyrie glared viciously at Mercy, who smirked back.

"Your pet doesn't look so good," Dexter said, looking at Samuel who was tense with his vanes popping out. It must be getting late. Valkyrie had thought it was still afternoon, but she supposed it must be evening. They really didn't need a vampire running loose in here.

Foe shrugged. "He's taken the last drop of his serum and that's all that's keeping him from ripping off his skin and killing us all right now. Your boyfriend took something similar didn't he, kid? What was his name? Caelan?"

Valkyrie took a moment to catch up to what he meant and then snarled at him. "Don't you talk about that."

"Bad break-up was it? Actually, don't answer that. I already heard about it," he grinned viciously.

"I thought you were a lesbian?" Ryan muttered.

Foe smiled, Mercy laughed and Valkyrie swatted him with the back of her hand. "See?" Mercy snickered. "Told you he fancies her."

She felt her hackles raise. "Shut up about him," she snapped. "What's the matter, Mercy – jealous that he likes me and no one in their right mind would ever like you?"

Mercy glared. "Plenty have liked me."

"Yeah," Valkyrie said, "I've heard."

Mercy's glare turned to a scowl. "Not like that."

"You don't have to justify yourself to me."

"Says the girl who defends her father after he caused a terrorist attack."

Valkyrie was about to retaliate but Crux beat her to it – "Shut up, both of you!" He shouted, storming away from Jack and Scapegrace to stand next to the maniacs. "Stop calling each other sluts and let's get this over with!"

Both Mercy and Valkyrie froze for half a moment. "Excuse me?" Mercy hissed.

"I never called her that," Valkyrie defended, watching Jack hop up on top of the Doomsday Machine out of the corner of her eye. He seemed to be enjoying the show. Scapegrace was just cowering behind them. "That's just too far."

"Enough!" Crux snarled. "Our Master gave us the orders. Get the boy. Kill the rest. Enough talk."

Crux pulled a giant machete out from under his coat. Valkyrie put her hand up. "Wait! I have to ask something first!" Crux and Foe's gang stopped. "Why do you want to destroy the world?"

She saw Jack's head tilt but he made no move. "There's no more need for its existence," Mercy snapped. "There's no point in life."

"And the Doomsday Machine will really blow it all up? Including you?"

Mercy didn't reply, she just launched herself towards them.

Valkyrie pushed Ryan behind her and Dexter dropped his phone that he'd been texting for reinforcements on and met Mercy's attack. She pushed the woman back with her fist, and then rolled to the side to avoid the stream of energy coming from Mercy's mouth. Ryan screamed behind her but wasn't hurt. It melted the ground everywhere it touched. She desperately wanted to get this bitch arrested – or other otherwise end her – today.

Tanith was thrown bodily into Mercy a moment later, cutting off the stream. Valkyrie took her moment as the other women rolled to their feet and touched Mercy on the head, pouring energy into her skull. Mercy jigged and fell to her knees, her hair catching fire, and Valkyrie let go quickly as she felt bile rise in her throat. She hadn't meant it to be that strong. She almost put out the flames when she suddenly turned and had to punch Scapegrace in the face, making him cry out and fall to the ground with a whimper.

She saw Ryan being dragged up the stage and Dexter fighting Foe, and then felt a prick of pain in her head. She swirled again, seeing that Mercy was now on her hands and knees – she tried not to be relieved she wasn't actually a brain dead – to see Obloquy running for her. She threw energy at him but he didn't fall to her magic again. He sidestepped and tackled her, immediately causing her extreme, head-splitting pain the second he touched her. She wailed and couldn't move, didn't even feel the crunch of her collar bone or the split in her lip as he punched her.

As soon as it started, it ended. Tanith stood over her, one leg on either side of her torso as she traded hands with Obloquy. The man was sweating badly, obviously exhausted from the exertion on his magic hurting her like that, but she was too weak to see that herself. She stayed staring at the ceiling until the noise came back and she heard her name called and the pain suddenly disappeared as if it never happened at all. She pulled herself to her feet and looked around. Mercy was on the ground, gasping breaths but unconscious. Obloquy had been stabbed but she wasn't sure who by. Dexter had Ryan behind him and they were backed into a corner by Foe who was hunting them. Samuel was beginning to pull his skin off as he transformed, Crux was walking towards her with his knife, and Jack was standing in front of the Machine angrily. She took a breath and focused on Crux.

She ducked his first swipe and kicked him in the crotch. He swung again and she stepped in, pushing his armed hand back and zapping his arm so that he dropped the knife. Unfortunately, she was too slow to stop him from grabbing her around the waist and jumping on her – she fell down, disoriented, feeling his legs wrapped around her arse and bending her spine painfully. She gritted her teeth and headbutted him, feeling the panic when she heard the full-fledged vampire howl. Crux had no cares for that though, punching her back and only grinning manically above her when she started wriggling to get free. She heard her name called again, and saw Tanith drop next to her only to pick up the machete and run at the vampire, having no time for her. Obloquy and Foe were making their escape, leaving them with Mercy and Samuel to deal with. She moved her head, hearing the bones crack in Crux's fist when it collided with the concrete floor. Spittle flew from his mouth onto her face. He flinched back from the pain and she flipped them over, getting the upper hand. She moved so her knees were on his crotch, making him scream, and pounded him with fists, ignoring the burn in her collar even as it forced tears from her eyes.

She had only a moment where she saw the bluish tint of skin and then had thrown herself off of Crux to escape the snapping jaws of the vampire.

It sadly ignored Crux and went only for her, snarling and not caring when she hit it with magic at all. There was no use running – she shouted at it and it roared, jumping up, twisting in mid-air to avoid the steaming magic she sent to turn it to ash, and had the wind blown out of her when it landed on her, racking its claws over her again and again but unable to get through her Bespoke coat.

They both heard Ryan's shouts to get the creature to follow him, and it did. Valkyrie cursed and jumped up to help when Erskine and Anton came skidding into the hall. Erskine put his hand out and the creature soared into the air as far as the ceiling went, and then he pulled his arm down, hard, and the vampire hit the concrete with a sickening _thwack_. Its leg twitched once and then no more.

"Well, fuck me," Valkyrie heaved, hunching over.

Crux laughed behind her and Scapegrace's nervous laugh followed. They all turned on Crux, who walked towards Valkyrie again as if no one else was there.

It didn't take long for Dexter, Anton, Erskine, Tanith and Valkyrie to subdue him and get him in handcuffs alongside the unconscious Mercy and pleading Scapegrace. Jack coughed from the stage.

"Sorry about that," he grinned disgustingly. "It seems I was lied to by this group of foul fellows. You wouldn't mind terribly if I ran along and you didn't fight it, would you? Seeing as how I did save yours and Blondie's lives when you were all knocked out there for a moment, hmm?"

Valkyrie glanced at Tanith, who shrugged. "Will you leave American?" She asked. "We have business here."

He shrugged. "'S'pose I can, Miss. Sorry about the mix up. I don't want nothing to do with blowing up the world."

"Neither," she muttered, and he bounced onto the beams way above them.

"Thank you!" He called, and was gone.

"He's strange," Ryan said.

"Yeah," she said. "Fuck, my head feels awful."

"You were knocked out for at least five minutes," Tanith said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Maybe you should have a rest and meet us later?"

"I was?"

"Obloquy's magic is quite damaging," Anton said. "I did not feel like myself for several days after being subjected to his torture."

"I don't have time for that," she moaned.

"It will get better though," he said with a soft smile.

She sighed and demanded to know when the bomb disposal unit would arrive with Kenspeckle.

"Soon," Dexter said. "But before that, we need to tell you something. You see, when we were at Crasis' house, me and Tanith worked something out."

"Yeah?" She said, sitting on the edge of the stage. When she stayed still, the world didn't spin nearly as much and her thoughts were clearer. It didn't hurt, but it was uncomfortable.

"It's about Ryan. See, he told us Deacon Maybury is actually alive."

"What? Really?" She asked.

"Yep," he smiled, putting a hand around Ryan's shoulders. "Our ride over here confirmed it too. Remember when Ryan put his drink on the map? It circled the Convention Centre. And then he needed to pee three times and made us stop, which caused us delays. And Ryan, you haven't wanted to call home or tell anyone where you are. Isn't it strange that a fifteen-year-old would just travel across countries to escape a group of killers rather than go to the police?"

Ryan tried to pull back but Dexter didn't let him go. Valkyrie started to get worried. "What do you mean? I've travelled alone before, loads! And – and I didn't call home because I was already running away," he admitted with a blush. "It had nothing to do with Foe."

"And then you went to the library," Dexter continued. "You knew exactly where to go to get that key. You knew where it was."

"I did not!"

"Ryan, what I'm trying to say is, you're not really Ryan. Your body has been made by Crasis just as he did for Mercy. This body isn't real. And all your memories? They also aren't real. You are Deacon Maybury. You used your own magic to mask your personality and turn yourself into an ordinary young man so that no one would look at you or cause suspicion. Exactly what you needed to hide from your problems until your magic failed and you started having gaps. You started going places that Foe's gang noticed, and then you decided to suddenly go to America and collect this little key. That's how they knew you were you."

Ryan spluttered. "That's not true! I live with my mum in Ireland and I go to school there! I wouldn't remember that or – or – I wouldn't love my mum if I wasn't real!"

"Your mother doesn't exist," Dexter said more softly, looking the boy in the eyes. "Neither do your feelings. Right now, we need your help to disassemble the bomb, and then you're going to turn back into Deacon Maybury. Alright? It's not going to hurt. But I think even you are starting to remember things that don't add up. Aren't you?"

Ryan went quiet and tears started to fill his eyes. Valkyrie looked away. She hadn't suspected Ryan wasn't Ryan this whole time. Tanith came over to the stage and put her arms around Valkyrie and they hugged. Ryan sniffed a few times, crying into Dexter's shoulder, and then asked if Deacon would be really mad if he helped destroy the bomb. Dexter said he would be and Ryan agreed to do it right in time for Kenspeckle to come in with a group of other people to disarm the bomb, plus Fletcher. He grinned at them and then cringed when he saw Ryan's tear-stained face.


	178. Interviewing Crux

**Chapter 178**

Ryan had quickly turned back into Deacon Maybury after the Doomsday Machine had been deactivated and the disassembly had begun. Valkyrie was quite unimpressed with Maybury, considering one of his identical brothers, Dafydd, had fallen prey to Foe's Gang, as well as drawing Crasis into the mess for no reason. And the fact he tried to sell a world-ending bomb on the Black-Market-for-Mages. That was pretty awful. She hadn't been there to punch him, but he had been arrested and would be facing legal consequences, and had apparently gone away crying.

Meanwhile, Valkyrie and Dexter went to the Sanctuary with their three prisoners to interview them. Of course, Mercy was immediately put into chains and doctors began the task of how much damage had been done to her brain. They just had to deal with Scapegrace and Crux for now. The rest of her family would be continuing with the New Year Eve problems without them, and there were a lot.

Crux had to be anesthetised to deal with getting him in an interview room, so while he sleepily sat at his interview table on his way to being coherent enough to talk to, Valkyrie and Dexter went to Scapegrace to start.

"Vaurien," Valkyrie said pleasantly. "You're a wanted man."

"I am?" He said blankly, before suddenly puffing his chest out. "I mean, of course I am! I'm the Killer Supreme."

"Multiple attempts at murder, evasion of the law, setting a luxury hot chocolate shop on fire in Wales, bodily assault, and for working for Grievers Down, a place that attempted to rape a minor at the same time of your employment, someone we know you came into contact with at the time. And now this. Do you have anything to say for yourself?" Valkyrie asked sweetly.

He had been grinning proudly until she mentioned Grievers Down, and now he looked ill. "I never tried to – I wouldn't! I mean, I love to kill people, but I'd never do something like _that_! That's sick."

"Well, that's all well and good, Scapegrace, but right now it looks as if you're getting charged with assailing the escape of and profiting off of a business that attempts to rape minors. That carries a charge of approximately fifty to a hundred years depending on the severity of your involvement."

He looked aghast. "I only worked there that one night! I only volunteered too!"

"Vaurien," she simpered, reaching across the table although they couldn't reach each other. She smiled kindly. "I understand. You're not like that, and I can see how this charge offends you. But you have to understand, there are no reliable sources to validate your side of the story, we only know that you were there. But I can see that you weren't involved in the crimes of Grievers Down."

"You were there," he said defensively. "I only tried to kill you."

"I know, and I believe you, but the Sanctuary don't want to believe you on your word. How about I offer a deal. I'll have that charge taken off if you tell me what led you to know Foe's gang and Crux and all that happened in your time with them. I might even be able to get you a smaller sentence."

He went to nod, and then looked at her suspiciously. "How do I know you'll keep your word?"

"I always keep my word," she said seriously. "If I didn't, no one would trust me, after all."

Scapegrace considered and then agreed. He embellished his story greatly, but Valkyrie narrowed it down to this – he ran into Crux on accident and agreed to help him out of fear for his life when he upset Crux. Crux already knew Foe's gang at this point. Together, they broke into a low-level prison and busted Springheeled Jack who agreed to help Foe's gang as payment for breaking him out. Neither he nor Jack were told what the Doomsday Machine was other than it was a bomb and very important to Foe's gang. He had overheard Foe and Crux talking about a favour, which seemed to be that Foe's gang would only work for Crux if he helped them with getting the Doomsday Machine and key first, so it didn't seem Crux understood what it did either. Of course, upon getting to Nevada and fighting the Dead Men, the ever so brave Scapegrace had found out what the Doomsday Machine really did and cowered in the corner out of fear for his life but certainly did not help from there on out.

"Thank you for telling us all this," she smiled. "I'll talk to the guys up top and have this charge taken off of your record entirely and let them know you were coerced into helping them. That'll soften the blow on you significantly."

He sagged in relief. "Thank you. I don't know what I'd have done if people thought I'd done something like that."

"You're a good man Vaurien. I wish you luck," she said and left the room.

"That was fast," Dexter said, falling into step beside her.

"He's easy to manipulate. There was never even an official record of him being at Grievers Down," she smirked at him. She realised, suddenly, that she was taller than him. No just a little shorter, not the same height, but legitimately taller by a few inches. She almost felt unsteady for a moment.

"You alright?" He laughed.

"Yeah. I just realised how short you are and it made me feel better," she grinned, shoving his shoulder.

He scoffed. "You're a brat."

She laughed and they went to check on Crux. He was just about awake now so they went in in hopes of him being more talkative with the drugs addling his mind.

"Hello," Valkyrie said, sitting herself down. Dexter stood behind him, so close his thighs were almost touching Crux's back. Crux blinked slowly at her but his eyes still burned with hatred. "We have a lot to talk about."

"I. Hate. You," he slowly hissed. Now he was still and up close, and Valkyrie's head wasn't spinning like it had been before, she could see the effects of his insanity. He was unwashed, his clothes old and ragged, his hair bald in places and matted in others. Some of his teeth had fallen out and the others looked yellow from being unclean and possibly from something harsh like alcohol, though unlikely to be cigarettes by the colour. He didn't look to be addicted to drugs. He was thin, but still stocky enough to be strong. He had cuts and scrapes all over and his knuckles had been broken for a long time, but that hadn't stopped him from using them and causing more damage.

"I know that. You don't need to like me. But I need to know about the Children of the Spider. Are they in Nevada?"

"I. Fucking. Hate. You," he repeated.

Valkyrie could feel this was going to go nowhere. She'd seen him multiple times since he attacked her and shoved her into a prisoner's cell at the Sanctuary, and it didn't seem there was much use talking to him. "I'll give you one last chance and then a Sensitive will be sent in to search your mind. Is there a group of Spiders in Nevada?"

"I'm going to make you suck my dick," he whispered lowly, and Dexter punched him.

They left him there and a Sensitive was sent in while the drug was working to gather everything they needed. A second had to be brought in to help because his insanity made his mind hard to work on.

Since it would take a while, and Dexter was shamelessly flirting with two ladies in the staffroom – they were both on his lap and he had forgotten all about her – she went outside to call Nadia.

She picked up after a few rings. "Hey Val."

"Hey. How are you doing?"

"Alright," she said. "Laila's down for bedtime. She really struggled. I think she's anxious because her Mama's not here."

"Ah, poor baby," Valkyrie said sympathetically. "Is everything else alright?"

"Yeah, it's great. I have food and water and the telly has some fun stuff on it. I called a few of my friends and they've been telling me about their Christmas'. How's your day been?"

"Insane," she said, walking down the street away from the Sanctuary to avoid the people. "We ran into Foe's gang. Do you remember them? They're the ones that took the Remnant, kidnapped me and Kenspeckle and got those bombs I forgot the names of. Remember?"

"Yeah."

"We only caught the woman, Mercy, and they were working with Remus Crux. Sensitives are with him now. Well, we caught their vampire too but I'm pretty sure they, you know, disposed of him."

"That's kind of messed up. I don't like vampires much but still."

"He was trying to set off a bomb that would destroy the entire world and probably solar system. So, he also was kind of a dick. But that's not the point." She hesitated and then cast the idea aside. She didn't want to talk about her ruined hair at all right now. "So, did your friends say anything fun?"

"No," she said with a weird tone in her voice.

"What?"

"I said 'no'."

"No, I mean, what happened? I can hear something happened."

She was quiet for a moment. "You need to work right now. I'll tell you later."

"They're going to be ages dealing with Crux and we've been stuck here for a while already. And I'm pretty sure Dexter's setting up a foursome for him and Saracen so I can't go back inside. Tell me about it."

Nadia let out a laugh. "Alright. Well, my mum called me. And I answered it."

"Oh," Valkyrie said, stopping and leaning against a low brick wall. There was nothing else around for miles but dead grass and the luminous orange sky from the lights of the city miles away. "What did you talk about?"

"It was bad, Val. She was quiet at first and just asked me how I was and I just said I was okay and she said she was the same. I asked about family and how her Christmas had been in India and she asked about mine. I said it was great. I sort of told her that I was in America with you right now and she asked if it was a holiday, and I said no, it was for your work. She got really quiet, so I just said that I had been on holiday for my birthday though and it had been great. She asked about it and I said about some of the stuff we did and she gave me a belated happy birthday, and Val, it was really nice."

"I'm glad," Valkyrie smiled.

"But then she asked what I got for my birthday and that she and Dad got me some presents too for when they saw me next. I didn't want to say anything about us getting engaged so I said about the car and she just freaked out. She just started saying how irresponsible I was and that I couldn't even drive and that I couldn't accept such an expensive gift from you and how I was going to afford the insurance and that she wasn't paying it for me. It turned into a fight."

"Oh, baby."

"She just wouldn't stop going on about how much she thinks I'm being stupid. She called me uneducated, Val. Un. Ed. Ucted. How dare she?!"

"That was horrible," Valkyrie agreed.

"It went on for a while and then I asked her, and I didn't shout either, why she was saying all these things and why she even called me in the first place. She just went really quiet and said that she missed me and wanted me to visit. So I called her a manipulative, narcissistic bitch and told her that I only wanted to see her when she started treating me like an adult and a human being. Then she just hung up on me."

"Ah, honey, I'm sorry she was so horrible," Valkyrie said. "At least you got to call her a bitch and told her how she should be treating you first."

"I guess. I still felt like shit afterwards. Laila ended up waking up because of me getting too loud and she wouldn't calm down and we cried together for a while. She fell back to sleep after a while and I called Charlotte."

"Well, that's good. Me and you can go out just us when this is finished. Just because times are crazy doesn't mean we can't enjoy ourselves a little."

"I'd like that," her voice said, a smile in it. "Thank you for talking with me. I love you."

"I love you too. Don't stress too much, I'll be back in a few hours now. Try to get some sleep until then."

"Alright. See you soon, sweetie."

.*****.

Three Sensitives had been used to get all the information Crux had in his mind. It wouldn't have been so many people except it was incredibly hard for them to stay in his insane mind for too long and had to take turns traversing through his memories.

It had also taken three hours, in which time Valkyrie had been exceptionally bored and Dexter had been exceptionally busy – he looked knackered, hair dishevelled, a button from his shirt had fallen off somewhere and he glugged down a bottle of water as they went over to see the Sensitives. She had wanted to be disgusted at his blatant disregard of embarrassment, but instead, she just snickered.

"Vex," a man greeted them, standing to shake his hand. "Detective Cain," he said, shaking hers. It was sweaty. "Take a seat, please." Around the meeting room was this man in a suit, themselves, the three Sensitives, and one other woman in a suit who did not stand. "This is quite unexpected. This is my colleague, Jennafer Anacreontic, she's here on behalf of the Elders."

"Crux must have known something pretty important," Valkyrie commented blandly. She kept her face carefully blank and hard. This was a game of power. Dexter stretched out, casual as ever, arm draped over the empty seat beside himself. Despite his relaxed posture, there was a mean look in his eye that belayed any sense of unawareness – Dexter Vex was a Dead Man.

"Yes," the man said. "Ah, I am Theodor Crest. I am the Supervisor of Criminal Information and Admissions here at the Las Vegas Sanctuary. These are my three Sensitives that worked with the criminal in custody, Mr Lark, Miss Hargu, and Mrs Santiago."

"Nice to meet you all," Valkyrie said. "I'd like to get to the information at hand. There's a lot of work to do tonight."

"Of course," Mr Crest gushed. "Miss Hargu, if you will…"

Miss Hargu nodded once. "Crux has been working with multiple criminals since his turn to insanity in Ireland. He has worked with several Children of the Spider, some assassins, and, most recently, Foe's gang. He was involved in breaking out the known criminal Springheeled Jack from an English prison alongside Foe's gang and Scapegrace, whom he recently met and recruited."

"Do you know which Children of the Spider? What assassins? Who did he meet in Ireland, England and in America? Also, I wasn't aware there was a break in at any English prison, when did this happen?"

"The break-in was kept quiet but was told to all Sanctuaries, so you'll have to talk to your Elders about that for more information. In America, he has only been in contact with Foe's gang," Mr Lark said. He was obviously trying hard to keep the emotion off his face but when Valkyrie looked at him his mask faltered and his hatred for her shone through. "He's only been here for five days."

"Where was he staying?"

"New places each night. He's insane, though, so even he didn't know some of his locations. We've written down places we think he's been from what we saw in his mind."

"That's still enough," Valkyrie nodded. "What else of note?"

"Only a lot of criminals and a body count. It's not high," Mr Lark said, picking up a piece of paper in front of him. "Seven men and eight women. One teenage girl and a dog. Six counts of setting buildings on fire. For the most part, he seems to wander from place to place finding people who hate the Dead Men. He's incredibly vindictive and angry against you."

"We know. He's attacked me multiple times," Valkyrie said.

"His thoughts," Miss Hargu took over, "have become more violent the longer he's been insane. He has a single-track mind in trying to kill you and doesn't listen to anything else. He helped Foe's gang in exchange for having them help him hunt the Dead Men but didn't have any understanding or real thoughts about the Doomsday Machine even though Foe's gang did mention it to him several times. If it isn't to do with you lot, he doesn't entertain the thought."

"That's worrying," Dexter said with a frown.

"He's crazy," Miss Hargu shrugged. "We've written a list of the assassins and other criminals we could identify, as well as some names he knew that we didn't. I don't know if they're all criminals or just those he interacted with."

"May I have it?" Valkyrie asked.

"Ah," Mr Crest sat up and gave her a piece of paper. She looked down it and did see a few Children of the Spider names Erskine had told her about but there were only a few.

"You've missed out information," she stated. "I know for a fact he's been in contact with Tesseract, a Russian assassin, and the Spider's Torment and Madam Mist. They were working together to storm the Irish Necromancer Temple this summer just gone. There were multiple witnesses, not all of them Dead Men. I know that would have been in his memory."

The Sensitives were silent. Anacreontic, the important woman in the suit, spoke up. "Insane people can forget significant things, Detective. It may be Crux forgot this encounter."

"It wasn't an encounter," she smiled. "It was an arranged attack. He is working with them. I'd like to point out now that the American Sanctuary has agreed to be utterly forthcoming in its information as an apology for your own wrong information that resulted in myself and Saracen Rue being tortured, and a minor and infant being kidnapped by a criminal organisation. We all know there was inside help, and this is our agreement. I will have no problem calling my Elders and yours if you don't comply with your own terms."

There was a long silence and Anacreontic soured. "We are not at liberty to be entirely forthcoming."

"You are and you shall be. Otherwise, you'll be breaking an international agreement."

"Let's not be hasty!" Mr Crest said loudly with a panicked smile. "I'm sure this can be cleared up! Wasn't there any more information on the Spiders?"

The Sensitives were still quiet but had deer in the headlights looks on their faces.

"Right." Valkyrie stood. "I'll be calling Meritorious."

"Detective, there's no need!"

"I think there is. You're withholding information on a night none of us have time for it. We have intel there are Spiders near to here and if Crux is working with them, you can imagine they can't be up to anything good. Say what you want about them in Ireland, but you can't seriously think Crux and Foe's gang working with the Spiders can be good news for anyone, can you? Now, are you going to talk, or do I have to make you?"

The woman just took her papers and stacked them more neatly in front of her so Valkyrie pulled her phone out and dialled Meritorious' number. He didn't answer on the first ring, but he did after a few more. "Cain."

"Grand Mage, I'm with some Sensitives and representatives of the American Sanctuary in Las Vegas. They're refusing to give me information from Remus Crux's memories, who we have in custody here. I am under the impression they must give us everything they know as per the Dead Men contract."

"That's right," he said, clearly heard by the whole table. "Can I talk with the representative please?"

Valkyrie turned the phone to the woman and she began to talk only to get verbally smashed down by the Grand Mage. It took some time and politics and some frustrations on all their ends, but after a long, long time, the five Americans turned on some high-security signals and spoke to them properly.

"Look," Mr Crest said nervously, having worked up a sweat by then and lost his tie. "I should not be telling you this. This hasn't even gotten back to our Elders. But we believe there's been a breach of ethics."

"What do you mean?" Valkyrie said seriously.

He wet his lips and glanced at Anacreontic, who was angry but didn't raise any complaints. "Someone a part of the American Sanctuary, we don't know who or even which one, was the spy that gave up information on your mission last month resulting in Mr Rue and yourself being tortured. But it's not what you think. We had some idea of a corrupt individual already, but Crux's memories told us everything except who it was. Mr Sorry, the man who tortured you. He had double-crossed Grievers and was meant to torture you to find out if there really a chance of war or if you were making everything up about the Spiders in Ireland."

"Someone ordered for me to be tortured," she stated. "From the American Sanctuary. They must have paid a lot to get Mr Sorry to double-cross Grievers."

"Yes. But not on our Elders orders or on record, as far as we know. We believe it's someone who personally wanted to know and got in contact with Mr Sorry. They must have known he was employed by Grievers. From what we can tell from our interviews with Samuel Grievers himself, which are entirely off the record, someone in the Sanctuary fed him information of the Dead Men storming his building. He sent Mr Sorry to torture you for information he wanted to know about your Sanctuary, however, Mr Sorry was also working for someone in our Sanctuary asking about Children of the Spider."

"I follow."

"Crux is in contact with the Spiders in America, and they are very angry at being double-crossed by Mr Sorry from Crux's memory, even though it was technically Grievers that was double-crossed. However, if this information got out that someone in the Sanctuary is corrupt, it could cause us massive problems and possibly panic from the public. Which is why we didn't want to tell you."

"Okay," Valkyrie said, taking a moment to think. "So we're certain there is a corrupt person who had me tortured for information. That is bad news for the Dead Men since they obviously hate us, and for you because of my age. I see why you don't want that getting out."

"Only ourselves in the room and a select few others know this information. In fact, they don't even know what Crux knows yet, we haven't had time to tell them," he admitted. Beads of sweat ran down his face. "Please know we are trying to flush this person out. But we have many Sanctuaries, and this takes time."

"I appreciate that, but even off-record this is going to cause you issues," she said, giving him and Anacreontic serious looks. "Corruption or not, this Sanctuary ordered for a child to be tortured. Can you tell me more about what Crux knows about the Spiders?"

Their meeting lasted hours, going way into the night. The information Valkyrie found out was massive. She had to bring out her notebook and write it all down to remember it all – locations, dates, people. Unfortunately, they didn't lie when they said Crux had a one-track mind and didn't focus on much outside of his own agenda, but still. The most important was the location of the group of Spiders on the edge of Nevada bordering Utah, which even the American's hadn't previously known, although they admitted they had a slight idea but it was not investigated due to not wanting to draw them out of their nest. A lot of names, a lot of plans and information. Some of it had already happened, such as the attack on the Irish Sanctuary in which Crux had tried to be involved in but was replaced in favour of having Skulduggery do the honours of blowing them up. The information debunked a lot of what the other Sanctuaries were trying to claim was happening, especially surrounding the Dead Men and motives of the Sanctuary.

But what did that matter? This was off the record. Never to be spoken of again. It was bittersweet, hearing American officials saying this but knowing that they'd never admit it again. The Dead Men were brutish soldiers, their Sanctuary was incompetent, and they were trying to stir up rumours for attention and nothing more. That's all that would be said after this.

For now, though, they had a lot to work on. Mr Sorry, the Spiders Den, all sorts of names. She'd have to go through it all.

"What's your plan?" Mr Crest asked her as she and Dexter stood to leave.

"Go to the Spiders and see what they have to say," she said with a wry smile. "I'd appreciate you not getting involved if we cause a ruckus. Considering we never had this conversation and you don't believe the Spiders are guilty, I'm sure that won't be a problem, hmm?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everyone that's leaving me Kudos, I really appreciate it! Feel free to comment too, it is very encouraging :)


	179. Preparation

**Chapter 179**

"Oh my God," Nadia whispered, eyes wide, a few tears on her cheeks. "This is awful."

Valkyrie sat on her bed, back on the wall. Nadia sat with her legs crossed at the headboard, Tanith and Ghastly sat together at the end with a sleeping Laila. The rest of the family was on Tanith's bed. They were all exhausted, all sweaty, all ready for some sleep. But their information couldn't wait.

Dexter had to tell them because Valkyrie was struggling to process it still. Sure, she'd always know that her being tortured was planned. They'd had to hire the torturer and place him in the right place, capture them and select her out of the group. That was a planned torture. But this was in the organisation she worked for. Someone she may well have met from her job. And they had ordered her, as a young girl by anyone's standards, to be tortured for information. It was just a lot to take in.

Of course, then there was the general information of the Spiders. Important but not unexpected. They knew a general amount from their own sightings, Skulduggery and Solomon, and from their missions in America. But God, it was a long list of names, each more dangerous and deadly, or sickening, than the last.

"We have to tell Meritorious," Ghastly said solemnly.

Dexter sighed heavily and rubbed his face. Saracen put a hand on his back. "It could cause us problems."

"It's already caused us problems," Ghastly replied tiredly.

"We may be better keeping it to just a few people," Anton suggested, shifting from one foot to the other. He and Solomon were the only ones standing. "We can use it as a way to blackmail the Sanctuary. With political tensions as high as they are, it may actually be the safer option. As much as I am loath to say it."

"But who – why would they do that?" Nadia whispered, looking between them all with horror. Valkyrie put out an arm and Nadia fell into her heavily, wrapping her slim arms around her waist. "Val's just a little kid to these people."

"I expect they hoped to get more information out of her," Tanith said slowly. "Being younger, they probably thought she'd crack faster than anyone else available."

"But didn't they t-" she choked on the word, "hurt Saracen first?"

Saracen hummed. "Mr Sorry asked us different questions. I'm thinking that Grievers wanted me tortured for information on the Sanctuary, and the corrupt politician paid for Valkyrie."

Nadia opened her mouth but no sound came out. She buried her head in Valkyrie's neck instead.

"How many names are there?" Anton asked after a moment.

"Seventeen," Dexter said. "There were more faces, but Crux didn't know them. Mercy might be able to shed some light but she'll be out for a long time yet, Valkyrie caused her some serious brain damage."

Valkyrie was so tired all she did was breath in response. Solomon tried to comfort her. "You're still new to this magic. You're going to make mistakes. Don't be too hard on yourself over her."

She nodded a little. She had been awake for almost thirty hours now and sitting down was making her body incredibly tired, so she didn't do anything else.

"What names do we know?" Tanith asked.

"Noirette Paine, the Sensitive. Keme Stolen, proficient in Signals and an assassin cross thief, as far as we can tell. He stole that Necromancer thing from the Repository," Dexter listed. "He knew the Wild Brothers by their group name, and had spoken to their leader. He didn't seem to have much contact with them. Madam Mist, The Torment, Ruette Dagger, Dark, and Darling Ciphers are among the known Spiders up top. They said there were dozens, perhaps hundreds in his memories but those were the big names. He also had met Craven any time he went to their Irish base which they move a lot. Also someone called Richard Killer. He was mentioned by Mr Sorry to Valkyrie according to the people we met. They had studied the recording of Valkyrie and Saracen with Mr Sorry."

"Who is Richard Killer?" Solomon asked.

"They weren't sure exactly, but they had heard his name mentioned by a few criminals before. The Americans seem to think he had strong ties to Paine, but even they said they could be wrong," Dexter said, putting his list in his pocket.

"Not like them to say they could be wrong," Erskine said with a watery smile.

Dexter put an arm around his friend and pulled him into his side. "There's a few other names, but these are the important ones from what we could tell. I'm starting to think we need to get a hold of Samuel Grievers and see what he knows."

There was some nodding and then they dispersed for the night. Valkyrie kicked off her shoes and pushed Nadia back, laid herself down and was asleep before anyone had even left the room.

.*****.

They were packed and in the cars the next morning heading towards Sawmill Mountain, the place the American Children of the Spiders were based. Other than a map of the route the Sensitives thought Crux had taken to get there, they had no other information. He had been there two times when they had further looked into his head a few hours earlier, and he had taken different ways each time and got inside in different places which didn't help them. As far as the Sensitives could tell, there were either multiple buildings or there was a massive underground structure. Crux's insanity didn't exactly help.

It was only a four-hour drive with some light traffic, but they stopped a little further out in a small town, barely a cluster of houses with a small shop and a church.

"It's so creepy," Nadia muttered quietly to Valkyrie. They had left the car with the men while they went to the little shop for food. They'd rented a house but it was only a two bed – Solomon and Erskine had been out and bought blow-up mattresses for the rest of them already.

"Mhh," Valkyrie hummed. "I'm sure it's fine. Is there anything you want for dinner?"

"No," she said quietly.

Valkyrie put a hand on her lower back to comfort her. "Please don't stress too much. We'll only be here a little bit anyway, maybe even just a day." They entered the little shop. It had a lot shoved into a small space. "Do you want pasta?"

"I'm not really hungry," she tried.

"Well, you have to eat, so you may as well eat something you like. What about roast chicken?"

"That takes too long."

"Something with rice then?"

Nadia shrugged a bit. "I guess. Just pick something you want. I don't want anything heavy."

Valkyrie racked her brain for something quick and easy they'd all like. She spotted the potatoes in the corner, a big bag just lying there. "What about that potato and pea curry you like? I forget the name, but that's nice."

She nodded and helped Valkyrie gather the ingredients, but Valkyrie could tell all the things they'd spoken of the day before was getting to her. After picking up sandwich things and some juice for lunch, they went to the tiny house they rented and spilt the bags on the table.

Anton came and took over the organisation as that was his element. Dexter was behind him, helping out. It was such a small space. The front door was almost opposite the stairs going up, the living room had a love seat, a small armchair and a small telly on the wall, the dining table was a small round one with just four mismatching chairs and the kitchen was diddy. There were only two cabinets for storage as the washer, oven and plumbing for the sink took up the rest of the space. There was an ironing board, mop and broom hung on the wall next to the back door leading to a small garden with a tree in it. No bathroom downstairs. Valkyrie pulled Nadia upstairs, where there were two small bedrooms and a little bathroom. They went in the smallest bedroom and Valkyrie closed the door.

"Talk to me," she said, pushing Nadia to sit on the lumpy mattress. Valkyrie got on her knees and held the girl's hands.

Nadia sighed heavily. "It's just all a lot. You know?"

"I do baby. But I can see you're letting it get to you too much. You weren't this upset over me going on missions. This is the consequence of that sometimes," she said softly.

"I know. I do. You've always said that things can go bad, and you said they could get bad for me and I could get pulled in by other people. It happened and I was mostly prepared for it. But I guess I never really thought much about the, you know, insides of it. It's always just bad people, not real life people that I could have met at parties. I mean, what if this person is never found and we just end up socialising with them one day? How can I trust people if that's what I'm thinking of?"

"Honey," Valkyrie sighed, pulling her in for a hug. "You can't think about it this much. You just can't. I know, I know, you can't just let it go so easily, but it's reality. I don't want you to be scared your whole life over one event. Someone's done something really bad to us by ordering me and Saracen to be tortured, but in the grand scheme of things, it's not that bad. I got hurt, and then I stood back up and survived. Right? You need to get back up from this and do the same."

"It's just hard," she whispered, playing with the pretty ring on her finger, twisting it back and forth.

Valkyrie tried a smile. "Is it weird? Wearing a ring all the time?"

"Yeah," she cracked a small smile. "It doesn't feel real sometimes. I end up forgetting I have it on and then I'll see it out of the corner of my eye and it surprises me. I love it so much."

"I'm glad," Valkyrie said, kissing her. She pecked her lips again, tasting the strawberry lip moisturiser she'd used earlier, and kissed her again, and again, until Nadia had wrapped her arms around Valkyrie's neck and had forgotten about their conversation.

Valkyrie pulled her head back when she felt Nadia's arm begin to dip towards her trouser button. "We should go downstairs."

Nadia let out a frustrated breath. "You never let me do anything just to you. You're always doing things to me."

Valkyrie grinned, kissing her and standing up. "I'll let you make it up to me soon."

Nadia smirked. "Can I use Tanith's Christmas present?"

Valkyrie went for the door. "Don't talk about that." Nadia laughed.


	180. A very easy break and enter

**Chapter 180**

It was decided it was too risky to stay so close to the Spider den for too long. That night Fletcher, Tanith and the Dead Men prepared themselves and left to go into the mountain. It was far colder than in Las Vegas, reaching minus one degree Celsius in the evening when they began walking and predicted to get significantly colder into the night. Even Fletcher stayed quiet, wearing a new coat Ghastly had made him quickly that was protective. It looked good and the others had complained that they hadn't gotten the same treatment. Then Ghastly had called Fletcher their 'get away boat' and Fletcher hadn't been so happy about the gift, but the others thought it was funny.

The road they took was nonsense and not a real road. Crux seemed to have no idea where he was going on the two occasions he had travelled to the Spiders and instead had roamed until he ended up where he was meant to be. They still chose to retrace his steps on the off chance he had actually had some plan though it didn't seem that likely. A small part of them thought that he potentially knew how to evade being noticed by the Spiders on his way there, which was why they wanted to copy his steps, but Valkyrie felt like a wild goose chase.

With no real intel other than Crux's mind, they had trusted the Sensitives and taken their word on what Crux had experienced. The first location he'd visited had been busier, and the second mostly quiet. With that in mind, they went to the second place he went so that they might get around easier – and that was assuming it was all connected underground, which it may not be. But they had all spoken and voted that it must be for ease of staying hidden from mortals as well as sorcerers, plus it aligned with that they knew of other large Spider dens.

The main thing they didn't know was how many Spiders lived in the mountain or how well they could detect and fight intruders.

"Are we nearly there?" Fletcher asked.

"Think so," Valkyrie answered very quietly. She held the map, just a sheet of paper out of a map book with a drawn-on line that they were following. "Right around this rock."

They hunkered down and, after Ghastly checked the area with the air and indicated where the entrance should be, Valkyrie crept forwards with Dexter to find the opening. It was just a rock, but Dexter's keen eyes found a small signal on the edge and pressed it, and the rock faded away. The entrance was just dark, no lights or sounds at all. The others came closer and they all walked in, looking closely for signals on the wall that could alert the Spiders or set off traps.

Dexter put an arm out and stopped her from stepping on a signal, and she stepped back to let him and Ghastly deal with it. It didn't take them too long, but after that came several more they needed to stop for. Ten minutes after entering, they came to a room, a round opening with several doors and arches leading elsewhere. Saracen pointed and they went where he said. Through that corridor and further downwards, hiding behind a corner as two people went from one room to another and closed the door. They continued, going right, and then left, leaving their fate entirely in Saracen's hands as his magic guided them somewhere they needed to be.

This left them in a small room they closed behind them, not able to move without touching at least one other person.

"Where are we?" Fletcher whispered.

"I don't know," Saracen replied quietly, "but there's a gathering."

"How do you know that?"

"I don't know," he replied again, "but I do, so shut up."

Valkyrie cracked a smile as Erskine finished picking the lock of the next room and they very quietly tiptoed onto a balcony, pressing themselves against a wall and staying quiet. Spiderwebs were freely displayed in here unlike the hallways they'd been in so far, but no spiders or Spiders were on them. Below was a quiet commotion. Valkyrie crouched down and lay flat, pull herself to the bannister with barely a rustle to look below.

There was a stage, not with any curtain for dances or shows, but with a large painting on the back and small fires all around the rim to light up the people. Three people were sitting and one stood to the side, talking loudly but not enough for Valkyrie to hear exactly what he was saying. She wasn't even sure he was speaking English. It was so far below her she felt as if she was getting vertigo. The hall was full of people, at least two hundred or more, all dressed well in black, red and dark green. They were on the walls in Spider form too, but all close to the floor and stage.

She pushed back and stood, shaking her head and indicating to continue. Saracen took them across the entire balcony and through into a similarly small room, but this one was not locked, and then they very quickly continued, wanting to get out before the gathering finished and all those Spiders poured out. It was the perfect scenario should they pull it off.

This time they went deeper, and Valkyrie knew they were going towards the work area. There was no name for being a leader in the Spider Community, as all Spiders were equal in name, but the status was there, and that office was what they needed to work out what plans the Spiders had. The rooms became cleaner and signals on the ceiling gave off a soft glow. There was no artwork on the walls that could be knocked by long legs, and she hadn't seen any lights elsewhere. Even the doors were larger, more grand.

Saracen's fallible magic only took them so far into the nicer area, but it was clear to see where to go. They followed the niceties until it took them to a double door that looked that much grander. Tanith pressed her hand to it and the lock broke. They stole in, leaving Saracen next to the door they almost closed so they wouldn't be immediately detected. It made Valkyrie nervous, not having Anton's magic to protect them, but she trusted Fletcher and her family.

The office was large, but not painted or warm, just like the rest of the caves. There was a giant desk and Valkyrie went straight to it, pulling open the drawers and looking over the papers. "What language is this?" She asked, pushing some paper towards Anton.

He looked it over. "Latin," he told her. "This is a stock list."

"Read the others," she ordered, going over the English papers herself. There was nothing useful in the desk, so she moved to the books, and the cabinets, getting whispers from Saracen that he could hear movement coming closer.

Erskine began to get panicked and Dexter was demanded they leave. They got everything they could together, all the war plans and important documents, the safe in the floor Ghastly ripped out with his magic, all gathered into their arms within five minutes of getting in there.

"Anton?" She whispered. "Come on!"

"I found something," he said simply, staring at a book.

"Well bring it with you, they're coming!" She pressed.

He snapped it closed, looked at the small stack of papers and another book on the shelf beside him and grabbed that too before going to the others, putting a hand on Valkyrie's shoulder – a moment later they were back in the living room of their rented house.

"Oh my god," Fletcher breathed. Valkyrie could see his heart beating through his clothes.

"That went really well," she grinned.

Tanith laughed and pulled Erskine in for a hug, and he folded into her.

"I have news," Anton said, putting his books and papers on the sofa. "I know what is holding the Spiders from attacking immediately."

That got their attention. "What is it?" Valkyrie asked. He sighed, sitting on the sofa and rubbing his face. Valkyrie's eyes widened in fear and she snatched up a book but it was in Latin. "Anton?"

"Do you remember we found the Sceptre of the Ancients?" He asked from behind his hand. He moved to sit up, passing around the books and papers. "I don't remember if we ever told you that there are other supposed weapons of mass destruction in the same manner as the Sceptre."

Valkyrie sat heavily, hearing Nadia's soft feet padding down the stairs. "What do you mean?"

"There was the Sceptre, which we destroyed. But these papers are correspondences and logs of tracking down the others. I didn't realise what I was looking at until I noticed it mention looking for the Sceptre and a plan around retrieving it. That whole book, the red one, is a log of plans where the Sceptre could be and if we have it. The leader here seems in favour that we do but I didn't read much more. But the loose letters focus on the other weapons."

"There's more?" Valkyrie asked faintly, picking up a piece that had a detailed drawing of a bow on it down to the colouring of the wood. Nadia came around the sofa and pushed between Valkyrie's legs to sit. The others lowered themselves onto surfaces to listen.

"The Bow, Dagger, Spear and Sword," he listed. "We've all heard rumours about them every so often, but I never took it seriously, just as I never believed the Sceptre existed. But we know the Sceptre was real, so if the Spiders are waiting on making their move in order to find these weapons first, we should take it seriously."

There was a long silence. "Um," Fletcher said slowly. "What's the Sceptre?"

There was some explaining and Valkyrie took some deep breaths to calm herself as Nadia rubbed her shoulder comfortingly. The conversation worked itself back around and Valkyrie listened as a plan was formed. They needed to get away and find them. They needed to pull all their contacts to do it. They also had to stay in America while they waited for their political contract to end or else risk more issues for their Sanctuary and wider country.

"We could split up?" Valkyrie suggested.

"It could still cause problems. The Americans asked for the Dead Men and we come as a package," Saracen said, rubbing his face. "We could ask Solomon but he needs to focus on the Necromancer stuff for you."

Valkyrie nodded. "Me, Tanith and Nadia could go though?"

There was a short silence, and then a lot of arguing for and against. Other names were brought in, the Monster Hunters and Aurora, what would happen to Laila, if it was safe, if Tanith and Laila should leave altogether until the weapons and contract were finished.

Valkyrie rubbed her face, feeling the tension. "It's going to be our best option," she continued. "I'm not a real Dead Man, and it would be easy to say that me and Nadia couldn't cope with the pressure and that Tanith had to leave for the baby. We can explain it away. As long as you're here they won't care."

"It's not that easy," Ghastly said, obviously trying to kerb his frustration. Nadia looked away and started braiding a section of Valkyrie's hair, so Valkyrie put a hand on her knee comfortingly. "Obviously someone needs sending but how soon?"

"They're all going to know immediately, we were hardly subtle even if we did get in and out without detection, which is a fucking miracle in and of itself," Valkyrie said seriously. "We took all the paperwork we saw, I'm sure they'll send their best out to retrieve the weapons. Any single one of them could mean winning or losing for either side, no questions asked. This is probably why they've been quiet these last few months. They're not just training and gathering followers; they've been tracking down these. We need to send a team in the next day and begin."

"I don't know if that's possible," Erskine said, forehead in hand, staring at the ground with wide eyes.

"Of course it is," she argued with fake confidence. "Me and Nadia for sure. Aurora will follow, so would the Monster Hunters, and there are other allies. I know Tanith, you'll want to come." Tanith nodded. "But you also need to think of Laila. So we can't be sure what you'll be doing quite yet. Your brother may want to help though; his help would be invaluable."

Consideration started to fall between the cracks and they began picking up ideas of where to go and what to do. Anton and Dexter poured over the papers and books to see what ideas the Spiders had of where the weapons were while Ghastly and Tanith went upstairs to talk – or rather, argue very quietly – about what was going to happen with Laila. The others began making calls, searching for information from their friends.

By the time the first light of dawn was coming through the window, they had their plan. Valkyrie, Nadia and Tanith would be leaving the Dead Men and Fletcher to finish their contracts in America while they hunted the Weapons of Mass Destruction. A true race against the clock.


	181. The Bow

**Chapter 181**

It took two days to organise what they were doing and allow their friends to extract themselves from their various jobs and commitments. Valkyrie had been the one to call China, sweet-talking her and promising a visit very soon as well as telling her about how Nadia absolutely dreamed and fantasied about being her apprentice and becoming her prodigy to convince her to give them her private jet. They were also able to enlist the help of Fletcher who had minimal choice and was also scared out of his mind imagining god-level weapons. Unfortunately, he would not be able to help them much as they wanted his presents in America in case anything went wrong so no one could imprison him and leave them with just Peregrine who was a pain to work with since he tried so hard to remain hidden.

Tanith had chosen to go with them in the end. She was gone for a day with Fletcher on a trip to England to drop off Laila and Fletcher would be taking Ghastly back and forth to visit and care for their baby. It just made the most sense to leave Laila with her parents than to trail her all over the world for potentially the next couple of months, and it just wasn't possible for Ghastly to look after her when he had to work as a Dead Man. It would be more work on Fletcher but he seemed to be more than happy to help. Neither Tanith nor Ghastly were too enthused about it, but they are more focused on trying to create a better world, and a safer one, for their daughter to grow up in. "Some sacrificed have to be made," Ghastly had told her, glaring at the wall.

The jet turned up on the third day, along with their team. Frightening Jones, Aurora Jane, Wilhelm Scream, the Monster Hunters, and of course Valkyrie, Nadia and Tanith. Valkyrie had met Frightening and the Monster Hunters before, briefly, when they came to flush out the caves under her house, but that had been at the same time as Caelan and they left right after Valkyrie and Nadia broke up so they hadn't exactly spent time getting to know each other. Nadia hadn't met them either. She also hadn't met Wilhelm Scream before, but Dexter had found him last second to deal with the electronics side of things – air traffic control and security, primarily.

"Hey, lovebirds," Aurora called, coming out of the small building and out onto the tarmac. The plane was filling up waiting for them. Valkyrie turned, hand in hand with Nadia.

"Hey Aurora," Valkyrie smiled. "You alright?"

"Sure, sure, you? Congratulations by the way," she said, giving them both one-armed hugs. "Where's Tanith? Is she bringing the kid?"

"No, the baby's with other family," she said, almost tripping on Laila's name. "Tanith's on the plane."

"I'll go say hi," Aurora smiled and rushed off towards the plane.

"Do you think they'll start dating?" Nadia asked.

Valkyrie grimaced. "I hope not."

Frightening came through the door next, the Monster Hunters on his heels. "Detective Cain, Miss Robin," he boomed, a massive grin on his face. "It is so good to see you."

"And you," she grinned back. "How have you been?"

"Well, despite the increasingly turbulent times," he said as he shook his hand. He turned to Nadia. "We have not met, but I have heard much about you."

"I've been told a lot about you too," Nadia laughed a little nervously. She took his hand and it engulfed hers. He gracefully gave her some space and turned to the Monster Hunters who were quietly waiting behind him like children.

"Hi," Donegan grinned.

"Long time no see," Gracious waved.

"It's good to see you too," Valkyrie smiled. "We're just waiting on one person now."

"Who?" Gracious frowned. "Is Aurora here?"

"Yeah, she's with Tanith in the plane. I think the pilot will be done filling up soon. Also, I signed you all up to eternal gratitude and service to China. It's her plane."

The Monster Hunters grimaced – the same expression at the same time. "Great," they said together.

"Yeah." Wilhelm Scream chose then to fall through the hanger door and onto the tarmac face down. "Wonderful, we're all here."

Gracious rushed over and helped Wilhelm onto his feet and gather all the papers, the thick laptop and rucksack for the tall, lanky, black-haired man. He went bright red when he saw they were all looking at him. "Oh, hullo."

"Hi," Nadia offered with a little wave. "Are you alright?"

"Oh, yes, of course," he said, brushing off his trousers and dropping more papers. He swore quietly and Gracious practically took everything the guy had been holding and carried it for him. "Thanks. Am I – am I late?"

"No, right on time," Valkyrie smiled, gesturing them towards the plane.

They wandered over and Wilhelm introduced himself to them. Apparently, Wilhelm had heard about them going on a mission from Dexter's scout, who was really just Aurora who had asked Saile but he hadn't been sure, and they'd been overheard by Wilhelm who wanted to get involved in a Dead Man mission. Saile said no in the end but Wilhelm had adequate skills to deal with the computer side of things, so here he was. It was thoroughly unimpressive and Valkyrie wasn't sure she was looking forwards to being on a plane with him for the next – well, she didn't know how long. Hopefully less than two weeks.

"Hey," Tanith said, her head poking out from where she was sitting. There were only eight seats, just enough for them all to sit. There was a kitchenette type of space mostly with dry goods, and lots of storage for all their bags, as well as a separate toilet and shower rooms. Four seats on the left and the same on the right with a middle aisle, and there were small tables between the seats. It was like a long eight-seater table with a cut down the middle to walk. They all shoved their bags away in their own cubbies and took a seat. Nadia took the window and then Wilhelm took the seat next to her with a nervous smile, his laptop clunking on the table. He immediately opened it and started doing _stuff_.

Nadia gave Valkyrie a look, but by then everyone had shoved themselves into seats and that was that. Nadia, Wilhelm, Gracious and Donegan took the right side, Valkyrie, Frightening, Tanith and Aurora took the left. Valkyrie was sat next to Aurora, who immediately grabbed her arm and made a sly comment about her getting even more 'jacked' than the last time they saw each other.

Tanith kicked her ex under the table, making Aurora laugh.

The pilot came in and told Valkyrie he was ready to go when they had their destination, and Valkyrie nodded. The group looked at her.

"I thought you had a plan?" Donegan asked confusedly.

"I do," she said, sitting up so everyone, but Nadia who was behind beanstalk Wilhelm, could see her. "I haven't been entirely honest about what I've got you all here for. As you know, we have the threat of the Spiders pushing for war with Ireland, and potentially more countries after that. At the same time, other Sanctuaries are trying to push for answers from Ireland and we can't do much about what they're demanding, causing political tensions. In one of the Dead Men's missions, we went into the American's Spiders hideout to find any valuable information as well as see how many Spiders there are. In doing that, we uncovered an ongoing plan to find and take the four remaining magical superweapons of mass destruction. That being the Dagger, Bow, Spear and Sword, which go alongside the destroyed Sceptre of the Ancients."

"They're not… real though," Aurora frowned, glancing between Valkyrie and Tanith.

"But they are. Whether the ones we're hunting now are the correct ones is another story, but they're certainly the ones the Spiders are after," Valkyrie told her. She seemed to want to argue but held her thoughts for now. "Regardless of whether you believe if they are what we think they are, the Spiders are planning acts of terrorism to get a hold of them. So we need to remove them so they don't do the attacks."

"Do we know where they are?" Frightening asked.

"Well. That's the reason we don't have our destination. The Dagger is in German Elder Johann Starke's house, and there's a Ball soon so we could snatch it then. The Spear is in Poland with a hermit and is the most vulnerable. The Sword is under the English Sanctuary. And the Bow is in Chicago with some gangsters. I can't decide which is best to get first," she explained.

"Most of the European Spiders," Frightening said after a considered moment, "are said to have migrated towards Ireland. Of course, not officially, but according to the rumours. So with any hope, the Polish weapon should be safe for now. The Sword is protected well and the political implications of taking it could be wide spreading. Both of those can wait. The Bow is close and since we know there are Spiders are in this country, it makes sense to get that and then move immediately to Germany in time for the Ball."

Valkyrie nodded and the others agreed all around on that plan. Valkyrie told the pilot where to go and he dealt with that, getting some security help from Wilhelm, and they were off. Valkyrie told them about some of the Spider stuff they didn't know, mostly people the Dead Men had confirmed and what the American Sanctuary 'hadn't actually told them but did in secret because they had to'. When conversation drifted to idle chatter, Valkyrie sent China a text to thank her again and watched the landscape change beneath them.

.*****.

**The Bow**

Touching down in Chicago was nice, but the air outside was frigidly cold. It was already minus four degrees Celsius and it was only going to get colder into the night. Being early evening, though, this was good. They'd have their freezing cold to contend with but so would their enemies. And they weren't far off so it wouldn't be a long heist.

Their pilot was going to sleep in the back bedroom while they were gone and be ready to leave by morning, he promised.

They got to the harbour by eleven at night in their rented car, liberated free of charge at the airport. The mortal gangster, Valkyrie had explained in the car, was somewhat unknown. However, they did know that he had a bodyguard, a Necromancer named Kaiven. Kaiven was apparently good at his job because his boss, Jackie Earl, was not yet dead. Earl's house was on a compound with high fences that enclosed three warehouses and a larger, main warehouse as well as a small house that looked like a barrack and was surrounded by actual barracks for all of his armed guards.

They got out the car near the compound and climbed their way up a stack of large metal cargo containers to see in. All eight of them had come. Valkyrie had wanted to leave Nadia in the plane, but Nadia hadn't wanted to be left with their somewhat strange, way-too-quiet pilot. He reminded Valkyrie of China's old bodyguard before he was killed, but Nadia didn't have the same experiences with China's people that Valkyrie did. Valkyrie hadn't been happy about it but they had agreed under the terms Nadia wear her protective clothing which wasn't quite the same as Valkyrie's war-ready protective gear but would still stop a bullet – Ghastly hadn't given her rubbish quality, he'd just given her what was appropriate given she rarely goes into the firing line. To make up for it, she was also wearing an old proper protective jacket of Valkyrie's that she could confirm would stop bullets. Aurora had snorted a laugh at Valkyrie's overprotective double-bullet-stopping bubble-wrapping she'd forced on Nadia but Aurora could go fuck herself if she thought Valkyrie wasn't going to guarantee Nadia's safety before Aurora's life. She'd turn her sister's ex into a meat shield for her fiancée.

Valkyrie mentally shook her head of thoughts of Nadia.

From her position on the roof, she could see Kaiven issue orders to the mortal men with guns. He wore only black but the rest of him was all golden hair, golden skin, and a bright smile. He walked proud, his build strong, and he moved gracefully.

He wasn't quite what she expected.

"He's really handsome," Nadia muttered quietly.

Aurora stifled a laugh while Valkyrie refused to even look at Nadia. Mostly because she didn't want to give Nadia anything for such a horrible thing to say, but also because she was beginning to focus now. They all watched quietly as Kaiven grinned at the men and ordered them back and forth as they received a shipment on the back of a large lorry. It looked to be bricked cocaine packed onto pallets and wrapped in so much cling film it turned each pellet into an opaque square. Stopping the drug distribution was a good bonus, but realistically, Valkyrie wasn't concerned. Keeping it going was actually better for them right now. Without a halt in supply, hopefully their enemies won't be any the wiser that they'd beat them to the Bow and move onto the next weapon before her team was ready.

They conferred as they watched and came up with a plan before splitting up. Nadia was going to go with Tanith and Frightening, the Monster Hunters were another team, and Valkyrie was going with Wilhelm and Aurora. By splitting people up from those who they might get too distracted by – Valkyrie protecting Nadia, Tanith protecting Aurora – they would theoretically be more likely of concentrating and coming out healthy.

Valkyrie, Wilhelm and Aurora snuck to wait in some bushes, pressed together and cold. It was a short wait before they heard the guns, and then they – that being Aurora and Valkyrie with a Wilhelm nervously trailing behind them – darted out from their cover and jumped the fence.

The Monster Hunters, their distraction, were going to town sweeping mortals off their feet and using little gadgets to blind and hurt people. Alarms blared as they got halfway into the yard and the lorry started back up to make its getaway. She waved for Wilhelm to get out of its path and then had to tackle him out of the way to stop him getting rolled over. She left him screaming on the ground, got back up and went around a warehouse before coming face to face with a vampire.

A bone-white, deskinned, frothing at the mouth vampire.

"Shit," she muttered, then dropped and rolled.

The vampire came back for her and swiped at her leg, almost knocking them from under her. She stumbled and pulled her magic out, letting it boil over her skin. She went to reach out and throw it at the vampire but it didn't care that she was trying to use her magic, she was just a standing meal. It jumped on her and she screamed as she held her hands out and held it up above her head, somehow lying on her back now. She was sure she'd hit her head, and she pulled at that magic again as its snapping jaws got closer and closer to her face–

She pushed her magic out violently and without entirely meaning to. The animal spasmed above her and then flew back with a howl of pain only to fall on its back. It rolled, twitched and gagged on its tongue. Horrified, she stared at it, pulling herself up and feeling blood on the back of her head from where she fell. There was gunfire and someone yelled her name. She scrambled up, pressed a finger to the vampire and let her power surge. It had a fit for a moment and then went still.

Haunted by that image, she turned and grabbed the gun off of her back to continue the fight. The lorry had crashed through the gates and left, there were packages of drugs on the ground and men were taking cover behind buildings while they shot at Valkyrie and her team. She felt a few bullets pepper her thighs and lower back as she ran, gritting her teeth through the pain before getting behind a building. She immediately shot three of the men in the chest and face and smashed her gun into the last one's face to knock him out. She heard Aurora call her name and she ran towards her.

Aurora was crouching and signalled for her. Valkyrie ran and Aurora jumped up as they became level to continue the fight together. They found Kaiven at the front doors of the largest warehouse surrounded by men with guns. Valkyrie pulled out her magic and zapped three of the men with it and they fell to their knees.

"Who's this then?" Kaiven asked with a big golden grin, pulled out a black, metal stick. "You realise you're not going to live through this, right?"

Valkyrie gaped. "Are you using your Necromancer object like a wand?"

"Don't take another step, whore!" He bellowed, levelling the stick at her chest.

"Oh my god," she breathed, barely even taking in the insult. They were common to her anyway. "Please stop waving that around. That's just… embarrassing! There are mortals watching."

"Indeed they are," said Kaiven, "and they will open fire on you and your small, blonde friend if you take one more step. You are not leaving here with the Bow. I don't think my boss is ready to part with it just yet. Maybe if you come in a few decades, after he's dead…"

"We're not here for a bow," Valkyrie lied, frowning and feigning confusion. "What bow does your boss have?"

Kaiven stumbled over his words slightly and they all heard a boom somewhere behind a smaller warehouse blocking the view to the sea. "What else would you be looking for?"

"We heard of a Necromancer using magic in sight of mortals," she fibbed. "We were just going to collect you kidnap-style and leave. But if you tell me why you're protecting this bow perhaps we could come to an agreement."

"What? Look, kid, I get paid good money to do an ass-easy job. I'm not interested–"

"Telling a single mortal about magic and revealing it to them in public spaces carries an automatic sentence of twenty years. Every other person after ten mortals adds twenty years. You're looking at hundreds of years in a gaol, Kaiven, so either tell me what's going on here so I can deal with that, or I can take you in and then come after our Sensitives have broken into your mind."

"Look, I get it," he said, trying his smile again and putting his hands up, wand included, like this was all a big misunderstanding. There was a flare of fire but no explosion this time. Sirens sang far in the distance. "You have a job to do. This was probably your first time out in the field, and you want to score big. But I am telling you. If you do anything to anyone here, we'll cut you, your girlfriend and all your teammates down like paper in the wind. I just want to live a peaceful life protecting a mortal man from sorcerers. Isn't that an honest enough life?"

Aurora sighed. "So, you truly can't be reasoned with," and with a well-practised move she swept the mortals off their feet, removing them of their semi-automatics.

**.*****.**

**Nadia's POV**

Nadia had thought she was ready to fight, to defend her friends and work for the good of mankind by taking this evil weapon from the evil drug man. Just like the last time she was in a fight for her life, she was barely prepared and utterly terrified. Valkyrie had tried to warn her and bundled her into protective clothing, but it just wasn't something she was good at. Some people saw danger and ran to safety, some fought it with all their hearts – Nadia was a throw herself on the cold ground and let herself die kind of girl.

But Tanith and Frightening wouldn't let her do that no matter how many times she froze, or her knees stumbled. She wasn't even sure what was going on, who was shooting who, or where exactly in the compound she was until Tanith gripped her shoulders.

"Nadia! Listen to me! Take Frightening and get up to that window! Now!" Tanith shouted in her face. Blood was splattered over her right cheek.

She tried to nod but it came off as frightened shakes. Frightening smiled kindly and shot off some orange energy towards someone Nadia failed to see, and she took a breath to centre herself. She could go up to the window and take Frightening with her. He wasn't that much bigger than Saracen or Dexter.

She took a last breath, held her hands out and Frightening wrapped an arm around her waist in time to catch a ride up, catching the windowsill Tanith broke and entered right before they got level with it. Frightening was fast enough to grab the ledge and pull himself through, reach out and drag her through before she had lost her upwards momentum. She crumpled onto the carpeted floor and kneeled while Tanith closed the window back up.

She was covered behind a large, walnut desk she immediately and irrationally wanted for herself. She could just see the top of Frightening's bald head over the desk flattening himself to the wall next to the door. Not a moment later a middle-aged, grey and patchy-haired man came through the door in a big hurry, sweating beads. Nadia hunkered down and paled, digging her nails into her palms and reciting everything Valkyrie, her friends, family and teachers had ever taught her about fighting and self-defence.

Jackie Earl went straight for the large case on the other end of the room and they let him take out the Bow within before Tanith struck – but she was seconds too late because he had the weapon up and aimed at Frightening's head before she could finish her attack.

Nadia held her breath as Tanith huffed and stepped back.

"How did you get in?"

"Window," Tanith said, a smirk in her voice. She didn't sound worried. Nadia was worried. "I have a way with locks."

"You're Tanith Low," he said, and Nadia heard them shuffle around so her friends were by the wall and Earl in front of them. She didn't dare look up and check out the arrangement. "Vigilante for hire, but now living with them Dead Men. I heard you had one of their bastards and they abandoned you."

"Not exactly," she said nonchalantly. "You know a bit about our world, huh?"

"I know about all of you. What, you think all of us mere mortals live in the dark? I've known there was magic in the world for years. Finally tracked down one of you, found out sorcerers are just like the rest of us. They like money and an easy life just as much as anyone. It kind of ruined the mystique when he started calling me sir, though. But hey, that's what money'll do to you."

"And you haven't gone public with any of this?"

"What would be the point? If people knew you existed, the whole world would change – maybe the Feds would even recruit some of you, set up a sorcerer task force to take down organised crime. No, I got no interest in outing you people. But I do like your toys."

"Then you know why I'm here," she said with a happy tone.

"You can't have my bow. As you can see, I'm using it."

"Not even if I ask nicely?"

"Not even. It's just too handy. I'm not that good a shot. But all I have to do is point and release. Why would I ever give up something like that?"

"Because if you don't I'll arrest you?"

He chuckled. "And if you were closer to me with your sword drawn, I would take you seriously. But it's too late for that."

"Well, if I can't threaten you for it, how about I bargain with you? How much will you sell it for?"

"It's not for sale."

"Of course it is."

"Not for a price you could afford."

"Mr Earl, you must realise there is no way we're leaving Chicago without the Bow. Even if you kill me and my friend here, our other friends are destroying your home and probably are halfway up to meet me now. The guns outside have stopped. We've already won. You must know this."

"I do." He didn't sound upset or worried.

"Then I'll either be taking that bow after paying you, and I'll even help you escape those police sirens coming this way, or take the Bow and wipe the blood off our shoes onto your carpet."

"I know how dangerous you are, Tanith Low. And your Dead Men fuck buddies. I've been listening to all of it through an earpiece. You brought some fancy toys with you today and some good soldiers."

"And I didn't even bring my baby daddy."

"I have no wish to go to war with you over this. So if I have to kill you to finish this right here and now, I'll kill you."

"Are you aware there is a war brewing? A real one? Mages we call Children of the Spider, able to shapeshift into massive spiders that can bite a human head off. No one likes them. They're collecting weapons like yours. That's why we're here, trying to get it before anyone else does. So even if you kill me, they'll be over here not long from now and they don't have to worry about letting you see them like I do. You're better off letting me have it and going into hiding quickly because I'll be making a racket elsewhere soon and they'll realise you don't have it and leave you alone. That's all I want."

He snorted. "That's a kind offer, Miss Low, but I'll have to decline. Nothing will convince me to part from my bow."

She sighed like it was awfully disappointing. "Alright. I suppose I'll take you up on your offer then, Mr Earl, and we'll leave you. I hope you know what you're doing."

He grunted and Nadia heard the door open and her friends leave. She pulled herself up on her knees to squat and looked up over the desk. Earl watched them go and then the door closed, and his arm lowered after a few moments of nothing. Then he reached into his pocket, effective prohibiting himself from being able to shoot easily again and pulled out a radio.

"Attention all remaining staff. Do not stop the fight now. There is a woman. Brown leather, blonde hair. Sword on her back. A black man is with her in combat, no visible weapon. Kill them. Shoot on site. Do not let them escape."

Nadia held her breath and prayed that he didn't come around the desk. He didn't put down the Bow, but he did sigh and pull over a chair from the other side and sit on it. She carefully peeked under the desk and saw his feet sitting by the cabinet the Bow had been in. He was silent but turned on his radio to quietly listen to the voices shouting on it – mostly asking for others to respond rather than giving news.

What the actual fuck as she meant to do now?!

.*****.

**Valkyrie's POV**

She was shaking badly and about to be wiped out by Kaiven when Tanith jumped on top of him like a rabid ninja and cut off three of his fingers and slashed his wand in two. She breathed heavily, standing on seriously shaking legs and looked around. Frightening waved her over and Valkyrie stumbled to her feet and followed him at a run.

"What's happened?"

"Earl accidently kidnapped Nadia."

"What?!"

"He does not know she is in his office. She's hiding. We had to abandon her or we would have all been killed. He has the Bow and is ready to kill anyone that walks in. We figured your magic was the best shot at killing him in one go."

She wanted to shout and scream and felt the rage build, and then used it to run faster up to the office Frightening showed her too. She didn't even think, just barged in and –

Stumbled and threw herself on her knees so she wouldn't trip over Nadia. Who had the Bow in her hands and looked just as shocked to see Valkyrie as she was to see Nadia with the Bow.

"What happened?" She asked, gaping at her.

"Err, well, Earl was just sitting there with the Bow. He sneezed and moved his hand, and I used the air to push him off his seat, took the Bow from him and punched him in the face. I think I broke his nose."

Valkyrie gaped for another moment before letting out a hysterical laugh and hugged her fiancée tightly.


	182. The Dagger

**Chapter 182**

High in the air, Wilhelm held his icepack to his bruised knee and sulked while the rest of them used his laptop to call Corrival, Meritorious and the rest of the Dead Men. Nadia was snuggled under Valkyrie's arm wearing her protective coat still and hadn't stopped gripping the back of Valkyrie's shirt since they found each other in Earl's office.

Valkyrie had had words with Tanith and Frightening already. They had thought it was fine as they knew Nadia was competent and able to defend and save herself, especially since Earl had no idea she was there and had the element of surprise. Valkyrie may have taken it too far in saying they were no better than Skulduggery, but she hadn't quite calmed down enough to forgive them or apologise. The bottom line for Valkyrie was that when she hadn't been trained enough, no one would have left her alone to defend herself. Nadia may be older than Valkyrie was at thirteen or fourteen when she wasn't able to deal with someone like Earl, but that didn't make her trained or all that capable of a fighter. She had managed it, and Valkyrie was incredibly impressed with Nadia, it just didn't make her less angry at her sister or friend.

"What do you mean you're in China Sorrows plane?!" Corrival shouted through the computer. "Who the hell gave you the authority to involve her?"

"China was going to find out about our world-hopping escapade anyway," Valkyrie told him calmly… and with some aggression. "We have her promise to help us. She fought with us already against the Spiders, she helped us kill her brother. She's involved and she's on our side. Trust me, she doesn't want these weapons in the wrong hands any more than us."

"No, she wants them in her own hands!" Corrival shouted, his face going quickly red with anger. She'd never seen him this mad before. "What were you thinking?"

"Pa, she's already aware that we intend to destroy them immediately and that they'll never even see Ireland or her." Possibly a lie, she had no idea where they would be destroyed, but as long as literally no one else knew it didn't matter. "She just wants them gone because if they are, there's no way for them to get back to the Spiders later and kill her. Did you know that someone killed three of her bodyguards a few weeks ago? They're trying to target her and get her alone. She doesn't want these people to have any more power than they already have."

"China Sorrows is a capable woman, and manipulative at that. I agree that she has good resources and someone like her is useful as an ally, but she cannot be trusted with this magnitude of information!"

"Well, with all due respect, it has nothing to do with you who I involve in this mission," she told him bluntly. There was a pregnant pause. Her team looked away as she and the Elders stared at each other through the screen. Valkyrie broke and continued. "This is a Dead Man mission. Soon we'll be stealing from the German Grand Mage who we are sure is conspiring to go to war with Ireland, irrespective of the Spiders, and then we'll be doing the same in England. In fact, as far as anyone is ever meant to know, this isn't even a Dead Man mission! We need all the help we can get and if China is offering that then we'd be dumb to not take it. I'm sorry, but that's our place in this."

"Detective," Meritorious started.

"I'm not a detective anymore, Grand Mage," Valkyrie said.

"I hope you're thinking this all through," he said simply, and turned off the call.

Valkyrie sighed heavily and closed the laptop. "That didn't go well."

"But we did what we needed to," Nadia said reassuringly. "You should get some sleep."

"I know," Valkyrie said. She looked at the others. "Don't worry about the Elders. They know they aren't involved; they're just as stressed about this mission as we are. We'll be in Germany soon and should get some sleep. We'll be diving straight into the party when we arrive and we don't know how long it'll take for the Spiders to begin their A-game."

**.*****.**

Luckily for them, Tanith was the perfect candidate for the mission. Nadia and Aurora had smoothed her hair back and strapped it with pins into a hairnet and secured a pretty but plain brunette wig onto her scalp, gluing it into place and cutting away the excess lace. It had cost them a few pennies but the transformation, after the eyebrow tint and makeup was applied, was astounding. Tanith had always had gorgeous blonde, tousled hair, occasionally straightening it or having it curled lavishly for events. But she had never, ever dyed it and had only recently been involved with a Sanctuary. She was dolled up for hours, pulled a swimsuit on and then a dress and Aurora made sure there was no way for anyone to possibly know she was Tanith Low, a mother, blonde, or allow her natural face shape and cup size be guessable let alone distinguishable.

"That's incredible," Valkyrie laughed, looking at Tanith.

She grinned. "Do you think I look good?" She did a twirl in her skin-tight burgundy dress, balancing skilfully in her black heels. Of course she looked amazing.

"Are you sure you know the plan?"

"Yep," she nodded, and continued in the fake accent that was just enough to make her seem vaguely French but also not so much that it sounded fake. "I'll just mingle for a while, catch the attention of our German and, may I add, happily married Grand Mage, convince him to give me a private tour and then take the knife."

"And replace it with the fake," Valkyrie added meaningfully.

"And replace it with the fake you commissioned. I'm still not sure on that bit," Tanith told her, sitting on the edge of the bed in the tiny back bedroom. It was a wreck in there from all the makeup, clothes and many people sleeping in it. "Are you sure you trust your sources?"

"I wouldn't put you in this position if I didn't," she said strongly. "I'd send Aurora instead."

"Stop," Tanith told her, giving her a look. "Are you certain it'll fool Starke?"

"Yes, Tabitha. Don't doubt it. Because if you do, people will notice. It'll be a quick switch and so fast that no one will have any idea it ever happened. I swear. Worst come to worst, you'll have to incapacitate him and jump through a window."

"I'd rather not," Tanith rolled her eyes. "I hate using this accent."

"Hey, that's your own fault for it being your best impression. Don't blame that on me."

"I think I'll call my parents while we wait and get an update on Baby."

Valkyrie smiled. They had to call Laila 'Baby' around all the other non-family members – normal practice for a mage child for their protection. As far as they knew, even Fletcher didn't know Laila's name and he'd lived with them since before her birth.

Tanith walked out of the room into the main sitting area and got immediately catcalled and jeered by the others. The door swung shut by itself, clicking into place, and leaving Valkyrie with Nadia who'd been silently leaning against the shower wall.

"Are you feeling better?" Nadia asked.

"Yeah. I'm fine. Are you?"

"You don't seem fine."

"You didn't answer me."

"I'm still a bit shaken, but I'm mostly relieved. A little proud of myself but not that much. I'm mostly just glad that you insisted teaching me how to defend myself and helped me get stronger. If you hadn't that never would have worked."

"Nadia, it never should have–"

"It doesn't matter what should have happened. I don't care and I don't want you to either. I want you to teach me more defence and help me get stronger." She continued in a whisper. "I don't want to be strong like you and Tanith, but I at least need to not have, you know, wobbly bits."

"I like your wobbly bits though," Valkyrie whispered, holding her arms open. "They're soft and squishy."

"I don't like them."

"You're perfect, baby," Valkyrie whispered, looking up at Nadia. Her face was in between her breasts and it was nice. "I swear. If you want to be more toned then that's fine but don't do it because of some self-conscious reason. You're wonderful and your body is too."

Nadia smiled down at her. "I used to be thinner."

"I could see your bones, Nadia," Valkyrie whispered seriously. "I know you don't like talking about then, and that it happened out of stress, but please don't think that I somehow liked you more or you looked better then just because you were thin. I was so worried about you. We all were. We debated going to your parent's house and literally kidnapping you and going to court for custody of you. And at any rate, you are still thin. You're just not bony anymore."

Nadia softly brushed hair behind Valkyrie's ear. "I guess I just feel gross. I haven't shaved in a week and my eyebrows are growing out, and I look like I have a moustache."

"I don't care if you're fluffy."

"I do though," she smiled. "Maybe I'll do my eyebrows tonight."

"Good idea. You can do mine too if you want."

"You barely need to do yours, it's not fair. They're so perfect," she groused, trailing a thumb over Valkyrie's left eyebrow. "It's got a nice natural arch and you don't need to do the top, just that little bit at the bottom and the middle."

"But if I don't do the middle I get a solid black monobrow so where does that leave us?"

"It does not, and you know it," Nadia rolled her eyes. "My eyebrows need plucking practically up to my hairline."

"You're exaggerating."

"Maybe a little, but not much. And I have a little bald spot, right here, see?" Nadia crouched down so Valkyrie could see what she was complaining about. There was not a bald spot, the hairs were just very slightly lighter in one spot, so subtle no one could possibly notice unless it was specifically pointed out to them. "And I have a mole on my neck."

"I have, like, ten moles on my whole body, and a bunch of random freckles, it's the Irish in us. I don't know why you're all of a sudden self-conscious. You're gorgeous, Nadia. Your body is amazing, your hair is amazing. I've only ever loved you and I've never said anything negative. What's brought this on? It's not because your jealous or something is it? I was told people act weird when they get jealous."

"No, I'm not jealous. I'm just feeling gross and hairy and I haven't showered today and I sweated loads on the mission so I smell."

"You don't smell."

"I haven't lifted my arms all night on purpose. Trust me, I do smell and it's pretty rancid. Plus I'm tired and grouchy and stressed and I didn't like how disappointed Elder Meritorious sounded with us. It made me feel crap. And I can't stop thinking about my mother and the wedding and I don't want everyone to see me on my wedding day if I feel like this. I'd be an ugly bride and my Great-Great-Auntie Durga will call me fat and everyone will laugh and my fifth-cousin Ronnie will throw dirt at me like he did when we were little."

"Baby, baby, please don't be upset. Stop," Valkyrie whispered, pulling Nadia onto her lap and hugging her tightly. "Don't cry. You have to hold it together for a few more days, alright? Please honey." Nadia nodded and bit her lip, not letting any tears fall. "I'm so sorry. You didn't need this stress. I didn't realise you were feeling so bad today."

"It's not your fault."

"For what it's worth, you are not going to have dirt thrown on you by your twelfth-cousin Ronnie and if he even looks at dirt when I'm around I'll kick his nasty ass. Okay? And if you think I won't tell your ancient auntie where to shove it you're wrong. She has no right to call you names, and you're not fat anyway. You're still too thin as far as I'm concerned. If you really want to work out with me and get stronger so you can fight, and you think that will make you more confident in yourself, then of course I'd love to work out with you. It'll be fun. Just don't think about anything that'll upset you. Your family will come around before our wedding because I'll make sure of it. By then, the war will be done and the stress will be gone so we can all really focus on them. And when we get married I can guarantee I will cry over how I get to marry the prettiest girl in the world. No one matters apart from you. I don't care about what anyone thinks of us, of me, of what we're doing. I just care about you."

Nadia smiled at her with bright, wet eyes. "Thank you, Val. I love you so much."

**.*****.**

**The Dagger**

Valkyrie watched from her crouched position on the boat through binoculars at the house. They were lucky he had a house on the water, and that Grand Mage Starke was willing to attempt to cheat on his wife. Then again, Erskine had informed her when she was about thirteen, when she'd first met Starke, that this was his eighth wife. Possibly his ninth, if you class a girl he married and immediately abandoned some four hundred years ago as a teenager when he'd been informed minutes after marrying her that she'd had a lover before him. Times had changed drastically since those days, Erskine had told her wisely, spieling on about the importance of standing up for herself and kicking men between the legs if they ever questioned her 'history' – this was before she'd told them she only liked girls and things were barely going with Nadia – but the only real thing she'd taken away from all that was Starke's teenhood mistake. She hated him and all his teen-self had stood for. The changes he'd gone through since that moment had no bearing on her. She just hated him for what he was before and she had no intention of ever letting that image of him go.

It certainly made stealing from him all the sweeter. Tanith came outside with him, hanging off his arm and acting ever-so-slightly tipsy but still coherent and ladylike. They stopped by the pier and spoke. Some time went by and Tanith ran a finger down his chest, pressed their bodies together and made Valkyrie feel bad about what else Tanith may have had to touch. And then Starke went inside his house.

Moments later, Tanith stripped off her dress and swan dived into the water. Valkyrie indicated to her team to get themselves together and they had a towel for Tanith to wrap herself in as soon as she was out of the water. The boat quietly started up and began its journey to the other side of the lake.

"Success?" Valkyrie asked.

"Success," Tanith grinned, handing her clutch bag over to Valkyrie.


	183. The Spear

**Chapter 183**

They were only halfway to Poland when the news came from Corrival. Just a simple message, nothing more.

'Spiders stormed Germans. Took knife. Everyone dead.'

When they landed in Poland they found that information was slightly faulty. They had only taken Valkyrie's _fake_ Dagger. And not everyone was dead. Just most of them. And not everyone was on the same page about who did it. No one suspected Tanith's cover and no one was really allowed to suspect the Dead Men as they were in America and no one really knew about them splitting up for this mission. That had left a gap in who to blame seeing as the German Sanctuary and all its allies were only interested in saying Ireland wasn't under attack from Spiders and telling the world they had been attacked by Spiders would wound their pride so…

They were claiming hitmen did it for the Irish Sanctuary. Representatives from almost all Sanctuaries across the world were threatening to come together to form a Supreme Council, which was only different from a war council in name. Irelands allies were being suspiciously quiet also, and that was making Valkyrie uncomfortable. Thank God they still had Meritorious with them to tell the other Sanctuaries to keep the peace for at least for a few more weeks, but it didn't look as if it would hold them back for much longer.

Valkyrie had hoped for more time.

It was with a heavy heart they stopped to refill in a rundown looking airfield and deboarded. They were all stiff and looking forwards to getting to the hotel to sleep the day away before snatching the Spear and leaving. Valkyrie sighed, pausing her walk with her arm over Nadia so she could wrap the other around her sister's waist, the bag with the two God-weapons safely on her back. Tanith looked up at her and smiled tightly.

"Not too long now," Valkyrie whispered.

"Yeah," Tanith sighed, clutching her bag closer like that would help satisfy the need to hold her baby again.

Their hotel wasn't far from the beach where the hermit with the Spear was but still far enough away the Spiders shouldn't find them if they were in the area. Valkyrie was fairly confident in their info on how many Spiders there were – a big group in America, a few hundred or so, a medium group in Europe but all scattered around, not many in Australia or Russia, but fairly large in Africa and Asia. They were imagining around five thousand actual Children of the Spider. One area of worry was of if there were secret Spiders in Australia no one knew about, but they were not in a position to check. In their area of Europe right now they could be confident they could sleep the day away without fear. Once night came that could change.

"Where should I sleep?" Wilhelm asked her, holding his three bags like it pained him and trying to stay on his laptop while walking.

"Pick a room."

"We only have four rooms," he frowned.

"Find a sofa then," Valkyrie raised an eyebrow at him. Nadia took Tanith's hand and pulled her quickly into a room with no window. "We have to bunk together. Be glad you're not on the floor."

He turned to Aurora, who glared and slammed her door shut. He turned to the Monster Hunters who quickly jumped through a doorway and closed their door. Valkyrie backed into her room as Wilhelm looked up at Frightening with wide, scared eyes. Frightening looked down at him with a smile.

She closed the door.

"These people are crazy," Valkyrie sighed, finding Tanith laid on her back at the end of the bed and Nadia checking her phone to find the nearest laundromat. "Are you going to be okay, Tan?"

"Yeah. We'll only be here for a day and then we'll be in England for the Sword and I can go see her again," Tanith said, staring straight up at the ceiling. "You know what's even worse? I was pumping this morning, in the shitty tiny plane bathroom, 'cause someone was in the bedroom, and that Wilhelm guy almost walked in on me. I forgot to lock the stupid door. I started crying, Val. I'm falling apart."

"No, Tan, you're not," Valkyrie said immediately, joining her on the bed and resting an arm over her stomach in place of a hug. "I mean, think about it rationally. Physically, you're at least ninety percent of the way back to how you were before the pregnancy. And in that last ten percent, we'd include, like, two percent achy abdomen and eight percent bleeding nipples. And although being away for Laila is really hard, at least your nip's are healing a bit, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," she said forlornly. "I just want to see her again. It's really hard. It was kind of fun at the start to have some time without breastfeeding and worrying over spilling the milk since I can't keep it here anyway. But now I just really want to hold her again and it's killing me. I don't know if I should have done this."

"What about calling your mum?"

"She'll be asleep."

"Try it anyway. She'll understand," Valkyrie encouraged.

It took a little bit, but they got Tanith to video call her parents and it turned out they were awake and her brother was there also, bonding with Laila. Valkyrie and Nadia left to do some washing for the team as Tanith's mum was saying that Laila was struggling to sleep without Tanith and Ghastly, which seemed to comfort and upset Tanith.

"God, being a mother seems really hard," Nadia cringed, handing Valkyrie the big bag of washing.

"We don't have to worry about that for a long time yet," Valkyrie smiled, wrapping an arm about Nadia's shoulder.

**.*****.**

**The Spear**

Valkyrie sent Frightening and the Monster Hunters to the hermit on the beach, watching secretly with Tanith besides her to see how it went. With the use of some gadgets and Frightening punching the hermit right off his feet and into a rock, they got the Spear.

It didn't take more than two seconds longer for Valkyrie to notice three small, little spiders scurrying along between the cracks of the rocks she and Tanith hid behind. No more than a second after that for there to be hundreds streaming from the crack.

Valkyrie cried out and Tanith jumped back, grabbing Valkyrie's shoulder to pull her back too. Frightening and the Monster Hunters heard them and started running but they were held up by another stream of spiders crawling out from underneath the rocks and forming a black mass flowing quickly towards the men. Frightening used the Spear to slash at the spiders, disintegrating them in long swipes, but millions more took their place. Valkyrie and Tanith didn't have nearly as strong a weapon and chose instead to run to the water where the spiders couldn't follow.

"Come to the water!" Valkyrie shouted.

Gracious glanced at her but they didn't come towards them. Valkyrie splashed into the waterline and looked back, seeing Gracious, Frightening and Donegan getting closed in on by not just the regular spiders, but also some Children of the Spider who were coming out from the streets and prowling towards the beach with big grins. They hadn't been looking to take the Spear before them – they'd been waiting to corner her team.

"Oh, shit," she heard Tanith breath, and then threw herself into the mayhem, staying close enough to the water to escape the normal spiders while thrusting her sword into the nearest Spider – and some of the larger normal spiders. Valkyrie sent the prepared password to the rest of the team hiding nearby, and then charged her magic into her hands and began blasting Spiders trying to sneak up on Donegan.

The fight went on and on. She felt herself start to sweat, concentrating hard on her magic and what she was hitting, trying to keep an eye on her whole team – only for the stupid hermit to try and kill Frightening. Within a moment both of their bodies were covered in spiders and the Spider's laughed maniacally as even more of them came out of the streets to take the place of their dead, wounded and unconscious brethren. She couldn't do much other than keep throwing her white energy at anything big that got near them, and sigh in relief when Frightening roared and shook the hermit and the spiders off of him, slashing at the ground around him and then at a young Spider running headfirst towards her.

"We need to leave!" She shouted. She had no idea how.

Thank God Gracious had a plan. He pulled something out of his coat and threw it in the air and Valkyrie, although she had no idea what it was, had enough sense to duck her head and shield her eyes.

It went off with a soft pop, and so much light filled her vision she thought she'd pass out. Her ears popped, her body felt light, her stomach sank so low she thought she was going to pee herself. It was a strange and unwelcome feeling.

As soon as the light passed, her training kicked in. She opened her eyes and assessed the damage, knees wobbling dangerously. The little spiders were still on the sand, a few twitching but not really moving. The Spiders were on the ground screaming and writhing, as was Tanith. The others had all covered their faces and were stumbling away from the beach.

Valkyrie heaved and threw up into the water. She stumbled forwards and stepped onto the thick mass of spiders right out of the waterline, feeling them crunch under her shoe, and almost threw up again. She spat and made her way to Tanith just as some new little spiders began creeping out of the rocks. It was just a few but it was enough for her to feel the fear. They only had a few more seconds of sensory overload before they were fucked again.

She picked her sister up – just throwing her over her shoulder like an unresponsive rag roll – and did her best to stumble despite the weight towards the others.

They had no time to go back for their stuff, they just flagged down a taxi. Frightening threw the driver out onto the street, helped Valkyrie set Tanith into the car, they all got in and drove away. She just hoped the others had gotten to the plane and hadn't been overrun either.

"Where's your bag?" Gracious asked, looking at her fearfully.

"Nadia has them," she said, ignoring his question and answering what he really wanted to know. "I switched the bags."

"Thank fucking Christ," he whispered, putting a hand over his heart. "If we lost the other two weapons, I'd have killed myself."

"Yeah, well don't get too comfortable. If they attacked us here, they might have attacked Nadia, Wilhelm and Aurora. Let's get in the air before we start celebrating."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait, I was binge playing Founders Fortune and forgot anything else existed


	184. Poor Gracious

**Chapter 184**

"That was a shitshow," Valkyrie said, a cold compress on her forehead. "We were freaking lucky there."

She got grunts from her team. Wilhelm was still sweating profusely, Tanith stayed unconscious long enough that she was now silently crying in the bathroom texting Valkyrie about how much her breasts hurt as she tried to pump, Nadia was in some state of shock and Gracious was the hero of the day. So yeah, a shitshow.

"At least we have the Spear," Frightening said. He looked regal, as usual, and barely had a bruise. If he changed out of his sweaty shirt, he wouldn't look as if he'd fought a million spiders single handily with a god-weapon at all.

"Only one to go," Nadia said quietly, giving Valkyrie a small smile.

Valkyrie smiled back and picked up Nadia's hand, giving it a squeeze. "Yeah. Nearly done. Then we need to destroy them."

"Um, how are we going to do that, e-exactly," Wilhelm asked quickly.

"Fire," she said, leaning back again and closing her eyes, letting the compress cover them. "A lot of it."

"Like – like a volcano?" He asked.

She shrugged, the ice crunching against itself with the movement. "No. You don't have to deal with that. The Dead Men will deal with it. We destroyed the Sceptre, after all." If throwing it into the deep ocean with as much weight as Anton and Dexter could carry onto the boat counted as 'destroying.' It was likely somewhere several hundred metres, maybe miles, below the surface, floating in the high pressures of the sea where no one with a spec of sense would bother diving. And even if it did end up being washed up, they had covered it in tar along the way to obscure its looks and it had no power sources anymore.

Tanith came out of the bathroom from her shower cross painful breastmilk extraction she didn't want everyone else seeing her crying over – why did people ever have children willingly? – and threw herself down on the sofa next to Aurora, opposite Valkyrie and Nadia. "Holding up?"

"Yeah, just a headache," she said quietly. She lifted the ice to see Tanith. Other than having wet hair she didn't look too drained and didn't have tearstains. "I'll be alright soon. Only a couple hours to get to England. When we're done, you can go straight to your parents if you want."

"I plan to," she nodded. "Hey, Gracious. What was that thing you did?"

"It's called a Flash Bomb Extreme!" He said excitedly. "They've been an absolute pain in the ass to test but they're really good if you get cornered by too many enemies. Unfortunately, not much really defends the user, or their friends, against the blast. Sorry you guys got knocked out by it."

"It's fine," she muttered, glancing out the window. "I was actually thinking. Something like that, but more concentrated, could be really good as a personal weapon for people that can't fight. Like a taser."

Donegan nodded. "We've thought about that, but it's been even harder to make. It's just trying to make them work on only the intended victim. We were thinking it would be good for, like, someone in a home invasion type situation. But people won't use it if it's going to knock out the assailant, their husband and the kids, you know? We made it so they won't harm the user though, we took some of the designs from Kenspeckle's bomb designs. Actually, we've been implementing it into a lot of our inventions."

Valkyrie nodded. "Something like that would be good for Nadia, and for the kid when she's old enough," Valkyrie nodded, giving up on the compress and just passing it to Tanith. "Although it might be fun to get you a taser."

Nadia laughed. "No it wouldn't, I'd end up shooting myself with it!"

"Exactly," Valkyrie snickered.

**.*****.**

After a quick call to Dexter, they left the plane for good and went to a 'friends' house. It was the early hours of the morning in England and they were in London, hurt, a little desperate, a lot hungry and exhausted. Valkyrie had promised China a text as soon as she was in England to say that she was no longer requiring her jet, but Valkyrie held off. She wanted to wait until dusk. China had made every right move to indicate she was on their side, but Valkyrie had been warned too many times to dare think she couldn't turn at any time. Tanith certainly seemed happy with her choice anyway.

As for the other three weapons... a quick call to Fletcher and they were hidden in one of possibly hundreds of storage facilities around the globe. It was as safe as anywhere considering what they were up against, and it kept them out of the fight. She was asked where they went by a bewildered Wilhelm, but she just told him to shut up because she was too tired to deal with questions.

In any case, they went to that 'friends' house, a doctor called Brennock who was not expecting them and not happy about it.

"What are you doing here?" He snapped.

"Hi, Brennock. I've been told you owe my big brother Dexter a few favours, and we need your help," Valkyrie said, and then forced her way through the door.

Thankfully Brennock agreed to fix their wounds so long as they swore to silence, although it seemed Dexter was slightly mistaken when he said Brennock owed him a favour. Valkyrie didn't think it counted as a favour unless both sides actually knew said favour was owed. But it didn't matter now.

They got healed by the grumpy doctor, and then he tried to explain to Tanith how horrible she was for leaving her baby 'all alone' and 'by itself' when she should be with 'it,' and her one and only job right now should be breastfeeding 'it'. He had acquired a broken nose and two black eyes before quickly choosing to take a nice long walk and not come back until the next day when they'd be gone. Valkyrie was impressed Tanith, Aurora and Frightening had held themselves back that much, because if she'd been told before Brennock had left, she'd have given him a piece of her mind.

At any rate, they didn't care much when they were cooking and eating literally all of his food.

"Did you speak to your friend?" Valkyrie asked Gracious, accepting the plate of fried tomatoes, eggs, mushrooms, and potatoes from Nadia gratefully. She had cooked for all of them already. "Make sure you eat something," Valkyrie told her. Nadia rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, he said there haven't been any recent disturbances inside the Sanctuary," he nodded, incredibly chipper after his sleep.

Valkyrie nodded. "Well, I'd expect that means the Spider's haven't been there, as they seem incapable of doing things quietly. Which means they'll probably be going for the Sword tonight so it all gets pinned on us. They must have worked out our pattern, and it wouldn't have taken them long to organise a group to be in England. I feel like either a lot of them are here so they're not in Ireland before things go down, or they've used the last day coming here from Ireland. Either way, this is going to be hard. This friend of yours – do you think he'll be able to let us in?"

"Not without getting himself arrested. But don't worry, I have a few tricks up my sleeve that I've been working on. You leave it to me."

"Alright then," she said with a disbelieving look, giving Tanith a little smile. "I have to admit, I'm a little nervous. We need to be incredibly stealthy. In and out without making anyone suspicious. It's not going to be easy, and if we get caught, we're going to prison. And Nadia, you're staying out of this one. I have a place for you to go," she said vaguely. Nadia just nodded, knowing that this really wasn't her thing. She wouldn't mind, Valkyrie knew, as she was going to send her to Tanith's parents to wait for her and Tanith. "If anyone has anything they'd rather being doing, now is the time to back out, 'cause we're leaving soon."

No one said anything for a few moments, and then Aurora stood, grabbed Tanith's arm, and pulled her from the room. There was a moment when they all heard Tanith begin to ask Aurora what she needed, and then it was cut off followed with a bang against a wall, followed five seconds later by clothes being thrown away.

Gracious hung his head in disappointment and the rest of them tried very, very hard not to laugh.


	185. The Sword

**Chapter 185**

There'd been all kinds of plans for how to sneak into the Sanctuary, but each one was discarded because either it wasn't very good or it wasn't very possible. In the end, after Valkyrie had left Nadia in Fletcher's capable hands – she used the term loosely – they just went up to the side door of the English Sanctuary and knocked.

The door opened and the Administrator, Merriwyn Hyphenate-Bash, looked out. Her gaze took them all in and then settled on Frightening.

"Mr Jones," she said, "I wasn't aware of an appointment."

"No appointment," Frightening said pleasantly, "but I need to gain entry nonetheless."

"I'm sorry, sir, but security has been tightened," she glanced at Valkyrie for less than a second, "and rules must be obeyed. If you'd like, I could have a representative of the Council come outside to meet with you, and if he is satisfied, we can begin formal procedures to get you a temporary visitor's pass."

Gracious stepped forward with a grin. "What do you make of this?" He asked, thrusting a small glass cube into her hand.

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow. The cube glowed in Merriwyn's hand. "It's certainly pretty," she said, staring at the colours. "Where did you find it?"

"It was just over there," said Gracious, not pointing or showing where. "I thought someone might have dropped it. The lights are interesting, aren't they? Almost hypnotic."

Realising what the stupid cube was, Valkyrie forced her eyes from it and looked at the wall where the others were all suddenly staring.

Merriwyn nodded and kept staring. "Very pretty indeed."

"They'd almost put you to sleep, wouldn't they? If you look at them hard enough."

"They might very well do."

"You can almost feel your eyelids get heavier…"

"I suppose your right."

"Look at all the nice colours…"

"I'm looking."

"Feel yourself getting more and more tired…"

"I'm really not tired, though."

"Feel your eyelids starting to droop…"

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and Donegan sighed as Gracious toppled over in a deep, deep sleep.

"Oh, my," was all Merriwyn had time to say before Aurora punched her and she collapsed into Frightening's arms. Tanith dropped down from where she was perched, watching the whole thing amusedly, as Frightening hid the Administrator behind the commercial green, blue and black rubbish bins.

Donegan nudged Gracious in the face with his foot until his partner moaned and sat up. "That," Donegan said, "was brilliant. You have outdone yourself, Gracious, you truly have."

"Did it work?" Gracious groaned, sitting up sleepily.

"You're a genius," Donegan continued in the same flat voice. Tanith and Valkyrie hid their smiles behind their hands while Aurora glared and the others watched on. "A magical, mystical genius. They'll write songs about you in years to come."

"Guys," Valkyrie said quietly, pretending she wasn't grinning. "We need to move. Save it."

Frightening helped Gracious up, getting a small blush from the smaller man, and they all slipped through the door, closing it quietly behind them. Aurora checked the air as Tanith flipped to the ceiling. "Two Cleavers in the next room," she whispered. "They're facing us."

"I'll handle this," Gracious said determinedly, digging into his many, many pockets.

Tanith giggled from the ceiling and Valkyrie had to hold back a snorting laugh. Her sister was so weirdly giddy after sex. She was almost glad she wasn't getting it at home or she'd have to deal with that constantly. "Are you sure?" Tanith asked him teasingly. Then again, it was so nice to see her old humour come back. She was way too stressed at home.

Gracious waved away their looks and threw a rubber red ball into the room, instructing them to shield their eyes. They did and a moment later a bright flash lit up everything.

Silence. No alarms raised.

Gracious crept to the door and looked out. Finally, he breathed in relief. "It worked."

"Useful," Tanith commented, and they all followed him out. The Cleavers stood perfectly still.

"What did you do to them?" Valkyrie asked as Frightening waved a curious hand in from of one's face.

"They're on a sensory shutdown. It's just like the other bomb but this one's not as big, and it's slightly more advanced than the other. I would have used this one before but, honestly, I grabbed the other first and I was feeling sort of desperate at the time."

"Understandable," Valkyrie muttered. "At least we're in. Right. Remember the plan, such as it is. Tanith, stay entirely out of view, you're our secret weapon. Frightening, you do the talking and pretend we're totally allowed here if anyone sees us. Gracious, try not to kill us with your gadgets. Donegan, make sure Gracious doesn't kill us. Wilhelm… try not to kill yourself. Aurora, can you guide us?"

"Sure. I've been before, we literally just have to act natural and not get seen. It's just after shift change, everyone should be taking it easy," Aurora shrugged before taking a deep breath and stepping out like it was nothing. They followed her lead and walked casually with Aurora in the lead, slowly checking, acting natural for any lazy guard scrolling through cameras, and moving along the walls towards the Repository three floors down. When they got there unharmed or seen, Valkyrie's body felt more tense and worried than it had in a long time. She couldn't understand where everyone was or how their plan was going so smoothly.

Tanith and Frightening took out the two Cleavers at the doors silently, and they went in together. Both stopped cold at the entryway and Valkyrie rushed up behind them.

Five men stood in the middle of the room, not as large as the Repository in Ireland – this was only one of many for the English Sanctuary – weapons drawn and obviously just having gotten down from a vent in the ceiling.

"Who are you with?" Valkyrie asked immediately, bringing white energy to her hands. Tanith and Frightening stepped to the side to give her room and drew their swords.

The men grinned. "You know who we're with," one said. All five seemed as if they once lived in the sun, their skin damaged from the heat and weather, but now it was pale. Their accents were hard to place too.

"Are you Spiders?" Tanith snapped.

They all scoffed. "Not everyone working with them is a Spider you know," another remarked mockingly. "We're just here to do our job so if you could step outside."

"We're not letting you get the Sword. You're all under arrest," Valkyrie growled, the rest of her team coming up behind her in support.

"Aww, look at that," a third commented. "They still haven't worked it out."

Valkyrie paused for a moment. "Worked what out?"

They all laughed. "The mole, little girly. The mole you've been trailing around. He's done a shitty job of it, and we'll have to kill him for that, but I'm impressed you didn't realise."

Wilhelm let out a 'eek' at their promise and Valkyrie almost sagged. Tanith grabbed him and pulled him in front of them to stand near the five men. "What the fuck, Wilhelm?"

"I'm sorry!" He almost shouted. "I didn't mean to betray you! Please don't let them kill me!"

"They're not going to kill you, but I might!" She growled. "How long?"

"Since the start," he said pathetically.

"How much did you tell them?" Valkyrie snapped.

"Everything I could. But you never told us the whole plan until right before so I couldn't relay enough for the Spiders to get the weapons before you."

"You are a rubbish spy," she told him. "Get on your knees and stay out the way."

He whimpered and shuffled off to the side, lowered himself on his knees and stayed there, facing the wall, like the pathetic, weak little man he was.

The five men sneered. "Disgusting."

"Agreed," Valkyrie muttered. "You're still all under arrest. Are you going to hand yourselves over or do we have to make you?"

"Well," the biggest of the five said. He was bald, with a big beard, and a broadsword, "it's not like you can arrest us from over there, is it, baby?"

Valkyrie thrust her arms out to shoot him with her magic, but all of a sudden, the alarms went off, doors slammed shut, alarms wailed and Cleavers burst out from nowhere. Valkyrie's heart sank even further as she realised the trap the English had set up for them. The five men looked happier than ever as the odds stacked up around them.

"Nobody," a man's voice said. He came around the corner and was revealed to be a narrow, almost petite, man. He was Palaver Graves, an Elder, "move." He stopped and looked them all over, weapons drawn and still facing each other from ten feet away. "Look at all you pesky little flies, all trapped helplessly in my web. Weapons on the ground."

Valkyrie immediately began suspecting him of being an insider to the Spiders. Or maybe he was just mocking them. She wasn't sure, but she hated him even more the longer she knew him, and she'd known him for several years now. She didn't do anything for a moment, but then the criminals heaved signs and threw their weapons away from themselves, even taking out hidden ones and throwing them in all directions just to be dramatic. Valkyrie and her team put theirs on the floor and raised their arms.

Graves smiled smugly and he gave the signal to stop the alarms, which they did a moment later. "Valkyrie Cain and Gracious O'Callahan. Two Irish mages breaking into the English Sanctuary to steal a weapon of supposed unstoppable power… some might say that's enough reason to go to war."

"This has nothing to do with the Sanctuary," Valkyrie said immediately. "We're on here on our own behalf, behind the Sanctuary's back."

"Yes, yes, you would say that, wouldn't you?" Graves said. "And who else do we have? Frightening Jones, operative from the largest Sanctuary in Africa. Donegan Bane, rogue English mage."

"I'm a rogue," Donegan whispered quietly.

"Aurora Jones," Graves continued, "an American who betrayed her own Sanctuary and has barely begun winning back their trust. They won't be happy you're involved in this, I dare say. And lastly, Tanith Low. A freelancer with rather unethical methods, new mother and honorary Dead Man, or so they say. You should all be ashamed of yourselves."

"I don't like you," Aurora said snottily.

There was a murmuring of agreement from all of them. She wondered if the Cleavers joined in.

"Ah," Graves said, turning to the five men, "I don't think I know any of you."

"Good," the smallest said. He was even smaller the Graves, probably barely five foot, and slight as anything. Valkyrie was probably twice his weight. _Nadia_ was probably twice his weight. Usually, she had learnt, the smallest in a group of men like that was the most dangerous. His magic was probably going to be incredible and destructive.

"And what was your plan, then? I know how entitled and gullible Cain and her merry band of misfits can be, but what about yourselves?" Graves said as the doors began to open again.

"We know what we're doing. In fact, you're playing into it right now," the smallest continued. All the men laughed.

Graves chuckled. "And how is that? You've been outmanoeuvred. Outgunned. Outsmarted."

"No, not outsmarted," the small one laughed. "You think so, but… not quite. We might be more brute than brain, sure, but I promise, we have outsmarted you this time."

"Uh, hu? How so?"

"Have you ever seen the movie 28 Days Later?" He asked. "With Cillian Murphy and Brendan Gleeson? With the rage-zombies?"

Valkyrie shook her head as Graves said he hadn't.

"You should, it's good. It's about a virus that gets out and everyone who gets it turns into the raging-zombie people who want to kill everything they see. Just mindless people, killing their lovers, children, friends, everyone at all. It's kind of in Kingsmen as well." Valkyrie had seen that, with the phone that let off the noise that made everyone try to kill each other. The scene towards the end when Edgar's mum tried to kill his baby sister had been awful to watch. She felt herself get chills as the man grinned and Graves' face fell. "Well, it was on telly a few weeks ago and it gave us the idea. How could we make a virus to turn everyone into rage-zombies to distract all of you idiots so we could get what we want and escape? Turns out, we can't, but we could pay someone else to make one, so we did. They'll be coming for us soon I think."

As if on cue, the sound of screams and shouts began in the distance.

Graves looked at the door in fright. "Close the doors back up!" He shouted.

"It's too late. See, when you apprehend a criminal, Elder Graves, you wait until everyone is in handcuffs and the coast is clear before opening your doors back up. Otherwise, you create situations like this. When you closed these doors, locking us inside, it put the whole building on lockdown and every person was stuck with the air vents pumping oxygen, and our virus, into their rooms. And then you opened them all prematurely with a little wave of your hand. Those doors won't allow another lockdown for another twenty minutes. However will you survive?"

From where Valkyrie was stood by the open door, she could see into the dark corridor where the screams were coming from, and began seeing shapes. Moving shapes. Coming towards them.

"Get ready!" She shouted. "They're coming!"

 _Thank god Graves had been stupid enough to get the doors back open_ , Valkyrie though as she immediately turned her attention on the wild, rampaging Cleavers. Those people would have been slaughtered by each other if they hadn't all spread out, keeping themselves further apart from the Cleavers and their blades. It seemed the Cleavers all grouped together, perhaps sensing the greater fight in each other, and then the rage-Cleavers and normal ones locked in battle. It was an amazing sight, one people, even someone like Valkyrie, very rarely got to see.

She didn't focus on that. She blasted them with controlled measures of magic, trying to get the worst of the fighters out of the count. Tanith and Frightening went for the criminals between the very sudden crowd of angry people in suits and work uniform, while Graves and most of his men ran, their little herd of Cleavers keeping the hoard off of them. _Pathetic_ , she sneered as she slapped a woman that got too close, the smallest amount of magic enough to throw her to the ground. She was trampled by three other people clambering to get to Valkyrie, forcing her to back up quickly.

"Gracious, do something!" She screamed over the racket.

She didn't hear a reply, but she did hear Wilhelm as he started shrieking. She almost blasted the person that had gotten to him, a heavily pregnant woman, but stopped herself at the last moment and dove towards them, grabbing her and pushed her to the ground, fully aware of how vulnerable she was. She couldn't risk choking her out or hitting her head or zapping her with magic, so she struggled to grab her handcuffs, dragged her by the hair and attached her to the metal shelving, getting scratched in the face for her efforts. It wasn't perfect but she wasn't going to be held responsible for killing her unborn child within the mess going on.

Unfortunately, Wilhelm, left alone, tried to make a run for it towards the back of the Repository where Graves had gone. Several other rage-zombies had gotten through the gap Valkyrie left in the form intended to keep the people back, and they saw a moving person and just went for him.

It was different from zombies though. They weren't trying to literally rip them apart or bite them, they were just trying to beat everyone around them. Some had objects and weapons, and those people were beating others up far more brutally, but it didn't seem as if they wanted to kill anyone. If anything, it seemed as if they were more rage than zombie. Certainly, it was nothing like when the remnants escaped.

Valkyrie grabbed a man by the back of the head by his hair and threw him to the ground before he could hit Tanith and took the thin metal pole from his grasp. She swung it and hit another in the knees that tried to get forward. She had to stop them from getting closer to the pregnant woman, who was snarling and screaming incoherently behind her. And she had to protect her team from the back too.

For what felt like hours, they continued to fight, and a literal mound of bodies, most of them crying and slamming their fists into each other despite being badly wounded and unable to stand, grew around them. When Gracious was finally able to throw one of his balls down the corridor they were coming from and stun them, making them all pass out properly unlike his other ones, Valkyrie swirled on her heel and ran into the shelving.

"Find the thieves!" She screamed, knowing she sounded more than hysterical. This was the closest they'd come to losing on the mission and she really, really didn't want to mess this up!

She ran and tried her best to find them, but she had a sinking feeling in her guts that it was too late. When she found a second hole in the ceiling and a grate on the floor, she knew they were gone. She turned the corner and found the display case the Sword was supposed to be in, shattered with a large chalk signal around the base of the stand to turn off the signals protecting it.

The next moment a wall opened up, revealing Graves standing behind four people with machine guns and flanked by Cleavers.

"Hands up, Cain," he said quietly, barely a hint of that previous smugness in his voice. "Just let it happen."

Valkyrie grit her teeth and hung her head. Corrival and Meritorious were _not_ going to be impressed.


	186. Destroying the Weapons

**Chapter 186**

To say they had thrown shit at the fan was not nearly a strong enough phrase to describe how many problems Valkyrie had caused herself, her team, the Dead Men and the Irish Sanctuary. They had been split up and interviewed. Thank God they had gone over the story before they had gone in. She stuck to it, and it seemed like everyone else had too.

She simply stated that she had lied to her family and pretended she wanted to leave the fighting in America and that she was visiting mortal family. They did not know where she was, much less did any Sanctuary. She was trying to get the God Weapons, which was the truth, before the Spiders, but failed. They gave her very pressuring questions towards where the weapons were, whilst also denying the English Sanctuary had ever had the Sword, and also asked where the Dead Men were.

As far as Valkyrie could tell, stuck in her little cell for a week and a half, they had absolutely had the Sword, before the Spiders men had taken it, and the English were trying to make out this was a crazed, terrorist-driven attack organised by the Dead Men.

After her initial interrogation where she repeatedly gave them nonsense and stupid answers in between their pre-planned story, they had gotten very annoyed with her and upped their game. Her black eye and broken nose had just made it worse though because then she _really_ wanted to mess with them. She didn't let herself cry. There were cameras in her cell and she didn't want to give them the satisfaction.

She probably wouldn't have gotten out so fast, in just a week and a half, if it wasn't for the surprise visit from an Irish representative to see the 'prisoners'. He took one look at her gaunt, hungry face, swollen cheek, black eyes, ripped and bloody lip, and crooked, blue bruised nose, turned on his heel and stormed away. A few minutes later she was hauled up by some guards and they dragged her into the hall. She yanked her arms away from them and walked herself up the four flights of stairs, making herself lightheaded, and to the Medical Ward. She sat herself on a bed and allowed them to rush and fix some of her wounds but didn't let them touch her nose. Kenspeckle would be furious if someone ruined her face.

Her team came up next. Tanith was glowering and looked like a very pretty, short ball of bruised rage. She had been so worried about her sister, sitting alone in her cell for the last week, thinking on her mistakes and of her baby. They hugged tightly, the doctors and guards hesitating on whether to pull them apart, but no one said anything. It was silent.

Fletcher collected them and took them to Kenspeckle's not too many hours later once the Elders had dealt with the news.

"Valkyrie!" Nadia practically screamed, and ran straight into her arms.

Valkyrie held the girl tightly, feeling tears well up in her eyes. "I missed you," she said simply, and then felt a lot of other arms wrap around her.

"Alright," Kenspeckle said gruffly, getting her free of the arms. He looked at her nose with narrowed eyes. "Your cheekbone is broken."

"We only saw the doctors a few hours ago," she said simply, and walked through to the back to her usual bed.

Nadia trailed behind her and studied her face when Valkyrie sat down. "What did they do?" She asked quietly.

Valkyrie lowered her eyes. Left her alone in a pitch-black cell so completely void of light she could hear only her thoughts and heart pounding through her body. Made sure the air was frigidly cold. Randomly turn the lights on bright white and blare high pitched screeches through speakers until she thought her brain was going to explode. Sent in Sensitives that couldn't get through the mental shields her family had put in place get to the information they wanted, but had been able to push all her scariest, darkest moments to the forefront of her mind before leaving her in darkness again. Used the Needs Remedied signals in her cell but turned down the feeding function to keep her alive but starving.

She took a difficult breath and pulled Nadia into her lap, only feeling better when Nadia's legs were wrapped around her waist and arms snuggly around her neck despite how sore she was. Nadia was so warm, smelt so good, her hair was so, so soft on her painful cheek. She couldn't tell her those things. Nadia was... precious, sweet and kind.

But she could let herself cry now.

.*****.

"Cain," Corrival growled, storming into the meeting room.

"Pa, how are you?" Valkyrie asked drily. "Yes, my week was wonderful, no problems at all. How was yours?"

"Don't you dare play games," he grit out, leaning over the coffee table of the Sanctuary meeting room and staring her in the eye. "What the hell did you do?"

"The Spiders raided the English at the same time as us. We lost the Sword to them. But we have the other three," she said, no smile on her face. "We were betrayed by Wilhelm Scream and I didn't catch it until we were already in the bottom English Sanctuary surrounded by Spiders and security. We fucked up."

"You did."

"We need to destroy the other three."

"How?"

"Fire. Tanith knows how."

"And where's Tanith?"

"With the baby."

"When is she going to help with the fire? And why don't you know too?"

"The Monster Hunters had to smuggle them into the country and I had to hide them. It's only been two days since we got free. As soon as Tanith's ready we're destroying them." He went to get angry at her and she spoke quickly. "I already have the supplies she told me about. We can only work so fast."

"This should be your first priority," he said, standing straight and looking down his nose at her. "The God Weapons are too important and dangerous to just leave lying around, no matter how safe you think your hiding place it. In case you haven't forgotten, the main body of Spiders are in this country right now, with more pouring in every day."

She sipped her tea, letting him get his frustrations out. "It is my first priority. I left Nadia and everyone else to hide the Weapons, after getting them back from Fletcher where they were also very hidden and safe, and then came straight here. In the next few hours, I'll be getting Tanith, the last of the supplies from the Monster Hunters and some from Kenspeckle and destroy them. I don't know what more I can do considering how much time it took to get our supplies."

"What supplies do you even need?" He asked, settling slightly but beginning to pace.

"We're practically making a lava inferno. I don't even know everything we need, we're just following Tanith's list of instructions. She got some of the information from Gordon, some from the research Skulduggery and Anton did on the Sceptre of the Ancients before we just split it apart and threw it away in the sea. We just need to put all this crap together, melt it, get it even hotter than that, and throw in the metals and hope we don't burn our eyes out our skulls at the same time. And I mean that literally, we might actually cook our flesh if we're too close to it."

He continuously nodded for almost a minute as he paced. "What did they do to you?"

Valkyrie knew what he meant. In the English Sanctuary. "It's been two days since I got back. I just want there to be more time between then and now. That's all that matters to me right now."

"No, it doesn't," Corrival said, stopping at looking at her with hard eyes. She could see his care and love behind them, but he put on a stern front. "Jane, Jones, Bane, O'Callahan and Tanith have told us what happened to them. I just want you to say it. You have a tendency to bottle things up and not talk about it. So I want you to tell me."

Valkyrie put her cup down, stood, and left the room.

.*****.

"So," Valkyrie smirked, coming up behind Tanith. She'd already handed Laila to Fletcher and sent them off to Ghastly. Poor Meritorious and Corrival had worked way overtime to keep the Dead Men out of what Valkyrie's team had done, although only some people seemed to believe it. The American's had allowed it to pass as they had seen the Dead Men while Valkyrie was gone, so their story was true enough to accept, at least for them to want the contract fulfilled. Valkyrie being underaged kept her somewhat protected from prison, but the others had to be protected by the Irish Sanctuary. Luckily, Aurora had been protected, somewhat unwillingly, by the Americans, and Africa was quick to grab Frightening and book it. "You and Aurora."

Tanith burst into a massive grin. "We're not starting anything."

"No?"

"It was just a one-time thing."

"Uh hu," Valkyrie grinned back. "So I can get the deets, right?"

Tanith snorted a laugh and they hauled the bags of metal, wood and other materials over their backs and went into the small, battered building. "Like what? It's still the same after having a baby, it's not permanent stretching."

"Really, I didn't know," she smirked.

Tanith shoved her with her shoulder and they both laughed. "It wasn't that crazy."

"Didn't sound like that from downstairs."

Tanith didn't look ashamed at all. "I mean the whole – the circumstances. It isn't a big deal. Just a little one-time fling. We've dated before, it's hardly crazy. It was good to have some fun after the pregnancy and fiasco dating Ghastly ended up being."

"I wasn't questioning it," Valkyrie smirked. "Are you ready to burn this shit?"

"Absolutely. I was stressing so much while these Weapons weren't destroyed. It'll be a pain doing this a second time when we get the Sword from the Spiders, but I think everyone will feel better when these are gone."

"Same," Valkyrie agreed.

"I can't help but feel like some of these could be useful though," Tanith said after a moment. "I know they're dangerous and we shouldn't. But as long as the Spiders have the Sword, shouldn't we be worried about how we're going to stop them? They're already several hundred strong, maybe more than a thousand, and much better prepared than us. Now with the Sword too… I can't help but feel like we should maybe reconsider."

Valkyrie was silent. They got to the bottom of the bunker, hundreds of years old and entirely mortal, making it relatively safe for them. Not that anywhere was entirely safe nowadays. The Spiders were sly, cunning and knew more about how to blend with mortals than it had first seemed, and that made hiding things in Ireland hard. Thankfully, the Irish mage population was willing to listen to Meritorious and Corrival and take heed of the situation even if other countries thought they were lying. That made movements hard, and that was enough to give them time and room to do things like this. Doubly so considering as far as anyone knew, Valkyrie was still receiving medical treatment and couldn't possibly be anywhere near these Weapons up until a few hours ago. Too little notice for the Spiders to move. Unless Fletcher was another mole, but she didn’t think he was capable of double-crossing them as he was just too kind-hearted and sweet.

"I know what you mean," she said quietly.

They set to work and got their molten fire rolling, being careful not to get themselves killed as they worked. Tanith's blacksmithing skills were put to use, and after some time, Valkyrie let Tanith throw in the Spear and the Dagger, and Valkyrie put in the Bow. They bunked there overnight, and in the morning, the still scorching ashes revealed the Weapons destroyed.

This was for the best, Valkyrie reassured herself. It was better to not her loved ones knew she hid the real Bow elsewhere.


	187. Aine Ó'Caoimh

**This is dedicated to absolutely no one. No references in this chapter whatsoever. Promise.**

* * *

**Chapter 187**

Due to their actions, Valkyrie wasn't allowed to go back to the Dead Men immediately, so she chose to stay in Ireland with Nadia. She did visit with the help of Fletcher, and they all hugged, but it wasn't anything fun. They were all just relieved to see each other looking healthy and well.

Tanith remained with them, not wanting to be away from Laila for a single second, and not wanting to deprive Ghastly of his child either. It did have one silver lining though – after being taken prisoner by the English Sanctuary, Tanith's parents decided it was best for Laila, who was struggling without Mummy and Daddy, to go back to the Dead Men where she was much happier, and Ghastly had become an even better father. He was certainly good at his job before his week and a half single-father time, but Tanith had taken on at least seventy-five percent of all duties since birth, so now he was a lot better practised at childrearing, and it showed in the way he confidently carried Laila and knew what was wrong with her from a different room just by her cry. It was very touching.

Nadia sighed and rested her head on Valkyrie's shoulder. "I really missed you."

"I know baby," Valkyrie whispered, squeezing her tightly. "The house looks really nice."

"It does. They've almost finished with the extensions," Nadia commented, not moving from their position. They were sitting on a felled tree in on the west side of the garden, looking at the extension and grounds of Grimwood Manor. The new trees and shrubs at the front of the property kept all the new work fairly hidden from passing cars and people walking, but there were a few spots people could look in. They would have to be corrected. The house itself looked really good though, and felt twice the size from the outside by its pretty cream-ish stone bricks, freshly cleaned of centuries of grime, the roof had been done up and solar panels plastered over the back side of the roof, they had a new front door and the front steps into the house had been switched from brick to a more fitting, matching cream-ish stone. It was bright, fresh, and felt like an entirely different property. She liked it.

The library extension was built on the outside with a few bits of tarp for the windows which were apparently going in very soon, and the inside had nothing but scaffolding and structural supports, but it felt very done from where the young women sat together. The garden had been all torn up and was a muddy, frozen mess, but some movement had happened with the slope to make tiers with the ground so they would have dedicated running and playing places and areas for flower beds. Nadia had told Valkyrie all about it and shown her a nice little sketch, and Valkyrie was excited. They were going to have a pond that was entirely self-sustaining with native fish as well, plus a porch with built-in outside kitchen, gazebo, barbeque, smokehouse, all sorts of fun things her family had wanted to include to satisfy their many and varied interests.

"I can't wait for the inside to be done," Nadia said, wrapping her other mitten covered hand around Valkyrie's bicep. "The original fireplace has been restored and prettied up, and it works through all the rooms it passes through again. We don't have a fireplace in our room, but it's going to be really nice to have a real wood fire downstairs."

"I can see the appeal of one right now," she teased, blowing air into her hands. She had lost her gloves but at least she had her Bespoke coat. "When are they going to be ready for interior decorating then?"

"Well, I got to start a little bit. The kitchen and bathrooms are almost entirely prepared and ready to go, we just need to decide flooring, tiles and paint. The worktops are being cut at the moment, I think. All the appliances have already been bought and are in holding with all the furniture from the house. Some of the paint colours and wallpapers have been picked, but not all of them. Luckily, we were able to save some of the original hardwood, but a lot of it is really badly tarnished from use, and some of it was ruined by other flooring being put down on top of it, but we worked it in a handful of places where it would be okay to have the new and old seem seamless enough. I'm excited to see the results honestly. Oh, and the built-in blinds are all picked. I think most of the house has been measured except for the new parts which can't be, but they're making what they can already so they don't get held up. It's all coming together nicely."

"It seems like it," she smiled, leaning over and kissing Nadia on the head. "Thank you for putting so much time and effort into our house. It's going to be so nice when it's done."

"It's okay. I've really enjoyed it. And honestly, Erskine did a lot of the hard grafting, I just picked what I liked best of his ideas," she explained.

Valkyrie nodded and they spent a little while longer there before they gave in to the cold and decided to get going. It had been two days since Valkyrie and Tanith had destroyed the God Weapons, but this was the first day where just Valkyrie and Nadia were together.

Back in the car, they put their hands up to the heaters before Valkyrie got ready to drive. "Where to then? We need to see a lot of people."

"I don't want to do Dead Men stuff today," Nadia admitted with a quiet voice. "I want to do us things. Maybe we could see Crystal?"

Valkyrie grimaced but took off from the curb outside the property in the direction of Haggard. "But we have to see Beryl."

"It's good to spend time with family," Nadia said simply in a quiet voice, looking away and out the window. Valkyrie sighed silently and put a hand on Nadia's thigh, knowing she was feeling down about her parents again. She could understand why.

The shock on Beryl's face wasn't any more pretty or enjoyable the second time to a month or so prior on their last visit, but she did recover quickly and they both took a cup of tea to warm themselves. Fergus was at work, thankfully, and they had called in the car so Crystal came home from whatever she was doing only ten minutes after they got there.

"Stephanie!" Crystal cried, and they hugged each other closely. It was so weird responding to that name. "Nadia, it's so good to see you both. How are you?"

"We're doing okay," Valkyrie said with a grim smile, tipping Crystal off easily to the fact things were not entirely okay.

"How about we go to lunch and talk about it?" Crystal immediately suggested.

"Crystal, that's rude, asking our guests to leave so soon after they arrived!" Beryl said, appearing over Nadia's shoulder. "And you haven't even taken your shoes off, where are your manners?"

"Sorry Mum, but it would be nice to catch up with Va-Stephanie and Nadia over lunch. I'm really tired from my walk and–"

"Nonsense," Beryl said, talking over Crystal, and went on to say more but Valkyrie quickly intercepted.

"Actually, Beryl, we came over to see Crystal specifically, and we would actually quite like to go to lunch. Perhaps we can catch up another time," Valkyrie stated. Nadia dipped between her and Crystal to get her shoes back on.

"Oh, well, if you're sure. It's just that we never get to see you, and it's always so fleeting when we do. You haven't even said how your family is doing. How's you adopted father? And his," she hesitated to say it, "partner?"

"Skulduggery has had to go away for medical reasons for the last few months," she said simply, "but Solomon is well and staying with my family. My brothers are doing good too. Tanith has taken really well to motherhood."

"Ah, that's wonderful! Do you have any baby pictures? Crystal and Carol were just wonderful children, I can't wait for them to have their own. What's the little one's name?"

Valkyrie should have expected that question over Laila's name, seeing as how non-magic people didn't have the same rules about names as mages, but she still ended up pausing for a moment. She grabbed her shoes to cover and pulled them on as she spoke to cover it. "We've just been calling her Little Baby most of the time, to be honest. I'll show you a picture," she said, finally getting her boots on properly, and pulled out her phone and showed her aunt the phone screen, which was of Erskine and Laila when Laila was only about three weeks old. "This was a few months ago now. She's trying to sit up by herself and everything now, and she's only four months."

"That's so sweet. And it's so nice how her parents let this nice man hold their baby, even with all his differences," Beryl said in a simpering way.

Valkyrie froze for a moment and then looked at her aunt. "What?"

"Well, I remember him, don't you, from when I visited your house. He has some disabilities, I know you haven't spoken about them to me, but it's quite obvious. But I think it's lovely how the other people you live with have taken care of him for so many years and that they trust him to hold such a small baby. It's heart-warming."

Valkyrie, for the life of her, didn't know what to do. A part of her felt like bursting out laughing. Another part felt like curling in a ball and crying. The other part was angry. "What?" She said more harshly.

Beryl reared back. "What's wrong? I didn't say anything wrong did I? I try to keep up with this whole political correctness thing, but I know I get it wrong something. I'm sorry if I said the wrong thing. But I really do think it's nice that he gets to hold such a small baby. Don't act so silly about it."

Valkyrie took a deep breath and put her palms together, feeling the stupidity of the woman decay her own ability to function with every word she said. "Beryl. My brother Erskine isn't disabled. He had a panic attack when he saw you because when he was a soldier, he was taken prisoner by a group of terrorists and tortured to the point he forgot his own name and thought he was one of them. He is a fully functioning, healthy, loving man who sometimes has bad PTSD days but is otherwise very happy and cheerful. You coming unannounced to my home without my permission did not trigger his PTSD into giving him a panic attack, but it did set one off. Honestly, it wasn't even that bad of an attack. He just had a little breakdown because he had spent the last few days in a bad place which gave him nightmares. I don't understand how you thought him having a panic attack, knowing he was once a soldier, has made you think he's somehow mentally deficient. And even if it was a disability, the way you spoke about it is awful."

Beryl had the decency to look embarrassed and blushed. "I didn't realise he was also a soldier before."

"They're all still doing the same work as when they were specialist soldiers, except just in Ireland now. In fact, they're all in America on a special mission. They wouldn't send someone with a disability as bad as the one you were insinuating to do work like Erskine does every day. It's not wrong for people to have disabilities, but it's very wrong for you to just assume someone does because of a little panic attack. Anyone can get panic attacks. It's honestly none of your business anyway."

Beryl looked very uncomfortable and Valkyrie huffed and walked out the door behind Crystal and Nadia, closing it forcefully behind her. They were in the car before any of them spoke.

"Sorry about Mum," Crystal said.

"It's not your fault. I just can't understand how she is able to function in daily life when her thought processing ability is so delusional," Valkyrie said honestly.

"Neither do I most of the time," Crystal said and then laughed, breaking the ice and getting them much happier. "Maybe we shouldn't tell Erskine about this."

"Are you kidding? I'm absolutely telling him, he'll get a laugh out of it," Valkyrie grinned. "Where do we want to eat?"

Crystal and Nadia chose a place only ten minutes' drive from Haggard, in which time Nadia and Valkyrie gave Crystal a very, very brief rundown of what had happened with them gathering a team, collecting the God Weapons which the Spiders were also trying to collect, getting all but the Sword and then being held prisoner. Nadia included how Valkyrie had been as good as tortured, which set off Nadia and Crystal to ask how she was and coo all over her which wasn't exactly fun for Valkyrie so she deflected and said how they had destroyed what they could and now at least only had a little more to go before they were finished. She tried to keep the guilty look off her face as she lied right to them about the Weapons. It was safest this way.

"Well, I'm glad you've recovered," Crystal said, hopping out of the car. "This is a really pretty colour by the way."

"Thank you," Nadia grinned. "This is my new car. Valkyrie got it for me for my birthday when she proposed to me."

"It's so nice," Crystal hyped, and Nadia preened a little before they went into the small café. They were seated and then spoke again. "I actually have something really exciting to tell you. I picked a name."

"What?!" Nadia and Valkyrie gushed at the same time. "Tell us!" Valkyrie demanded.

"Aine Ó'Caoimh," she smiled proudly.

"What does it mean?" Nadia asked instantly. "It's so pretty."

"Ó'Caoimh is the main part of the meaning for me," she explained, blushing darkly and lowering her voice so the other handful of patrons wouldn't hear them. "It means loveable and pretty, but also gentle. And it's so pretty to say, even if it's a bit of a weird spelling. I love it so much. And Aine, mostly because it means brightness and there are myths of a goddess of summer being called Aine. But also because of some other myths, were she comes out on top," Aine said with a small, but sad smile.

Valkyrie nodded. "I don't know those myths."

"Neither did I until I started roaming the internet for names I liked," she laughed slightly. "But I'm really happy with what I found."

"What were the myths?" Nadia asked. Valkyrie looked at Aine too, intrigued.

Aine looked at them uncomfortably for a moment and then leaned in and whispered, "Well, it's about how the goddess was taken advantage of but came out on top. It just reminded me of, you know. Him. Hagan."

That felt like a blow to Valkyrie's stomach. That piece of shit, filthy man had hurt her cousin too. She had thought so, when the topic had come up with Aine before, but she hadn't heard her say it aloud. It really, physically hurt to hear it. "Oh," she said simply.

Nadia put a hand on her arm comfortingly but spoke to Aine. "That's a really strong thing to do," she smiled. "I think it sounds powerful and beautiful, and it still soft and sweet. It really fits you. Super Irish too."

Aine brightened and smiled happily, going off on a ramble about how much she had been researching and preparing and how she had had the name for only a week but wanted to share it with them in person. Valkyrie took a few long gulps of her drink when the waitress dropped them off and got herself together.

"How has your tutoring been going?" She asked when there was a lull in the conversation.

"Really well," Aine nodded. "Mr Pinnelli has been really patient with me but has pushed me really hard to get all this done. I decided to quit my job to focus entirely on what he's teaching me. He's just kept to the basic stuff that you showed me," referring to Nadia showing her Elemental magic, "because I'm too old to try and successfully get a grasp on anything else in time for you-know-what, but I honestly love it."

"That's good," Valkyrie nodded.

"It is. And I've been to China's library a few times, and Mr Pinnelli took me to a few places like Roarhaven and some shops. It was fun."

"I'm really happy for you," Valkyrie smiled. "And I'm really glad you get to know all this stuff with me. It's nice to have some more family with me."

Aine smiled happily back, a calmer sureness in her eyes that had been hidden by anxiety only a few weeks ago when they last saw each other. "Me too, Val."


	188. NSFW and picking out flooring

**Warning: NSFW. Or home. Looking at this is a crime. A gay crime.**

* * *

**Chapter 188**

"Mmm, this is nice," Valkyrie sighed, lying on her front as Nadia slowly massaged her back.

"I told you you'd like it," Nadia said, a smirk in her voice.

"Shh, you don't know anything," Valkyrie joked, her voice growing husky as sleepy pleasure took over. The room was nice and hot, she'd had a long soak in the bath with another special healing stone to help draw out any lasting aches in her muscles and joints from her stint as a prisoner, and Nadia had lit a candle. It was a little strange at first because they were staying at Solomon's old house he still hadn't sold, in his guest bedroom that had a fine layer of dust all around, but how could she not be relaxed and happy when her fiancée was stroking her back?

"I think you should admit I'm right," Nadia said, pausing to lean down and kiss along her left shoulder blade. "I could have helped you before."

"Before what?"

"Just before. When you were tense or stressed. I think this would have made you feel better."

Valkyrie just hummed.

"Is your back feeling more relaxed now?" She asked, kneading into the harder, tense muscles in the hollow of her back.

"Yeah, a lot," she said quietly.

"Good."

Valkyrie's mouth opened slightly as she focused on the feel of Nadia's fingers kneading and stroking along her body from her neck all the way to the base of her spine. Gradually, Nadia's soft fingers began to trace further down, dipping between her legs and barely tickling the inside of her thigh. Valkyrie felt herself get wet and moaned, repositioning herself so her legs were more open. Nadia kissed her lower back and flicked a finger over her clit, getting a happy sigh from Valkyrie, and began to slowly rub her finger over the sensitive area.

"Would you mind doing something new?" Nadia asked in almost a whisper. Valkyrie hummed questioningly. "Do you remember Tanith's Christmas present?"

Valkyrie didn't react immediately, because it took a moment for her to actually remember the gift, but then her eyes shot open and she half turned over, toppling Nadia onto the bed. "What?"

Nadia giggled and pushed Valkyrie on her back. "Yeah, it could be fun. Would you at least try it? We can stop as soon as you want to."

"I'm not sure. What if it hurts?" Valkyrie asked cautiously, laying back on the covers.

"It's not going to hurt, and if it does we'll stop. I've been reading up on the whole process from the book Tanith got us, and I ordered some stuff online. I know what to do, I swear. It really isn't as crazy as you think," Nadia insisted.

Valkyrie paused. "Wait, are we thinking you're going to use it… on me?"

"Well, yeah," Nadia smirked. "What better way to get comfortable with it than to experience it being used first-hand? But I promise, I know what I'm doing and if you don't like it, I'll stop!"

Valkyrie stared at her and Nadia, naked and sitting on top of her, stared back happily. "Not a chance. No way."

"What? Why? I can top you if I want to!" She cried, pretending to be offended. "And you promised me you'd let me go down on you more, this is almost the same thing!"

"It is not the same thing! And you can't even feel the thing, how will you know if you're hurting me?"

"You'll have to tell me if it hurts, obviously, just like when we're having sex without a toy. I'll be really gentle! I'm not trying to stick it in your ass!"

"I'd hope not!" Valkyrie said, sitting up quickly, making Nadia topple over again. "No way am I letting you shove that plastic shit inside me when you don't even know if it's going to hurt."

"It won't hurt, why do you think it's going to hurt?" Nadia asked, exasperated. "People use strap-on's all the time, it's not a painful thing. You're going to enjoy it. And I bought lube too, like the book said to. And anyway, I know it won't hurt because I already used it on myself."

"How?"

"I just stuck it in, it's not rocket science," Nadia shrugged. "It's not as big as I think you're imagining. It's practically a training dildo."

"Is that a real thing?"

"I don't know. But it's only, like, five inches long and not that wide. I swear, it didn't hurt me and it won't hurt you. Please will you be open to the idea?" Nadia begged. Valkyrie hesitated. "Would you feel better if you used it on me first?"

"No," she sighed, feeling like she was going to regret her choice. "It would be weirder for me to use it."

"That was my thinking. I promise, if it makes you too uncomfortable or you don't like it, or if it hurts even a little bit, I will stop immediately and won't bring up the idea again until you want to try again, if you ever want to. Is that fair?"

Valkyrie nodded. "Alright. Fine. I'll give it a go."

Nadia literally squealed and hopped off the bed and over to their suitcase where she pulled out a toiletry bag, only to open it and spill the content onto the bed – two different bottles of lube, the sunflower yellow strap-on, and something small and pink.

"It's not as big as I thought," she admitted.

"See!" Nadia said triumphantly. "I told you it's not that bad. And it's a really nice shade of yellow."

Valkyrie snorted a laugh. "Yeah, I'm sure Tanith was really taking into consideration the colour palette when she picked it out."

Nadia grinned. "I would hope so." She picked it up by wrapping her hand around the base of the dildo. "Touch it."

"I'd rather not."

"I double doughnut dare you," Nadia laughed.

Valkyrie fake-glared. "If I do this, will you buy me doughnuts?"

"I'll order you a dozen and they'll be here in half an hour."

Valkyrie nodded and decided to just bite the bullet and took the thing from Nadia to look at it. It didn't have any gross veins or particularly penis-like shapes moulded into it, and that actually made it a whole lot nicer to look at. Instead of a disgusting, way too big penis substitute, it was honestly just a yellow piece of plastic, slightly curved but nothing major, with a rounded tip. It had a similar thickness from the base to tip, except where the tip rounded to an end of course. It wasn't totally hard either, which Valkyrie had been a little scared of, but rather very slightly squishy, but not exactly flexible.

"I'm a bit scared you'll miss," she decided to say, putting her hands down and looking at Nadia. "Like, what if you're doing the whole thrusting thing and you go too far back and it comes out and you don't notice and it hits me? It'll really hurt. And if it hurts me and then because you’re still thrusting it goes back in after smacking into me like that, I’m probably going to be really upset. I know it sounds dumb, but it scares me.”

"I'm not going to do that," Nadia said immediately. "I wouldn't try and do anything that hard or ever try to just smash it back in. That would really, really hurt. I'm going to go slowly and be gentle and we'll just see how it goes. Maybe you'll want me to do things like that, or maybe the whole thing will be too much and I'll never do it again. I'm only asking you to give it a chance."

Valkyrie nodded. "Okay. I'm okay with it."

Nadia grinned and shuffled over, cupping Valkyrie's face in her hands. "Thank you." She kissed her deeply.

Her nerves made it hard to get back into the mood, but gradually, Nadia coaxed her onto her back and relaxed her, sucking on her neck, running her fingers up and down her waist to make her skin dance, playing with her nipples. Nadia settled between her legs and licked her, slowly building up in speed, making her groan loudly. She had begun to feel those now-familiar tingles and the tightness in her abdomen when Nadia disappeared.

"Wait, I'm almost there," she immediately moaned, moving to rub her own clit.

Nadia batted her hand away and pulled on the strap-on quickly. Valkyrie noticed the straps were already fitted to Nadia's size. "Give me a moment."

Valkyrie couldn't help but blush when she saw Nadia in the _thing_. It was extremely weird, a bit embarrassing, a little bit uncomfortable – but at the same time, Nadia smirked and looked down on her in a way she hadn't before, and it was hot. She looked so confident and ready to do whatever she wanted, and even through her apprehension, Valkyrie couldn't stop the little shots of excitement that made her shiver.

"Open your legs again," Nadia commanded and pushed them open. Of course Valkyrie let her – her thighs were more than strong enough to stop Nadia if she wanted to – but far be it from Valkyrie to stop a woman on a mission. Nadia bent over, ass in the air, and looked Valkyrie in the eye as she brushed the tip of her tongue over the part of Valkyrie's clit that always took her straight to the edge of climaxing.

Gasping, Valkyrie threw her head back and felt her leg shake happily. She was so fucking close. Clenching the bedspread in her hands tightly, she welcomed Nadia's thumb rubbing roughly over the area, pushing her hips up towards the feeling. She expected the feeling of the cold plastic at her entrance and it made her pull back, but neither she nor Nadia stopped. Very, very slowly, still rubbing Valkyrie's clit how she liked it, Nadia shuffled forward and pressed the tip of the dildo into Valkyrie's pussy.

At first, she wasn't quite sure if she liked it or not, and then Nadia started thrusting back and forth and powerful waves of pleasure rolled over Valkyrie. She moaned and lifted her hips, putting an arm over her face to hide how red she was getting. Nadia leaned over her and pushed her arms aside, though she didn't make Valkyrie open her eyes, and pushed in further. The pre-lubed dildo filled her and Nadia's gentle rhythm felt so, so good. And when she leaned on her hands, resting below Valkyrie's armpits from their height difference, she began to go faster and harder.

"Yesss," Valkyrie hissed, pushing her hips up to meet Nadia's unconsciously. "Fuck, Nadia. Don't stop. Don't you fucking dare."

Nadia laughed quietly and upped the pace. Valkyrie fisted the sheets and repeated Nadia's name, meeting Nadia thrust for thrust, and quickly felt that tight, hot feeling spread in her abdomen.

"Ohh, I'm so close baby," she panted, clenching her eyes shut. "I'm close, don't stop."

Only a few thrusts later and the feeling began to feel frustratingly close but not quite there, and she put a hand awkwardly between them to rub her clit. Only a moment later, the feeling released. Valkyrie groaned and her whole body spasmed, heat immediately spreading from her pussy down to her feet and up her chest as wave after wave of pleasure washed over her. Nadia didn't let Valkyrie cumming stop her from thrusting, although she was panting, and they both felt as her slick cum began to drip out of Valkyrie’s pussy and spread over both their legs and the bed.

"Oh my God," she said, opening her eyes finally and gripping Nadia's arms. She stopped with a small, exhausted laugh. "That felt so fucking good."

"I told you," Nadia grinned, pulling out and crawling up to kiss Valkyrie firmly, dragging her cum up her stomach. "Am I going to get to do that again then?"

"Fucking hell, yes," Valkyrie smiled before letting out a breathy laugh. "I really, honestly thought I would hate that."

"I knew you wouldn't. See, you should trust me more."

"I trust you plenty," Valkyrie said, opening her eyes to look at Nadia's flushed face. "That doesn't mean I want plastic shoved inside my most private place."

Nadia shook her head. "Not the most private. The booty-hole is the most private."

Valkyrie snorted a laugh. "Booty-hole? What's what we're calling it from now on. Only booty-hole."

Nadia grinned into Valkyrie's shoulder. "Hey baby?"

"Yes?"

"Are you doing to eat me out now?"

Valkyrie began laughing again and reached down to undo the strap-on on Nadia's hips when the doorbell downstairs rang.

Valkyrie was all for ignoring it but Nadia forced her to get up. It was kind of gross putting on underwear before she had cleaned the mess between her legs, but she got down and dress in time to answer the door to a Jehovah's Witness, and promptly shut the door in their face.

"You know," she said as she hopped back up the stairs and back to Nadia. "I love this country, but if I could change anything, I wish I could make cold calling illegal. Do you think I should run for President of Ireland?"

"You'd be the prettiest President ever elected," Nadia smiled as she brushed past Valkyrie to the bathroom. "But I don't think I can allow it. I need you with me too much."

"Hmm, yes, I suppose Presidential duties would put a stop to all of our sexy times."

"Sexy time?" Nadia laughed, turning on the shower. "You're weird."

"Says you, Miss Booty-hole. Give me a kiss."

"No."

"I wasn't asking, bitch," Valkyrie grinned, grabbing Nadia around the waist and pushing them both into the warm shower. "Now look what you've done. My clothes are wet!"

"Val, take them off, oh my god!" Nadia shouted, pushing her out the shower. Valkyrie stripped off quickly and re-joined Nadia as she was getting ready to lather up her hair.

"I wonder," Valkyrie smirked, "how well you can concentrate on cleaning when I do this?"

Nadia raised an eyebrow and then gasped when Valkyrie pushed her against the cold tiles. "No! It's cold!”

"Stay," she grinned, angling the showerhead to hit Nadia's side but not so much that when she got on her knees and pushed Nadia's thighs apart her face would be waterboarded. She carefully ran her tongue from the back of Nadia's pussy and up to her clit, shuffling her body to get in the right position. Nadia shuffled slightly also, spreading her legs wide enough for Valkyrie's face. She had goosebumps from the cold tiles. "You are so pretty, Nadia."

"Mm, shut up and lick my clit, bitch," Nadia managed to say before attempting to get back to her hair. Valkyrie waited until she thought she was in control before slipping a hand between their bodies and quickly pushing two fingers in and sucking on her clit at once. Nadia's body went still as she cried out happily.

Needless to say, she did not manage to clean herself effectively so long as Valkyrie was on her knees.

**.*****.**

"I think I know what I want to buy," Nadia told her as they walked into the carpet, tile and hardwood flooring outlet. "I just need to get all my samples in the same place so we can compare and make sure it all matches. Like, I'm not going with that trend at the moment where all the rooms in the house need to have the same colour theme, but I do want the same wooden flooring everywhere so I need to make sure it goes with all the different wall tiles and stuff. I’m not conceived I’ll like the cleaned-up hardwoods with new flooring mixed together considering that. But I don’t just want to get rid of perfectly find flooring just because I want it to match better."

"I know baby."

"And I need to make sure the tiles match the paint I pick for the bathrooms, and that the paint also matches the floors. And speaking of bathrooms, we still need to decide if we want wooden flooring in them or tiles. Well, no, full bathrooms with definitely have tiles, I mean half-bathrooms. Just toilets and sinks. What do you prefer?"

"Well, downstairs is meant to be super fancy like a show house, right? And they'd have seamless flooring and no full baths downstairs, so it makes sense to have the same wooden flooring. But I worry it'll get too same-y over the entire house."

"I agree," Nadia nodded as they approached the wood sample area. Nadia started picking pieces out without needing any help from Valkyrie. "Although, I am thinking we can have designs in the wood. Like, I'm thinking the skirting will be white, and so will the trim. That's very modern and will brighten up the house significantly. So with the floors, I was thinking it'll mostly all be in one direction, except perhaps the formal dining room which can have a diamond pattern made from the floorboards, and I was thinking perhaps some rooms could have a diagonal pattern with a border surrounding it. I was thinking the snug could have that just for fun. Or the game room."

"Sounds good to me."

"At first I actually thought the cinema room could have it but then I remembered we're having carpet in there. So, onto carpet, we need to do some very serious thinking. I was assuming you liked the same concept of the same colour carpet throughout the house, which is fun and basic enough, but what colour are we going for? Like, I don't want to be stressing over every singular spill, and we have a baby in the house and we know we want kids someday in the future, even though it's a long way off, so white is _not_ a good idea. I don't want a colour because it'll clash with everything else, and definitely not floral. But I kind of feel like a beige will just look basic and cheap. Bear in mind there won’t be that much carpet in the house, just a handful of rooms."

"Uh hu."

"But then again, some of those on the wall over there don't look bad. And I bet if we get one of the ultra-long-lasting, fluffy, deep cushioning types, it'll be good no matter what. Like, the quality will shine through even though it's just a basic colour in everyone's houses. There are grey colours but I think that's a trend. I don't mind it in woods because that's the natural colour of the tree so it's fancy and more timeless, but in carpet I think it's a bad choice. Oh, that's a good point actually." Nadia stopped to think, pointing absently at the grey carpet samples on the wall. "A nice beige colour could actually be a good idea. It's light, and if we get a good quality one it'll feel good. And it's a timeless colour. No one will ever think it's gross."

"True."

"Mm, yeah," Nadia nodded, moving towards more samples and picking them out seemingly at random. She seemed to have some method, but Valkyrie wasn't sure what it was. Almost everything seemed to be the same colour, quality, thickness, shade, texture, price... strange. "Honestly, I think you'll love picking out tiles, Val. I know the hardwood and the carpet is kind of boring to sort through because it's very same-y, and it'll be like that on purpose in the house so everything else stands out, but the tiles will be so much fun. I want to have a theme in every bathroom. I want a jungle theme, butterflies, the ocean, native plants, you know, all sorts of fun things. I've been mostly thinking about the jungle theme one, and I think some gorgeous burnt orange tiles on the floor, white tiles up half the wall and then a dark, dark green above and on the ceiling, and then we'll have hanging plants and pots everywhere. It'll be so cool."

"If we have them themed, it would be fun for that to be downstairs too."

"You might be right. God, I can't decide."

Nadia continued to talk and tell Valkyrie all about the plans and Valkyrie followed along like a good girl and paid for all the samples, which was not that many as Nadia culled two-thirds of them once she had collected them all. After that, it was off to a nice dinner.

"This place is cute," Nadia smiled, looking around the attic dining area of the fancy cafe they were at. "Is their dinner menu opened?"

"No, we might have to have dessert first," Valkyrie said. "Want cake?"

"Yeah, they looked so good at the front," Nadia smiled.

"Okay then. You know, it's nice to see you like this. You've been so quiet this last year since we re-found each other. I was worried for you, but your personality's coming out more and more," Valkyrie admitted, putting her hand over Nadia's on the table.

Nadia smiled shily and dipped her head. "It's just been a good day. I like being like this, I just get anxious sometimes. I don't want to mess things up."

"I don't mind if you mess up," Valkyrie smiled. "It would be nice to not be the only one."

Nadia laughed a little darkly. "Well, considering I have done the most damage to our relationship historically, I don't think you have much to worry about. Unless you have something to admit to me?"

Valkyrie shook her head. "Nothing comes to mind."

"Oh good," Nadia smirked. The waitress came over and took their order of fizzy drinks and cake and left them again after saying the dinner menus would be out in just under an hour. "You know what will be fun, after all this? Going on dates again. We can go out every week if we want. And we can have movie nights in with a takeaway and fancy, expensive ice cream. And when one of us is staying late at work to catch up on reports or whatever we do there, the other can come in with a hot drink and a hot meal they made at home. It'll be good."

"I like that idea," Valkyrie whispered. "If we both work at the Sanctuary, I'll make sure to bring you nice coffee and hot chocolate when I come in. The stuff they have there is gross."

"I expect I'll be in business," Nadia told her. "Well, first it'll be a whole lot of studying. China is working me hard already and she's only giving me boring tasks she can't be bothered with. Simple drawings, a ton of reading. I'll be ready when the, you know, happens." Referring to her Surge. Being in mortal company, they couldn't say it out loud. "I don't mind it, but it is a lot of work."

"Well, yeah, you're tutoring under the very best. I wouldn't expect any less. You'll be good and ready when it happens though. It'll be a really useful skill."

"I hope so. Not so much for business, but that's okay."

"Will you run my family business, or work for your dad, or someone else in your family? Or start your own?" Valkyrie questioned as the waitress dropped off their drinks and cake.

"I think I'll focus on working for you first," Nadia said. "Gordon was teaching me a ton before we went to America and all that drama started, so I'm more prepared for his side of things than anywhere else. Plus I'm familiar with all your investments and policies Gordon set up. It shouldn't be too hard for me to start up in, especially since I wouldn't be working up from that low down."

"No, you'll be going in at the top position."

Nadia frowned. "No, I won't."

"Yes, you will. Gordon has multi-million investments when you add them all up. I don't want to trust that to just anyone. Sure, you'll have advisors and help, but you're going to be in charge. I wouldn't want to trust anyone else."

"Valkyrie, you can't just put me in control because you love me, I have no experience. What if I change my mind and want a career change suddenly? What if I mess up and you lose all your money? Don't be ridiculous."

"I'm not. I've thought about it for years. I'm not going to drop you in the deep end without training, but you're the best for the job. Don't forget, you have to manage some delicate things, and I don't want just any old person knowing some out my families business secrets. I trust you. And you can't do much worse than the current man in charge, a third of the businesses and investments are just making even and a handful are losing money every year. That's not useful and he's not really doing his job right. And I know you'll want to finish at least your apprenticeship with China first, maybe do even more work after, perhaps even go into business training, so this is still years away and you can work your way in slowly. It won't be sudden. I promise. And if you really don't want to do it, I won't force you."

Nadia just shook her head. "And my family was worried you'd put me in a bad position going into the workforce."

"They thought some really weird things about me," Valkyrie admitted.

"They just wanted to make sure you weren't all the things my parents were telling them," Nadia defended, taking a bite of her lemon cake. "I know they went kind of far with questioning you, but they only did it out of love for me. They were worried you were going to get me killed."

"I'm not faulting them, but asking how I'd provide for you is a little weird."

"It was a bit far, I guess, but then we did get engaged not that long after so we don't have much to stand on."

"Fair."

"And I hope you know, when you're friends with my family after this stuff and we tell them we're engaged, they're going to do that all over again but they'll actually mean it."

"What happens if they decide I'm not worthy of you?"

She shook her head. "It's not like that. They'll just judge you and decide if they like you or not. It might mean they ask for us to stay in India while they get to know you better, but they won't stop it from happening if I actually want to marry you."

"But they can make our lives harder to try and persuade you not to do it," Valkyrie deduced.

"Yeah, unfortunately," Nadia admitted. "It's really not that bad. I think you'll enjoy being able to prove them wrong."

"I'll make sure you have a pony to drive the point home," Valkyrie smirked.

"I would love a horse, don't even joke about that," Nadia told her.

"Let me financially recover from the house first," she laughed.


	189. Nadia. Therapy. Now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have so many ~ c r a m p s ~ right now omg my uterus is ~ i m p l o d i n g ~

**Chapter 189**

"Hey Aine," Valkyrie smiled, coming up behind her cousin. "How are you feeling?"

"Sore but alright," Aine said with a small smile. "I didn't think it would hurt so much."

"Yeah. I was lucky, my Surge was sort of an opposite. I had no magic for a few weeks and then it just came back how it is now. I'm sorry it hurt you," Valkyrie smiled, placing the flowers from herself and Nadia on the hospital side table. They were at Kenspeckle's, as that was the only place Valkyrie had thought of when Aine had called her about an intense pain and feeling like she had 'too much magic inside'. He assured her that staying home on bedrest would have been suitable for her cousin, but since they were already there he had allowed Aine to stay anyway. It had only lasted six hours.

"Oh, why was yours different?" Aine asked.

Valkyrie let out a short bark of a laugh. "Err, well, my Surge happened accidentally. It didn't happen naturally like yours, or anyone else's, where they chose a magic. Although I know you didn't have many options to choose from, but it's still a choice in a way. My magic had been drained by a bad guy, I was under a lot of stress and I guess something just went wrong. I ended up pulling on some other magic and now I'm left with this stuff," she smiled, flicking her hand and making white energy flicker between her fingers.

"Oh, cool," Aine grinned, happily ignorant of the other not so fun facts. That was probably for the best. "Did you see your house yesterday?"

"Yeah, it's coming along really well. Me and Nadia saw it and then had a little date night after getting samples for the flooring," Valkyrie grinned, thinking back to her and Nadia's new favourite thing to do. Again, nothing Aine needed to know. "They think they'll be done in a month or so but then they need to finish the insides, and that's before the furniture is found and brought in. So it'll be a good four months I expect. That's with good weather and not including the more intricate woodwork Nadia and Erskine have planned for the new staircase and library. Some things won’t get finished until after all the Spider mess is done, I bet."

"That's not awful, considering how much you're changing the house. It's basically going to be brand new other than some exterior walls."

"Exactly," Valkyrie nodded. "Nadia's actually looking at wallpapers and paints now, which is why she isn't here. She says hi by the way. I think, because she grew up with magic, the whole idea of a Surge is just a bore to her. It's only interesting when you're a kid and then it's just this thing that'll take ages to happen and takes away a lot of the magic you learnt as a teenager. So she's not as interested as me."

"Has she had her Surge yet?" Aine asked.

"No, but I doubt it'll be long now, she's eighteen. Most people Surge before they're twenty, but that's not to say it might not take a little longer after that even," Valkyrie told her. "What did you tell your folks about staying away the night?"

"I didn't tell them a reason, I just texted them that I wasn't coming home. I bet they're really mad," Aine said, her face falling immediately. "Honestly I don't want to go home right now."

"Yeah, I can imagine," Valkyrie said, sitting on the edge of the bed. "If you like, you can come and stay with me and Nadia at my – well, he's not my father, he's my kind of adopted father’s kind of ex but not really ex-boyfriend. He's great though, I love Solomon a lot and he's honestly the most responsible, sweet father figure I've ever had. He really cares about me. And he hasn't done a lot of the crap Skulduggery has."

"Skulduggery is getting treatment right now, though, right? I know he's done a lot of bad things to you, mostly right before, you know, he had to leave, but maybe you should wait and see how he is after the treatment to make your final judgement," Aine suggested, looking at her with concern. "I mean, you know him better than me, but I figure, if he's in therapy and he's really trying, maybe he deserves a last chance to make it up to you. If he messes up again after that, I wouldn't blame you for being really angry though."

"Yeah, I think I'll kill him again if he does that," Valkyrie joked. "I think I want to give him another chance. But he has to come back and make one hell of an apology and promise to not put anyone else in danger, especially with Tanith and Ghastly's baby living with us."

"That's fair."

"And he'll need to make it up to Nadia. I want to forgive him and let it go, but if Nadia can't trust him then I don't think I'll be able to. It's not fair on her, and I love her too much to force it."

"You're a good person, Val," Aine said, holding her hand. She laughed suddenly. "You know, I think this is the first time we've ever held hands."

Valkyrie laughed. "Yeah, I think so. God, I'm being soppy, sorry. I've just been missing Skulduggery a lot and there's been a lot of stresses. And… and I think there's something going on with Nadia. I didn't bring it up with her yesterday, even though I meant to, but I noticed after I got back from England that… well, I think she's self-harming."

Aine's jaw dropped and she sat up a little higher. "What? Oh no, that's horrible!"

"I just don't know how to handle it. I know the basic stuff, like not making her feel bad about it and stuff, but I just feel fucking awful that she's so stressed and anxious about her life that she's doing this. I mean… honestly, a little part of me thinks it would be best to convince her to go to her parents. I know there's a lot of crap going on with them and her, but she needs normal friends and family to help calm her and take some of this pressure. She's not like me. I've lost so much and gone through so much, but I've always come out on top, even if it's taken a while, purely because its happened so much and because I'm just one of those people that can handle it. Not everyone can. Nadia had her whole childhood handed to her on a silver platter and she was rarely told no. Now she's dating me and her family hate her, she has only a handful of friends, she doesn't see those friends very often because she lives with me. It's no wonder she's breaking down."

"Wait, calm down," Aine said soothingly, crossing her legs and getting Valkyrie to pull herself further into the bed and cross her legs across from Aine. "There's no point working yourself up. I suffer from a lot of anxiety, especially at home, so I know how Nadia feels. But you know what, from want you've told me of when you two were broken up, she was in a lot more pain then to now. And if you've only just noticed, that's because she isn't hurting herself when you're together. She's doing this when she's away from you because she's worried for you and because she loves you. Not that that makes it good, but that's why she gets anxious."

"But she shouldn't love me so much she's dependant on me!"

"She's not, you're missing the point. She was stressed and anxious and not eating much when she was in India, right? And I'd bet she started self-harming there because that was when she was at her lowest, at least from what you've told me. It makes the most sense. She gets physically ill, can't eat, gets tired and exhausted and feels awful, and that results in self-harming. So now, when she starts feeling the same waves of anxiety or panic or stress, she falls back on it. She needs a counsellor to teach her how to deal with those feelings rather than falling back on bad habits."

"How do I convince her to go to a counsellor though?"

"Ask her. Just sit her down and talk to her. I know that would have helped me when I was younger," Aine smiled. "Hell, I still do it on rare occasion, just not nearly as badly or as much. This stuff takes time, a lot of understanding and no judgement. Considering she's tried so hard to keep it from you, I bet she's going to be upset when you talk to her, but personally, I think she's better off being forced to be honest and talk to you than bottling it up and getting nowhere. She agreed to marry you, I would imagine that means she must love you enough to feel comfortable talking and just hasn't found the right way to do it."

Valkyrie nodded slowly. "I think you're right.

Aine smiled. "Good. Now, could you help me to the bathroom? I want to get changed but I keep thinking one of the doctors are going to come back in."

"I don't think Kenspeckle, Civet or Stentor care about seeing you get changed. Kenspeckle had to put stitches in my vag once. Did I tell you about that?"

"No!" Aine said, looking at Valkyrie with horror.

"Yeah, funny story. I was attacked by three homophobic girls a bit older than me when I was, like, fourteen, and the kicked me between the legs so hard I was cut and Kenspeckle had to sew it up. I was so embarrassed he had to put me totally under rather than use a local anaesthetic, and then I didn't look at him for two months because of it. It was wild."

"That's horrible!"

"Yeah, but I lived. I mostly just feel bad for Kenspeckle."

.*****.

"Hey, baby," Valkyrie smiled.

"Hey," Nadia grinned. "Hi Aine, how are you?"

"I'm better now, thank you," she said politely. "I'm sorry for ruining your date night last night."

"That's okay, it wasn't a real date," Nadia smiled, leaving the dark oak dining room table and coming over to hug Aine tightly. "It's good to see you better though. You can help me and Valkyrie pick out some paint and wallpapers if you like. I picked up some wood samples too that we need to go over, and a bit of carpet but not too much. I narrowed it down a bunch today. I figured we should work out the main walls and wood before moving onto the random rooms."

"Sounds good," Valkyrie said, before asking what everyone wanted to drink and disappearing to make a pot of tea. She came back in to her cousin and fiancée looking very, very closely at a nice dark brown wood, not too black and not a stain, and not with any red tones. "That wood looks nice."

"Thanks, it's something fancy," Nadia smirked. "I'm not sure if I like this brown or a greyer colour though." Nadia moved around the room, collecting various pieces of wood and stacking them on the table. She sorted them into an order of dark brown, lightening up to an ashy grey-brown. "The dark browns are a statement and a lot of people have that in old houses, but the grey is much more modern. But I'm pretty sure that the grey is just a fad, and grey will limit a lot of our other colour choices. But I don't want to go as dark as this wood."

"I agree," Valkyrie nodded, picking up the one darkest one and all four of the grey tones. "I'm not a fan of the grey, and I want our house to remain for another few hundred or so years. These slightly lighter dark browns will be brighter in the house, which I really want, and it'll go with practically every other colour we want. Plus, no orange or red tones, and I love that."

"Yeah, but that's still three," Nadia complained.

"That's a lot less than two minutes ago," Valkyrie pointed out. "I prefer the middle one personally, but I think they're all nice. It's up to you honey."

Nadia hummed. "What do you think Aine?"

"I think the darker one looks more expensive," she said, somewhat shily. "But they're all really nice."

In the end, Nadia didn't make a decision, but she did pick out a few nice paints that would work with any of those woods that she marked down for later, so it wasn't all unsuccessful. She also kept a hold of all three of those remaining woods to choose between.

They decided to go to their bedroom to 'relax' after a while so Aine could call her parents in privacy.

"That was stressful," Nadia sighed, lying face down in the middle of the bed. Valkyrie stood with her back leaning on the closed bedroom door, looking at Nadia. "Are you staring at my ass? We can't do anything naughty, Aine is in the other room."

"I'm not trying to start anything," she sighed, pushing off and sitting on the very edge of the end of the bed. "Sit up. I want to talk."

Nadia sat up quickly, looking at her with concern. "What is it?"

"Nadia," she said slowly, reaching out and taking Nadia's hands. Slowly, she pulled up Nadia's left jacket sleeve, brushing her fingers over where the very, very faint marks were now practically gone. She must have used a healing stone on them earlier that day. "You've been stressed recently."

Nadia hesitated and pulled her hands out of Valkyrie's hold, shaking her sleeve down. "Well yeah. I was really worried about you, and Tanith, and the others. And then I found out they were torturing you and I was even more worried because they wouldn't let me see you."

"I understand, baby. I can't imagine how hard this is for you, the amount of strain you're under," she said softly, keeping her voice low and sweet. She paused for a moment, drawing her leg up to her chest. "I had hoped you would come and talk to me about your… stress starving and self-harming, but I let it go since it seemed you were talking to Dexter and Saracen, but I've noticed you doing it again."

Nadia was completely frozen, staring at her hands she laid very flat on her knees.

"I don't want to force you to talk to me if you don't want to, honey. It's okay if I'm not that person to you. But would you be open to talking to a counsellor or a therapist or someone like that? I love you so much, I just don't want you harming yourself because of the things I’ve introduced to your life," she said, trying to not sound desperate or condescending.

Nadia shifted slightly and Valkyrie kept her mouth close, forcing back her sudden need to keep talking. She took a deep breath. "I didn't think you knew."

"I suspected you might be doing worse than not eating, but I wasn't certain how bad it was. Saracen made a comment that made me think he knew what was happening and was working on it with you so I didn't bring it up, since you didn't, but a few days ago when I came back from England I noticed the cuts on your arms. Again, you didn't mention it, but since you took your clothes off around me with the cuts, I thought you were going to tell me, so I waited. But you didn't."

"I just didn't… I didn't want you to worry about me. You had a lot on your mind, and right when you got back I thought you were going to get really depressed at first and I was panicking. And honestly, I thought they were faded enough for you not to notice."

Valkyrie smiled up at her from under her lashes. "You're dating a detective, Nadia. Of course I'd notice."

Nadia cracked a smile. "Fair."

"Would you be willing to talk to a counsellor then?" She asked sincerely.

She hesitated. "I suppose. It would probably be a good idea. I know that cutting myself, and the scratching, is wrong but sometimes it happens without me meaning too. And I genuinely don't try to starve myself, when I get stressed and anxious I actually do feel physically sick, that's why I don't eat," she defended.

"I'm not denying that," Valkyrie soothed. "I'll organise someone for you to talk to and we'll see what they say. I mean, you have been attacked and held hostage by a rapist vampire, cut off from all your friends and most of your family after being thrown into a school you hated, couldn't speak the language at school, attacked a bunch of times and held hostage again since you started dating me, and that's without all the trauma of watching me go through crap. I think it's fair that things can get a little too much for you sometimes," she smiled, getting another smile from Nadia. "And we'll go on another date. Tomorrow. You deserve it. I'm going to take you to a really fancy restaurant, and I'll ask China what fancy thing is happening soon and I'll take you there. I promise."

"Thank you." Nadia crawled up and hugged Valkyrie tightly. "I really appreciate it. We need a nice time together after… you know. Everything."

"Yeah. Me too."


	190. Fletcher and Myra

**Chapter 190**

There was one tiny thing Valkyrie had to do before her date with Nadia that night. Nothing particularly big or significant. Not even really important at all. She wasn’t worried. And that was why she hadn’t made sure to make sure she was wearing her tightest, most muscle bulging military-style clothes that day. That was just an accident.

“You look like you’re going to kill someone,” Dexter grinned proudly, looking her up and down.

Valkyrie grinned back and turned to look at him over her shoulder, showing off the actually-too-tight-barely-able-to-move-or-have-organ-function trousers she was wearing. “Don’t I look good though?”

“Sexy, for sure,” he encouraged, and wrapped her into a hug. “It’s good seeing you happy again.”

“It feels good,” she said simply, and pulled away to greet Fletcher. “How are you feeling? This is a big day.”

He nodded. He was pale, dark circles under his eyes, and it didn’t seem as if he’d eaten enough recently. Even his stupid, pointy hair seemed limp. “I’m alright.”

She grunted disbelievingly. “Yeah, I don’t buy it. But look, I’ve done these things before. It’s shitty when you see the person, but you have to remember that it’s out of your hands one way or another. Keep your chin up, Fletch.”

He cracked a small, fake smile. “Sure. Sure. I’ll try.” He cleared his throat. “Are you… you know, better?”

“I am,” she nodded. “Oh, and you too should know that my cousin has chosen a name. She’s called Aine O’Caoimh. It’s very Irish. And she had her Surge.”

“Oh, so did Fletcher,” Dexter said, leading them into Roarhaven Sanctuary. “You’ll never guess what magic he picked.”

Valkyrie flashed Fletcher a grin. “You’re a Sensitive.”

He snorted an unattractive laugh. “No, still just one of the two remaining Teleporters in the world. The best looking for sure.”

“Oh, absolutely,” Dexter nodded, looking back on the two of them with an incredibly serious face. “I’d much rather suck your dick than Emmett Peregrine’s.”

Valkyrie burst out laughing, especially when Dexter finished it off with a wink, air kiss and roughish grin at the violently red, somewhat uncomfortable, awkwardly heterosexual Fletcher. Dexter was too much for such a little boy to handle.

“Dead Men,” Tipstaff greeted, meeting still-smirking Valkyrie and Dexter in the main reception. “The Elders are waiting for you at Interview Room Seven. I have also been told to warn you that a man by the name of Gunvald Feie will be joining you.” He lowered his voice and stepped closer so only they, and Fletcher, could hear. “He is to be vowed in as an Elder in the next few days, so you are aware. Keep it to yourselves.”

They nodded, and Valkyrie was honestly excited to meet the new Elder. The walk to Interview Room Seven was a rather long one, as it was in the dark, wet, cold parts of the Sanctuary that they kept hidden and out of mind. It was the perfect place to talk to Myra one last time.

“Eachan,” Dexter greeted with a handshake. “Corrival. And it’s nice to see you again Mr Feie. I’ve heard the news. Congratulations.”

Gunvald Feie was as strange and darkly ominous as his name. He seemed to be Corrival’s age, with frown lines and a downward slant to his lips, and he wore black suit trousers, white shirt and red suspenders. He stood as straight as his back would let him but he gave off an air of grace and strength despite his slight hunchback. The thick, black moustache with grey speckled actually softened the look to something resembling aged wisdom. “Mr Vex. We have not seen each other since you were practically a knee hight. You look better with age.”

Dexter smiled. “Thank you. May I introduce to you Valkyrie Cain. The Dead Men have been raising her since she was a child as our apprentice. She is something of a daughter to us all.”

Valkyrie glowed inside, although she did avoid looking at the other two Elders, seeing as they had parted on somewhat tense terms last they spoke. “It’s nice to meet you Mr Feie.”

“And yourself, Miss Cain. Congratulations on your engagement, by the way. I have followed your progress over the last few years, and I am quite impressed,” he said in a perfectly neutral tone. “Now, I would like to conduct this meeting.”

He and Corrival immediately turned and opened the doors to the interview room, leaving poor Fletcher out of being introduced, and they all went in, letting the Cleavers seal and guard the door to be soundproof and quite safe. They all sat down, giving Valkyrie the room to conduct the meeting.

Everyone stayed silent, even Fletcher who was clenching his fists tightly. Myra was paler without the Australian sun, and slightly thinner, her hair an absolute mess, and she was sporting a black eye. She actually looked to be posing as a heroin addict but had just enough health in her cheeks to still look like herself. Valkyrie sat opposite Myra in the large, badly lit room, the Elders and Fletcher sitting around and Dexter going to stand directly behind her as an intimidation device. It was incredibly underhanded and actually borderline illegal to use a male to intimidate a female non-magic the way he was, but Valkyrie trusted Dexter over anyone else in the world to not abuse his power, so she had asked him to stand there on purpose. No one else said a thing.

Valkyrie looked at Myra for a long time, settling into her chair and waiting to see when Myra might get antsy. It took a full minute and forty-eight seconds for her to wet her lips and flick her eyes away from Valkyrie’s.

Valkyrie turned to tilt her head in the other direction and began. “You’ve done some bad things, Myra,” she said quietly, her voice vibrating around the large room. “Working with Samuel Grievers, the Children of the Spider, plotting to kill my family. All right under our noses. I’m impressed, honestly.” She paused to smile at the older girl – the young woman, more appropriately. “You don’t look like you’re enjoying prison life very much. What happened to your eye?”

Myra glared harder, irritating her swollen eye, which made it twitch. Valkyrie smirked and the muscles in Myra’s jaw clenched.

“We don’t actually need you here for questioning, as I’m sure you know. We have all the information surrounding your crimes from the unbiased Sensitives. We just wanted to make sure we told you, for ourselves, that you aren’t ever welcome in our home, or our country, again. But then, I suppose it doesn’t matter if I tell you that. Because I know how long your sentence is,” she grinned nastily, watching Myra’s face flicker between indifference, worry, fear, anger and back to careful indifference. “Are you going to ask me how long you’re getting?”

There was a long pause as Myra tried to push the power balance. She began to open her mouth to talk, and Valkyrie immediately spoke first.

“One hundred and fifty-seven years,” she said softly, watching as Myra practically flinched. “In the mortal judicial system, you’d had gotten perhaps thirty years, give or take a few. Perhaps a little more, since mortal systems allow for sexism pointing towards longer sentence for women that commit crimes against children. But thereabouts. With your acting skills, you’d be out on parole after maybe fifteen or twenty, if we’re being generous, giving you just enough time to meet someone, get married, start a career, go back to school to graduate, start a family, maybe see your mother again before she dies. But you fucked that. Didn’t you? You’re never going to see the light of day again. You’re never even going to know another building apart from the prison you’re being sent to tonight. See, us magic folk, we’re real protective of our vulnerable people. We don’t like it when assassins hold guns to infants’ heads. And you tried to kill the baby of the most dangerous individuals in the world. What did the Spider’s offer you to make you take the job?”

Myra spoke quickly this time. “It wasn’t as simple as that,” she spat.

“Then how was it?” She continued, still calm as anything.

“They offered me millions, and complete safety. That’s more than anyone else has ever been willing to promise me before!” She shouted.

“And what made you think they cared about you? You’re just one girl that–”

“Because I have skills other people don’t! I can do things mages can’t! God, you’re all so entitled and brainwashed to think you’re so amazing, but you’re actually weaker and more narrow minded than you think. I could get close to anyone the Spider’s needed killing without arousing any suspicion, and I got away with it!”

“Yes, it says in your confessions,” Valkyrie remarked lazily.

“And you made it so easy! Fletcher fell for my sop story immediately and I moved into your house within a few weeks! It was so easy I almost laughed right in his face. He’s so weak minded and desperate for attention I was able to do whatever I wanted and he never thought about it for a second. I don’t think anyone’s ever loved him in his life, the stupid boy. He told me every little thing he knew about all of you, and I didn’t even have to ask. And then you brought me with you to America! You’re all so fucking stupid, you never once suspected I had been feeding the Spiders and Grievers your information for months already! _I_ was the one that told Grievers you were going to his little hell hole to search for your stupid ‘ _father’s_ ’ man-slut, _I_ was the one that made sure the worst of their men were there that day! I’ve been making your life difficult for over a year and you never once suspected a single thing!”

“So you orchestrated a rape,” Valkyrie stated simply.

She huffed a self-pitying laugh. “I tried too.”

“Why do you hate me that much? You have to really want someone to suffer to try and have them raped.”

Myra paused, and then smirked up at her from beneath her lashes. “Because I can.”

Valkyrie nodded, keeping her face very blank. “I honestly don’t think we have much more to know from you, Myra. This is it. Your last chance to talk to anyone outside of a guard or other prisoner. Anything of meaning you want to add to the world?”

Myra opened her mouth, then hesitated and closed it. A full second went by and then she began again, looking at Fletcher. Valkyrie’s stomach sank, knowing Fletcher was going to regret coming here. “I don’t think it’s any wonder your father left, or that your mother killed herself. You are the dumbest, most self-absorbed guy I’ve ever met, and if I hadn’t been paid double to date you, I never would have. And you were right, when you accused me of cheating. You couldn’t even see what was right in front of you when you saw me kissing other people, and if that doesn’t show quite how thick you are, I’m not sure what else can. I hope you kill yourself just like your prostitute m–”

Dexter put a hand around Myra’s neck right as Fletcher stood up and stormed out of the room. The Cleavers parted and the signals immediately went down, signifying the swift ending to the meeting. Valkyrie acted like nothing wrong had happened, shaking Me Feie’s hand as he left and waiting for Dexter to pass Myra, who was injected with something to make her sleep, off to a new handler.

They didn’t speak until they were away from the room. The Elders all walked ahead of them. “That went as well as expected,” Valkyrie said sadly.

“I told him not to come.”

“He wanted to have closure. I would too.”

“Yes, but he shouldn’t have expected remorse from her. He truly thought she loved him between what she did to us,” Dexter revealed. “We all told him not to think like that.”

“It’s too late now. At least he doesn’t believe a lie.”

Dexter hummed non-committedly and rushed ahead to go find Fletcher, wherever he had ran off too. That left Valkyrie with Corrival and Meritorious at the top of the stairs after they had waved Feie off, and Meritorious have her a small nod before leaving. Corrival gripped her shoulder.

“You did good today. And…” he hesitated. “I think I was too harsh the last time we spoke. I’m sorry, Valkyrie. I spoke to you out of my own frustrations at the situation. None of this was, or is, your fault.”

“It’s okay,” she said immediately, moving in to wrap him in a hug he returned. “I’m just glad you don’t hate me.”

“I could never do that. No matter how we may disagree, no matter the situation. You are my boy’s girl. I love you,” he said gruffly into her shoulder. She hugged him tighter.


	191. Stan Nadia

**Chapter 191**

“Ready for our date?” Valkyrie asked, kissing Nadia carefully on the lips.

Her fiancée was wearing a sheath dress in a lovely nude-pink colour that complimented her warm brown skin and dark locks of hair which she had curled to a gorgeous, gentle wave that made her look incredibly sophisticated and womanly. The dress itself, other than being a delightful colour, hugged her from its capped sleeves on her dainty, slightly toned arms, over her pert breasts, tucked in at her little waist, back out at her hips, and then fell to just above her knees. She had chosen very small white heals and her big, white puffy winter coat. The coat didn’t quite match but considering the four inches of snow and ice they had to get through, it would at least help keep Nadia warm. Then again, her bare legs might see that she wasn’t warm at all.

Nadia smiled up at Valkyrie, reaching up and resting her hands on Valkyrie’s shoulders. Her ring glinted in the light, which Valkyrie now noticed she had paired with some beautiful diamond earrings Valkyrie may or may not have bought for her for her fifteenth birthday, but she honestly couldn’t remember around all the other gifts. Her makeup was pretty too, very light and shimmery to go with the subtle threads of silver sparkle running through her dress. Her eyes looked even bigger and prettier with the mascara and eyeliner too, and Valkyrie enjoyed that.

“I think so, I just need my bag,” Nadia smiled, leaning her head up for another kiss Valkyrie happily gave her. “I wasn’t expecting you to wear a suit.”

Valkyrie smiled, trying very hard to not immediately move to straighten the jacket like a certain man would do. “Well, I thought I would change it up. Plus I don’t have any dresses and didn’t want to go shopping.”

“But you had time to find a whole tux, huh?” Nadia raised an eyebrow.

“ _Half_ a tux,” Valkyrie smirked. “I borrowed the rest from Skulduggery.”

Nadia smiled. “It looks good on you. Better than him, I dare say.”

Valkyrie was grinning now, their bodies pressed together how she liked it. “Don’t let him hear you say that. It looks really good though, doesn’t it? I already had trousers, it turns out me and Solomon have the same shoe size, and Ghastly had made me a suit jacket for a formal a while ago but I refused to wear it so he didn’t finish the whole look. The rest is from Skulduggery’s house.”

“And your hair looks good,” Nadia complimented. Valkyrie had styled it, for almost an hour before she even had any clothes on, to sweep back into a knot at the back. Her whole look was somewhere between masculine and androgynous, mainly due to the painted fingernails and her own makeup that had accidently complimented Nadia’s. But Valkyrie was coming around to the look. She still preferred ballgowns and getting a chance to dress up feminine, but she also liked the tux a lot. Plus the bow tie was really cute. Something about looking so different to how she usually did was appealing. “Let me grab my phone and we’ll go.”

They called out a goodbye to Aine, who saw them for a moment to say how lovely they looked and to wave them out, and then Valkyrie drove them to the cocktail party China had gotten Valkyrie tickets for. They were absolutely gate crashing, but they wouldn’t be denied as China had requested for the two of them to be her personal guests.

Valkyrie parked Nadia’s car in the racecourse car park and hopped around the car to help Nadia out like a good fiancée, before locking up and making their way over. Valkyrie had to physically pick Nadia up for a part of it and carry her over big patches of ice in the road, thankfully resulting in neither of them falling over.

“Cain and Robin,” Valkyrie told the man at the door in his fancy red suit.

He looked up at Valkyrie in surprise, then looked her up and down. “Um, I’ll need a form of identification, ma’am.” Valkyrie raised an eyebrow but got out her real – sort of – I.D. to be briefly looked at and then returned to her. “Thank you, Miss Cain. Have a wonderful night. Someone will take your coat just inside the door, Miss Robin.”

They nodded and went in quickly, happy to be out of the evening chill.

“He thought you were a guy,” Nadia whispered to her excitedly.

“That isn’t a good thing,” Valkyrie glared down, flicking her eyes between Nadia’s face and her chest – her own chest, she wasn’t _that_ inappropriate. She was wearing _makeup_. It wasn’t that she thought makeup was only for women, just that she had thought she looked slightly more like a woman than she apparently did.

Nadia giggled, taking her coat off and handing it to a teen about their age to take it, who looked at Valkyrie with barely hidden curiosity but didn’t seem to recognise her. “Well I think you’re perfect,” Nadia continued quietly when they were away from him. “I think I forgot to put on my necklace.”

“You look amazing, baby, don’t even worry about it,” Valkyrie smiled. “Now come on, I need to keep moving or I’ll start thinking about how everyone thinks I’m a man and I’ll be upset.”

“I’d still love you if you were a man.”

“That doesn’t help me, though,” Valkyrie rolled her eyes.

“I don’t mind it,” Nadia grinned. “I think it’s hot.”

That did make Valkyrie smile, and she stood poised as she was meant to and led Nadia into the large hall the fancy party was in. It was more of a glorified bar, to be honest, but it was an incredibly fancy one with glass bar tables near the polished bar, barrels of various exotic ales, and there were larger tables for sitting and eating. The food itself was a buffet, but everything looked to be canapés, or close to that, and very expensive. How China had gotten the hosts to give her two extra tickets for someone as young and unimportant as the Dead Men’s adopted not-a-child-anymore was a little beyond her, but it looked like they’d enjoy their date at least.

“We should get a drink,” Nadia whispered immediately, and they changed course to the bar.

Valkyrie smiled and waved at someone from the Sanctuary she recognised, but they obviously didn’t recognise her. There was an opening in the bar and the two young women slipped in, casually waiting. Valkyrie ordered a fruit drink without alcohol and Nadia ordered a small, white sparkling wine, and while that was being made, Valkyrie felt someone walking up behind them and turned.

“Valkyrie, darling,” China smiled perfectly, opening her arms and lightly hugging Valkyrie, kissing each other on the cheek. “You look wonderful! And Nadia, I am so glad we get to meet again. You are absolutely stunning.”

“Hello, Miss Sorrows,” Nadia said shily, a blush creeping up her face.

Valkyrie spoke to cover. “It’s good to see you, China. You’re beautiful, as always.”

China laughed, her voice drawing the attention of the predominantly male party. “You’re growing up to be such a charmer. I heard you had some trouble recently.”

The switch in conversation was seamless. “Yes, we ran into a few issues on some work I was doing, but it’s been supposedly smoothed over,” she said with a wry smile, accepting their drinks from the bartender. “I know, I need to visit you and tell you everything.”

“Tomorrow,” China said, seriously but not too forceful. Valkyrie knew she meant it. “It is nice to see you out being social. You’ve barely been to any functions in the last two years, I’ve missed running into you.”

“Duty calls,” she shrugged. And noticed a few people behind China whispering at the tables and looking at her. “Also, no one knows who I am. They all think I’m a man.”

China laughed, really laughed. “Yes, I know. I only realised it was you from your lovely fiancée.” Nadia blushed again, sipping her wine. “I think you’ve grown a good two inches since the last time you were actually working in the Sanctuary, and you’ve always had such long hair and worn dresses, so you’ve thrown everyone through a loop. This is probably the most entertaining thing that’ll happen tonight,” she said quite casually. “Come, let me introduce you to the host, I’m sure he’ll let everyone know who you really are.”

Valkyrie smiled and put a hand on Nadia’s back, following China to a balding man that was slim, somewhat handsome but not massively so, in a very nice suit but not so nice of an expression. He had a deep frown on his face, studying Valkyrie hard. The funny thing was, Valkyrie had met him before, once. Back when she had accompanied Gordon on one of his business ventures when she was a child, on a snow day when her school was closed but her mother had been supporting her cancer ridden sister, so she had to go to work anyway and left little Valkyrie with her uncle. This man was Mr Henning, who worked primarily in stocks but also in a lot of Cleaver distribution. Gordon, or rather she, had money mainly in the Cleavers and Reapers Production directly, but that was anonymous to anyone else. Mr Henning was similar in that way but was involved in the recruitment as well as making the uniforms and weapons needed by the Producers. There was a lot, lot less money involved as Cleaver and Reaper Production was not a very lucrative business, although it certainly had other benefits.

At a time before war, like now, it made a lot of sense that Mr Henning was trying to get in with a lot of the ‘good’ people, and a lot of those ‘good’ people were trying to get favours and protection through Mr Henning, seeing as how it was practically impossible to hire Cleavers or Reapers otherwise. Mr Henning was one of the only people that knew Valkyrie now had a big hand in the survival of the industry – assuming he remembered.

“Mr Henning,” Valkyrie smiled widely, reaching forward and shaking his hand, though he was quite bewildered. “We’ve met before, Valkyrie Cain. May I introduce my fiancée to you, Nadia Robin.”

“Oh, Miss Cain!” He said, the shock lasting as he took a step back to look her up and down critically, getting quite a lot of attention and immediately letting everyone know who she was. Well done, Mr Henning. “Yes I do remember. Miss Sorrow’s asked that you could come, and I was quite happy, you see, to get to meet you. You say we’ve met before?”

“Yes, with my Uncle Gordon Edgley. It was barely hip height at the time,” she smiled.

“Oh, yes, yes,” he nodded, though he obviously didn’t recall. “And you said this is your fiancée?”

“Yes, Nadia Robin,” she repeated, and he kissed Nadia’s hand like a gentleman.

“I haven’t seen Gordon in so long!” He stated. “Tell me, how is he?”

Valkyrie paused. “He’s dead.”

“Oh,” he said, shocked.

“But he lives on through an Echo Stone attached to an energy supply, so he is still around, in a way. He considers himself alive and is writing more novels at the very least,” she continued.

“I didn’t know,” he said, surprising Valkyrie a little. She thought everyone knew about the Dead Men’s Skeleton Detective’s friend that left them a little girl to raise and then turned out to be living in a rock and considered himself alive. It was sort of a sensational story. “But then, I have been quite busy these last few years, what with the revival of the Cleaver industry in the last twenty years. Good thing too, what with the things going on.”

“Yes, but I am forbidden to talk about that,” she smiled politely. “Me and Nadia like to get a break from my work.”

“Oh, yes, of course, you are a Dead Man in training,” he nodded enthusiastically. “Well, here’s what I’ll do, take my number and call me if you need anything! I’m sure even a girl like you needs help occasionally.”

China laughed as Valkyrie accepted the unnecessary business card. “Mr Henning, Valkyrie is hardly a child anymore. Perhaps treat a young woman accordingly, hum?” She simpered, coming to stand on Valkyrie’s other side and resting a hand on her arm in an almost flirtatious manner. Mr Henning started spluttering and stumbling on his words. “Come, Valkyrie, Nadia, let me introduce you to some more people and then I’ll leave you be.”

China kept her word and only introduced them to a few more people and then they were free to get some food and sit at a table, talking quietly for the rest of the night in quiet whispers, only occasionally being interrupted by someone Valkyrie knew from work, someone utterly random she didn’t much care about, and a handful of other people who Gordon had money with. It was strange, realising how much of Gordon’s money lessons she had really taken in considering how few of them she’d had, but it was nice to see her own progress. It was also nice to find out someone who they had been considering dropping was drunk stupid and blabbing to everyone about how his business was about to go under, so she’d make sure to pull what she could. But really, she got to spend a good four hours with Nadia, barely interrupted, in a gorgeous hall with wonderful food and drinks, Nadia getting progressively more drunk and happy as they went.

At around eleven, Nadia complained once more about being hungry, so Valkyrie decided it was time to slip away. She had prepared for this, being given a heads up from China that the host barely fed his guests even at a three-course dinner, so she drove herself and a giggly, tipsy Nadia to a dessert bar.

“It’s so cold and pretty,” Nadia grinned up at Valkyrie. “I want your jacket.”

“No, wear your coat,” Valkyrie said, reaching to grab it out of the car.

“No!” Nadia whined loudly. “I only want yours.”

“You are getting so drunk,” Valkyrie said, as if that would tell her off, and took her suit jacket off, wrapping it around a giggling Nadia. She loosened her bow and let it hang like Dexter would, undoing her top button. “Come on, it’s fucking freezing.”

Nadia laughed meanly and they rushed into the bar, Nadia almost slipping three times. “Two please!” Nadia said immediately to the waitress at the front. Valkyrie smiled at her apologetically, but the lady just smiled and led them in, asking about their night. Nadia regaled her with a shortened version of the fancy party they went to as a date, but how the food was lacking so they bailed. They ordered quickly, Nadia choosing a lemon glazed tart, and Valkyrie choosing a white chocolate and raspberry cheesecake.

“I’m so hungry,” Nadia complained again.

“It’ll be here in five minutes, calm down,” Valkyrie soothed. “Have you heard from your friends recently?”

“Fleet was texting me earlier,” she said, a smirk in her eyes. “She wants to meet us and get drunk again.”

“Why do I feel like that’s going to go well?” She said drily. “What plans have you two made? Anything I should be worried about?”

Nadia dipped her head and looked up at her through her eyelashes prettily. “That depends on how much you like Fleet.”

A smile pulled at her mouth. “You realise I’m dating you, right?”

“Yes. And you’ll continue to do that. With a little bit of Fleet.”

“I’m not dating Fleet.”

“But you kiss her.”

“Once.”

“You enjoyed it.”

“So did you,” Valkyrie raised her eyebrow. “Apparently more than I thought.”

“I’m just saying, it’s kind of hot seeing you make her blush is all,” Nadia said very quietly so no one would hear them. “I wanted to ask you before but you were all worried about the other _stuff_ , and there’s been actual stuff on both our minds, so I didn’t. But it might be nice to think about. Would you consider it, at least for one day in the future? I’m not saying we’d go all the way with her. I prefer you to myself.”

Valkyrie laughed softly, sipping her lemonade she had just been served. Nadia sipped her wine through a straw like a soft drink. “I would be willing to consider it, yes.”

Nadia giggled. “ _Heee_ , a kissy threesome,” she said, and then laughed into her hand.

Valkyrie sighed but grinned, loving her drunk fiancée too much. Fleet was cute, and as long as they all wanted it… Valkyrie would be willing to consider the possibility. After talking with sober Nadia. “Shh, calm down Nadia, kids are here.”

Nadia laughed some more but settled before their desserts came, and they enjoyed them happily, Nadia chatting her head off about the wedding and that she’d been looking at dresses and venues online for fun, and showed a few to Valkyrie on her phone. They were all gorgeous and Valkyrie knew she’d be happy with any of them, but none of them could possibly hold all of Nadia’s family which apparently had to come.

“I just don’t get it,” Valkyrie said eventually. “If you barely know half of these people, and a lot of them you don’t get on with even without factoring me into the equation, why invite them?”

“Because it’s tradition and I have to!” Nadia repeated. “Look, in reality, I might not care, but in terms of family dynamics, it would be like if I invited Anton, Erskine and Ghastly, but none of the rest of your brothers. It just wouldn’t work! To me, those three could be my favourite people in the world, but to them, their favourite people are Dexter and Solomon, so if I don’t invite them, Anton, Erskine and Ghastly might be upset. And Dexter and Solomon’s favourite people are Skulduggery and Saracen, so I have to invite them so Dexter and Solomon aren’t upset, because if they’re upset, Anton, Erskine and Ghastly would be upset. And it’s not like I can invite no one from my family because I don’t hate _all_ my family. I just don’t enjoy being around a few of them, and since I can cope for one day to keep the peace with people I _do_ like, I should invite them. And if I’m inviting this person, I have to invite their sister, or their mother, or their kids, and suddenly it’s the whole freaking family. It’s just how it works.”

“No it isn’t.”

“I don’t feel like you’re listening to me,” Nadia said, frowning over her plate. “It’s not really up for debate, Val. It’s not even up for debate for me! I can’t choose this. It’s a family tradition that all my family see me get married. I’m happy to do it in Ireland but it would be such a faff it isn’t even worth it. So we may as well go to India, have our crazy, big fat Indian wedding over the course of a few days and have a good time and think of it as a big holiday, and then we’ll have the real thing. India can just be our fun holiday before the day, everyone will treat us like princesses. And you said that by then you’d be friends with my parents, so it’ll go really nice, and it would mean a lot to them to have this wedding.”

Valkyrie put her hands up. “Alright. I’m convinced. Two weddings. One for your family, one for us. Is there anything I have to do for the Indian wedding?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know how it all works, honestly, but I’ve been to a few and it’s all very extravagant. I doubt we’ll get much say in it anyway. We might as well forget about it and do what we want in Ireland,” she shrugged.

“Well, no, that will be our first ever time getting married,” she frowned. “I know it’s not the official wedding in our eyes, but it’s still real.”

“I know,” she smiled indulgently. “But what can we do? I don’t want to organise two weddings a week apart. I know you don’t! So we have to let something give, and I’d rather let the whole Indian wedding go to my family to do what they want than get only half of what I want at two weddings, leading to being really stressed and not fully getting any of what I want in the end. It just works out like this.”

“I guess it does,” Valkyrie nodded. “Come on, let’s get some cake for tomorrow and get going.”

They ordered three more cakes to go, so Aine could have one with them, making sure to pick a low fat one to respect her serious diet efforts she’d been going to, and started out of the restaurant, only for Nadia to practically fall on top of someone as they pushed their chair out.

“Sorry!” Valkyrie gasped, pulling Nadia to her chest. Nadia kept repeating “shit” which was very helpful. “She’s had a bit to drink, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” the girl said, laughing.

Valkyrie steadied Nadia and picked up the girls’ coat which had fallen, putting back on the back of her chair as Nadia finally apologised, but then caught a look at the girls face and paused. She looked around the table at each of the girls and something felt familiar. “Hey, have we met before? Did we go to school together?”

The girls looked around at each other, and the parents looked at the girls. “Um, I’m not sure. We’ve not been in a – um, a traditional school. For a while,” the girl they bumped into stuttered. “Um, what’s your name though, maybe we went to school together before we left?”

“Stephanie,” Valkyrie said, almost stumbling on her Chosen Name.

The girl’s eyes widened and she went pale. “Oh.”

“What?” Valkyrie asked, looking between them. “What school did you go to?”

“We didn’t go to school together,” another girl said, looking down at her plate.

One of the parents, a father, got up. “I don’t think now is a good time, honey,” he said lowly, pushing Nadia quite forcibly.

“Don’t put your hands on her,” Valkyrie immediately told him, putting a hand on Nadia’s back. They stepped back, Valkyrie confused and glanced one last time at the first girl before she went to leave.

“Wait!” The last one practically shouted. They got a few looks from around and all the parents immediately tried to quieten the girl, one of them gripping her arm tightly. Valkyrie waited, not sure what else to do now. “I – I’m sorry.”

“What?” Valkyrie asked. “Look, I’m sort of confused, I don’t know if you have me mistaken for someone. I’m not really sure why this is such a… I don’t know, _thing_ for you guys.”

“We met at the swimming competition when we were younger,” she got out, looking pale but obviously trying to be strong. Valkyrie froze entirely, looking at the girl closely and turning to see her properly. What were their names?

“Oh,” Valkyrie shook her head.

All of the table looked sombre. Only the last girl spoke, moving out of her parents grasp and going to stand in front of Valkyrie. She noticed, now, that the girl looked thin with long, mousy hair, was short and had an awkward posture. She looked incredibly self-conscious and it showed in every move. Only years of training going towards literally not backing down made her keep a straight face and not take a step away. “I wanted to say I’m really sorry. We all are. We never should have done what we did. I – I wanted to send you a letter, when I was younger and realised what I did was wrong, but they wouldn’t let me. I – I really am.”

Valkyrie nodded automatically, looking at her like she might explode. “Which one are you?” She asked.

The girl hesitated. “What do you mean?”

“Your name.”

“Oh. I’m Megan,” she said quietly, clutching at her hands anxiously.

Valkyrie thought back to that day, so long ago, and it took a moment to recall. Three girls, an older, ugly one, her competitor, and the youngest called Megan. Megan was the only one whose name she knew. She’d also been the only one Valkyrie had successfully fought against, having dislocated her knee quite horribly and then being thrown on top of her by the ugly one, which Valkyrie doubted had been nice.

“I remember,” she said. Nadia put a hand on her back. “How’s the knee?”

Megan let out a pained laugh. “Yes, it’s okay. It only took a few weeks to get better.”

“I’d think so. I’ve had my knee dislocated a few times. Mostly my shoulders though,” she said, not entirely certain why. Inside, she felt like she was freaking out. She had had nightmares about these girls, imagining all the horrible things they had done, hadn’t done, could have done when she was passed out. They had, in a way, violated her. But on the outside, she saw a very timid girl that was trying to make atonement for what she had done. And that upset her more because Valkyrie suddenly realised the young teen Megan, at the least, had been… was a normal girl. Not a monster. She had just made a very, very stupid mistake. It was human and she really didn’t like that. “I was never told what happened.”

“With the – the case?” Megan whispered. “Um-”

“I’m sorry, girls,” one of the adults said. “But maybe could we sit for this discussion?”

Valkyrie looked at Nadia, who didn’t look happy, but they sat anyway. Valkyrie drew to chairs over so they wouldn’t have to sit at the booths with anyone. Nadia sat quiet and still as a rock, refusing to look at anyone. Of course, this was the main place Nadia’s anxieties over holding hands in public came from. If these girls hadn’t attacked her, Nadia wouldn’t be nearly as timid about public expression.

“Um, well, after what happened, we stayed in prison for a while, and then our parents got to take us home,” Megan explained. “I was younger, so I didn’t have as much time as Abigail and Natali, but we all went to the same prison after the court date. I remember, your family was there, but I think your dad stayed home with you or something.”

“Yes, Skulduggery would have had to,” she said blankly, trying to understand what was happening.

“I don’t really remember it, I was really upset and didn’t understand what was happening. I was only twelve, but Abigail and Natali were sixteen, so they got a little longer. I had three months, and they had to do five, and then we all went to a behavioural school. It wasn’t – well, I mean, I didn’t like it, but we deserved it. We all became friends though, and our parents like to meet every year, so that’s what we do.”

Valkyrie nodded slowly. “So you’ve been out for quite a while.”

“Yes, but we had to do other things, like see a behavioural specialist and stuff. It took a long time for me to understand, but when I turned fifteen two years ago, it sort of clicked how bad it was. I really wanted to tell you how sorry I was for hurting you and saying what we did, but I couldn’t.”

Valkyrie took a breath and looked at her. “Do you mean that? Really?”

The girl flinched, looking barely thirteen instead of sixteen, still small and petite, unlike her two stockier friends. She nodded though. “I do. I actually joined an LBGT plus group as a volunteer to help them with setting up events, and I did all my counselling and things, and I’m trying to catch up in my studies to be a lawyer to specialising in helping to fight against hate crime, especially against the LGBT community. I know I’ve made some big mistakes, but I am trying.”

Valkyrie nodded again. “Okay. I mean, this is really weird, but you have a really good goal you’re working towards and… I’m happy for you.”

The girl broke into a beaming smile. “Thank you! It means a lot, from you.”

“Well, everyone can change, I guess,” she said, leaning back in her chair and almost rubbing her eyes before remembering the makeup. “Oh. This is my girlfriend, Nadia. We’re still together still, I don’t know if you remember I was dating her when those things happened.”

“Oh, that’s so sweet!” Megan immediately said.

The others at the table nodded too, but Valkyrie noticed the other girls still looked incredibly uncomfortable. Valkyrie sighed and sat up. “Look, we’ll get going. I’m sorry for running into you like that, literally. I’m really happy for you Megan, I hope you all the best. Hopefully, one day, the rest of you might not be as uncomfortable about all this.”

There were some quick looks from around the table. Whether it was them, that being the other two girls or the parents, being homophobic or just very uncomfortable with meeting the victim after all this time, she wasn’t sure, but it was making her uncomfortable so she wasn’t interested. She gave Megan a hug, almost bring her to happy tears, and then she led a sobered Nadia out of the building.

They were almost at the car when the other two girls came out and ran up to them in their tall, stilt-like heels. “Wait!” They called.

Valkyrie sighed, standing with Nadia protectively. “Hey guys, look, I understand this is all really weird, but I’m–”

“No, wait,” one of them said. “Look, we’re really sorry. My names Abigail by the way. I don’t want to be rude, we’re just not quite as, you know, open about all this stuff as Megan is, but we are sorry. We were really jealous of you beating me in the race, and we took it out on you in a really horrible way.”

“We didn’t understand at the time,” Natali said, “that we could disagree with something and still tolerate it. What we did, with attacking you, was really wrong, and we’re sorry about that. You didn’t deserve to be physically attacked, called names, or made to feel like you can’t be who you are openly just because we didn’t like the idea of it. The whole idea of tolerance is something we never knew about, and we’re sorry.”

“I appreciate your honesty,” she said seriously. “I admit, I’m a bit disappointed that you came out to tell me you only tolerate my relationship, but that’s great, I guess. God, this so a fucking weird night.”

She got some awkward laughs from Abigail and Natali. “Yeah,” they said together, and laughed again.

“Look, I should get going,” she said quietly. “Thanks for coming out though.”

They nodded, and a moment went past as Nadia got herself halfway into the car and Valkyrie left her to finish and went to the other side.

“Wait, is that it?” Abigail asked, wide eyed.

Valkyrie’s stomach lurched, but she plastered a smile on her face. “Yep, it’s midnight. I need to get home.”

“But – aren’t you going to forgive us?” She asked desperately.

“Mate, you beat me unconscious for being gay and coming first in a swimming competition, you need to get over yourselves. Leave it how it is. I appreciate your honesty, that’s going to have to be it,” she said, crossing her arms. Her muscles bulged under the shirt. They had to be as big as Tanith’s by now.

“But you forgave Megan!”

“Megan was younger and more easily influenced to follow a path that wasn’t right. She’s since fully accepted what she did and she’s gone above and beyond to make up for it, supporting the gay community and trying to work towards being a lawyer to help get equal right for everyone and to fight against the exact thing she did. That is far more commendable and deserving of my forgiveness. You tolerate me having a girlfriend and have possibly gotten over me winning a dumb race. The fact you’re demanding forgiveness proves you don’t deserve it. Please just go inside,” Valkyrie grit out, feeling herself getting far more angry as she went.

“That’s not true, we’ve changed a lot!” Natali cried.

“Yeah, it’s been four and a half years, you grew up. So will everyone. I’m not saying that learning tolerance is bad, I’m just saying that your part in the crime and your ages made you so much more of a worse person that the way you’ve changed hasn’t really made enough of an impact on me personally to forgive you. Acceptance and tolerance are entirely different things. Maybe one day I can forgive that, and we’ll run into each other and I’ll tell you. But right now, I’m not happy about it. Please leave us alone now.”

“No! No, this isn’t fair!” Abigail whined, stamping her foot. Valkyrie raised both eyebrows at her.

She cut her tantrum off. “Look, I’ve tried to be nice. Go inside or I’ll be forced to ask the police for help. I don’t want anything to do with you right now.”

“What?!” Natali screeched. “You’re being totally unfair!”

“You’re a twenty-two year old adult, act like it!” Valkyrie snarled. “Leave us alone or I’ll ask Nadia to phone the police. Last warning.”

“Stop it! You’re not even listening to us! We’re trying to say we’re _sorry_!” Abigail shouted. She paused like this was a big revolution that changed everything. “Don’t we deserve our forgiveness too?! We went to prison and therapy and we’re doing our best! And you don’t even care!”

“Nadia, get in the car,” Valkyrie demanded, glaring at the girls as she got her phone out.

But Nadia didn’t. She had gotten _out_ of the car as the girls ranted, and now that Valkyrie was at the point of calling someone, she had gotten it into her drunk head to take on the girls herself.

“I hate you,” she said to them suddenly, getting all their attention. Nadia swayed slightly and put a hand on the short bonnet to steady herself. “You really hurt my baby, and now you think you’re entitled to forgiveness? Seriously? You are disgusting, nasty little girls that deserve every moment you had in prison.”

“We were–”

“ _I don’t care what happened to you!_ ” Nadia screeched. “You’re a _horrible_ human being for even _thinking_ you deserve forgiveness, let alone trying to get us _alone in a car park_ to _force_ one from us! You’re _evil_!”

“Nadia, hon,” Valkyrie tried.

“ _No!_ I remember you _crying_ through the night, talking to me on the phone crying at night months after it happened!” She repeated in her drunken haze. The girl’s parents and Megan were coming out of the restaurant and running to them, others watching in the window of the building. “ _I_ cleaned you up in that shower stall! _I_ saw what they did to you! You were covered in _blood_ and _bruises_! How is that fair, Val? How is it fair that they get to come out here and corner you, and demand you forgive them because they don’t want to beat you up for existing anymore?! It’s not _fair_! I _hate_ them!”

“Baby, you need to calm down,” she said much more calmly than she felt, going around the car and holding Nadia tightly. “Don’t let them get to you. Let it go.”

“No! I don’t want to let it go, I want them to – to – I want them to go _fuck_ themselves!” Nadia finished dramatically, now sobbing.

“Yeah, I know,” Valkyrie whispered, kissing the top of Nadia’s head. “Let’s just go home.”

Nadia glared at Valkyrie for a moment but then nodded and turned on her heel, throwing herself into the car with violent sobs.

Valkyrie sighed, glancing at the girls. Their families and Megan were staying far behind them. Megan was crying, and so were Abigail and Natali, but in a different way. She got out her phone quickly. “Megan,” she called, getting her attention. “What’s your number?”

She got it from the sixteen year old quickly.

“Alright. When you get your grades back, tell me. I want to see you be a lawyer,” she said determinedly, knowing how keeping in touch with her would make the other girls that much more upset. She could have a little petty revenge, she supposed. Megan nodded and smiled through her silent tears.

Abigail started crying so hard she fell to the floor and started spitting insults at Valkyrie – none of them homophobic, but that wasn’t the point – despite the adults trying to stop her. Valkyrie ignored it and got into the car, only to suddenly see Nadia storm up to Natali and slap her in the face.

“ _Nadia!_ ” Valkyrie cried, running towards her. “What the _fuck?!_ ”

Natali backed away, refusing to hit Nadia back, which was probably smart. Abigail apparently wasn’t because she got up and screamed “Don’t hit my friend!” and tried to punch Nadia.

Nadia dodged the hand, somehow – likely accidentally as she stumbled a lot – and punched Abigail in the nose, knocking her into her father’s arms. Nadia immediately turned and stomped back into the car, slamming the door and crossing her arms like a child. “I want to go home!”

Valkyrie sighed and closed her eyes. _This was going to be ugly_ , she thought as the parents went off on her. She locked Nadia in the car this time.


	192. Time to leave

**Chapter 192**

“I’m really sorry again, officer,” Valkyrie reiterated, getting her keys back from the Gardaí. “Thank you for letting me take her home tonight.”

“It’s fine, Miss Edgley, just keep yourselves out of trouble. Eh, Miss Robin, can you do that for us?” The officer questioned jokingly.

Nadia nodded, makeup streaked down her face, heels in her hand. “It won’t happen again. I’m sorry.”

They were waved out of the lobby and Valkyrie leaned down, picking Nadia up with one arm and jogging down the steps to the car that had been parked outside the police station by another officer when Nadia had been arrested and taken into custody, bringing Valkyrie along as a witness. It was five in the morning, the birds were starting to tweet, and it was bitingly cold.

“I’m sorry Val,” Nadia whispered.

“It’s okay, honey. Let’s just get home,” Valkyrie told her tiredly. She opened the passenger side door and swept Nadia’s legs into the car, shut her in and drove them home. “What will I do with you?” She asked when they parked, looking at her sleeping fiancée. Valkyrie smiled. How couldn’t she love that face?

**.*****.**

Valkyrie waited impatiently for the end of Nadia’s first counselling session to end. She’d had to look far and wide to find someone she could trust to leave with Nadia, doubly so considering some of her issues included topics surrounding the Dead Men, the Sanctuary and all that business, but she’d settled eventually on a lady called Sermon. She had been understanding, straight to the point, matter of fact, and had been quick to tell Valkyrie before anything else that she would not be telling anyone what Nadia told her, including to Valkyrie herself. She’d been satisfied with that and booked a session. Some pushing on the necessity of the meeting, as well as paying more than average, helping get a session much, much sooner than was usual.

But that had been then and now she was _bored_.

Finally, after an hour and a half session, Nadia came out with a small smile, going straight to Valkyrie in the small waiting area of the apartment complex-like building.

“All done?” Valkyrie asked.

“Yep. Another session booked for next week too. On Thursday morning,” Nadia nodded, taking the water bottle Valkyrie had brought gratefully. “I didn’t realise I had so much to talk about.”

“Is that a good or a bad thing?” Valkyrie asked with a smile.

“Good, I think. I only really spoke about my parents, honestly, and a bit about us. I didn’t even mention Skulduggery,” she told her. “I think I will next time. It was really good though, she made me feel like I wasn’t being, you know, mean to my parents.”

“I’m glad. She seemed nice when I spoke to her. Are you okay going to China’s still?”

“Yeah, I want to get my apprenticeship sorted!” Nadia grinned.

They’d taken the motorbike, so it was an hour drive over to China’s library, and they met China in her apartment. Valkyrie sat down in her usual spot and left China and Nadia to flush out the deals of their apprenticeship contract. It was going to start immediately, focusing on getting Nadia up to scratch in time for her Surge, and would continue even harder after that. Nadia looked excited, albeit a little nervous around China, and accepted a few books to read as well as promised to buy some supplies to work with. She went into the library to begin immediately, leaving Valkyrie with China.

“Well then,” China said, sitting in her luxurious green armchair and crossing her legs before looking at Valkyrie for a long moment. “You’re not happy.”

“Just a bit stressed,” Valkyrie said. “But I’ll be fine.”

China hummed. “You’ve said that before. So, tell me, how did it go with your hunt?”

Valkyrie was as honest as she could be, detailing everything that had happened up until the destroying of the three – two and a fake – of the weapons. But it was a lie she told everyone, so she didn’t feel too guilty.

“I am concerned about the Sword in the hands of the Spiders,” China admitted when she was finished.

“So am I, but there’s only so much we can do. The Spider’s haven’t been as loud or as active as I thought they’d be. Considering their previous actions.”

“Yes, I have been thinking of that also,” China said with a small frown. “It looks to me that they’re planning something. They have many assassins and other such people that can kill off important people of this side of the efforts, but they haven’t done that.”

“It seems unusual. It’s been three months of practically nothing. I do understand some of it was put into finding the God-Weapons. But I would have expected them using the Wild Brothers, or Stolen, a lot more. It would make a lot of sense too. And I’d have thought Craven would want to come out and do something too.”

China grimaced prettily. “Craven wouldn’t dare. Assuming he’s still alive. The Wild Brothers would be a better choice. Along with Springheeled Jack, if he’s still with them.”

“What do you think they’d be planning?”

China thought for a moment. “I expect they want to make Ireland look as unstable as possible. I’ve been hearing a lot of rumours – more like news – that the other Sanctuaries are talking of forming a new council, a supreme council. It would essentially be a cover to meet and talk about overthrowing our Sanctuary. If it weren’t for Meritorious and the respect they have for him, we’d already be in the midst of war, I expect. If not overthrown entirely.”

“They’ll be here soon.”

“I agree. It’s a matter of weeks, I think.”

“Weeks?” Valkyrie frowned. “I thought we’d have a few months.”

“No, dear, I think it’ll be much faster,” China said seriously. “I suggest you put all your efforts into preparing yourself and finishing your home. You’ll need it soon. I wouldn’t be surprised if they attempted to take out the Dead Men while they were still in America.”

Valkyrie tried to not look worried. “I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

“Badly, I would imagine. Do not stress yourself too much, Valkyrie,” China said softly. “The Sanctuary and our Elders are doing all they can. Elder Feie being brought in certainly helps us with the other Sanctuaries, probably giving us additional time. I wouldn’t worry until the Spider’s wake up and start causing problems. Then, I think, things will happen very quickly. You need to be prepared. More so, you must prepare Nadia.”

“We’re doing our best to train her to be ready. She’ll never be able to fight like either of us could but–”

“Valkyrie, you misunderstand me,” China interrupted. “You must prepare Nadia for the death that could happen. They will target her to get to you, and through you, the Dead Men. Her family, especially her parents, are some of the most at risk right now.”

Valkyrie’s stomach squirmed anxiously.

**.*****.**

Valkyrie opened the front door warily to see Solomon, and immediately flung it open and threw her arms around him. “I’ve missed you so much.”

He grunted but wrapped her up tightly, leaning on his cane for support. “So have I, Valkyrie. Come on, it’s not good to hand around on doorsteps.”

She let go and let him in, locking the door closed. Aine came out of the kitchen.

“Oh, hello Solomon,” she said nervously.

“Crystal,” he said with a smile. “It’s lovely to see you. How are you?”

“You too, I’m grand, and yourself?”

“She has a Taken name now,” Valkyrie interjected, going through to the kitchen. The others followed.

“Oh?” Solomon asked.

“Aine O’Caoimh,” she smiled.

“Hmm. I didn’t expect that, but I like it,” he nodded. “Congratulations. Now, how about some tea? I travelled here on short notice.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t expecting you,” Valkyrie said. Nadia came in and there were some more greetings before they all sat around the kitchen table together. “Why did you come so suddenly?”

“We’re worried,” he said simply and seriously. “Corrival called the Dead Men last night. He’s getting increasingly concerned about the prospect of war from the other Sanctuaries. China has advised that the others may be meeting in secret.”

“She told me too,” Valkyrie frowned.

“They’ve decided to act as if we’re in a state of emergency. Anything we need to do before we go to war must be done now. We have two months maximum, according to Meritorious, unless they’re able to achieve something so undeniably miraculous the rest of the world has no choice but to back off. Of course, that’s unlikely, and this is all under the table business,” he told them. “I’ve come to make arrangements for yourselves and to make a list of those that may be at risk.”

“Aine, Nadia and her family,” Valkyrie said immediately. “On my side, anyway.”

“That’s what I’m focusing on. After the fall of the Irish Necromancy Temple, I have no one to organise,” Valkyrie felt terrible for him, “and almost of the Dead Men’s friends, as well as Tanith’s, are in the industry, so to speak. Aine, is there any way you could convince your parents to go into hiding?”

“Not without telling them everything. I doubt they’d even believe me,” she said, going a nasty shade of pale. “Would someone try to hurt them?”

“I don’t know,” he said softly, but firmly. “With any hope, they will not be targeted, as they’re mortals and most people believe Valkyrie was raised in the mage community due to Gordon. We need to get yourself and Nadia to safety.”

“Where? Wouldn’t Valkyrie go with us?” Nadia asked.

“Valkyrie will be spending the next month or two with me for her _procedure_ ,” he said, avoiding saying ‘Magic Keeping Ritual’. Valkyrie’s heart leapt into her throat, realising what was happening now.

“Already?” She asked. “By the time we get back the country could be at war.”

“I know. Which is why we must do it now. Because once that happens, the Spiders will waste no time trying to capitalise on the Sanctuaries distraction in order to take out every person of importance and then take the country before the other Sanctuaries can take them out, whilst also putting players into position in foreign countries also. Without the house completed, we cannot suggest Nadia and Aine stay there, plus it’s too obvious of a location. I think a safehouse could be possible, or, and please don’t hate me for this, you could both stay with Nadia’s family in India.”

There was a very long silence that Valkyrie didn’t dare break.

Nadia laughed, short and almost hysterically. “There’s no way in hell. I’d rather force myself on Aine’s family and stay there! I have friends I could convince to hide me in their houses. There’s no chance of me going to my family. And I just started counselling, I want to keep going.”

Solomon smiled but it didn’t really meet his eyes. Valkyrie realised how tired he looked. It reminded her starkly of when she first met him in that abandoned building, full of fake smiles, pale skin and purple bags under his eyes. He looked more like that now than she’d seen in years. “So long as you’re sure and you’re safe.”

“You’re sure we barely have two months?” Aine asked very quietly. There was a shake in her voice.

“As far as anyone can tell. But I expect attacks on the Dead Men and other travelling Irish individuals to begin much sooner. Hate crimes are already beginning to spread slowly but surely, and that’ll only continue when their Sanctuaries don’t punish the perpetrators. That’s why it’s going to be best to hide you now. We’re also worried if we put you in a safehouse and the Spiders or another Sanctuary finds you, there would be no hope of help. In fact, I doubt we’d be able to check for months after you were already dead. I apologise for being blunt, but I must be honest.”

“I understand,” Nadia whispered, all heat gone from her voice. “Can I not go with Valkyrie for her… procedure?”

“No.”

Nadia put her head in her hands rubbing her palms over her eyes.

“I don’t want to leave my family,” Aine said. “I can’t leave them to die. Even if I can’t do anything to help them. Nadia’s more than welcome to stay, I bet I can convince my mum.”

Solomon nodded. “I understand. Nadia, I can give you until tomorrow to decide, but after that, I am taking Valkyrie away to begin the procedure. We really must begin immediately.”


	193. Fried or scrambled?

**Chapter 193**

Solomon really meant it. First thing in the morning, barely oh-six-hundred, he was knocking on Valkyrie and Nadia’s bedroom door and waking them up. Nadia, holding back tears, holding Valkyrie tightly, asked to come with her to help with her ‘procedure’. Valkyrie had asked Solomon, practically begged, but he had categorically said no. There was absolutely no way Nadia could come with them. She could stay with the Dead Men and Tanith, with Valkyrie’s aunt and uncle, with friends, she could even try and stay with Tanith’s parents, but there was no way she could travel with Valkyrie even just for her getting her eggs removed. Nadia had cried into Valkyrie’s shoulder up until the very last second.

Fletcher had very quietly teleported Valkyrie and Solomon away. Valkyrie’s last image of Nadia for possibly months was of her in tears, wearing Valkyrie’s ratty old t-shirt and shorts, both way too big on her, arms wrapped around herself and nails digging into her skin. She tried to smile at her fiancée, but the tears in her own eyes didn’t seem to help.

“It’ll be over soon,” Solomon said quietly as soon as Fletcher had teleported away, leaving them wherever they were. Valkyrie’s hadn’t even looked at him.

“I know,” she whispered, holding back the tears.

“She’s safer where she is.”

“I don’t even know where she’s going to stay.”

Solomon stayed silent, letting Valkyrie have her moment, before she eventually turned, picked up her small leather backpack and nodded.

“We have a two days travel,” he told her. “We’re on the outskirts of Sweden. Fletcher hasn’t been near where we need to go, unfortunately, and we must travel without drawing attention to ourselves. We can still use some magic, thankfully, as the world is not quite at that point, but we really have to be careful of being recognised.”

Valkyrie nodded despondently.

“Buck up, Valkyrie,” Solomon said, wrapping his arm around her as they left the small public restroom that was thankfully deserted, getting some freaked out looks from the early morning locals walking their kids to school, probably worried about the young girl coming out of the men’s restroom crying. She didn’t look at them, instead focusing on wrapping her thick Bespoke coat tightly around her body to fight the frozen temperatures. “I know you are worried about Nadia, and I understand entirely, but she’s a smart girl. She’ll find somewhere safe, and Fletcher will make sure she makes it there before he leaves.”

**.*****.**

**_Three days later_ **

It took them two days and one night to get to Uppsala, a city not drastically far from Stockholm, where Fletcher had left them. Solomon had kept her busy, getting her to use her magic in small capacities again and again, trying to improve on the aim of her strikes, the level of power, what body part it came from. Valkyrie personally wanted to make the magic come out of her eyeballs so she could shoot eye laser beams at criminals and fry them, but Solomon had given her a look of disappointment at her lack of serious attitude and that little bit of humour she’d found vanished.

She’d also had to abandon her phone. She had it, just turned off, for emergencies but she wasn’t allowed to use it. She thought a lot about Nadia as they walked.

They slept an extra night in Uppsala before Valkyrie was admitted to a small local clinic by Solomon. The doctor had not looked at Valkyrie once, only speaking in broken English to Solomon, and had refused to let her talk to him before the operation. Solomon had briefed her before going in that it was a simple operation. Usually a woman, or other person with ovaries, would have to go on medication for around ten days before the ‘egg retrieval’ as only mature eggs that had a certain hormone Valkyrie couldn’t remember the name of could be collected. Normally the hormone was released before ovulation to mature the eggs ready for their unfruitful journey down Valkyrie’s lesbian fallopian tubes, ready to be fertilised by something Valkyrie never wished to touch. But in this case, they would be collected three hours after an injection of something that made Valkyrie’s arm tingle and gave her a feeling akin to horrible period pain. It obviously affected more than just her uterus too as her breasts felt tender to the point of painful, her nipples felt as if they were uncomfortable swollen and she felt nauseous. The collection process would leave her “sore” – Solomon’s words – as the eggs would be retrieved vaginally, rather than surgically.

She wasn’t sure how she felt about that, but that was how they were collected everywhere, all over the world, so she took her lumps for Nadia and their future possible children, and drifted into sleep when the anaesthesiologist made her.

She woke however many hours later in a bright room wearing the same teal-green hospital gown that only covered her front in burning pain. Her vagina and insides were on fire, her whole body felt woozy and she didn’t feel right at all. Unable to move, she began to panic, breathing faster, hearing her heart machine going wild, tears pricking at her eyes.

“Valkyrie! Calm down!” She heard through the fog. Solomon. She couldn’t see him, couldn’t open her eyes, but even with them shut the bright lights were giving her a headache. She tried to make a noise, a grunt, anything, but she couldn’t. “It’s alright. I’ve got you. I’m right here.”

She breathed heavily, tears leaking rapidly as the panic made her feel sick and awful, suddenly able to feel his hand in hers, one on her forehead, and him softly kiss her cheek. The fight left her and she sobbed, as well as she could through the drugs, slowly regaining her movement and curling up into a ball. Solomon held her close, letting her work through it.

“It hurts,” she whispered into his chest through her crying.

He leaned back slightly, worried he was crushing her. “Where honey?”

“Where do you think?” She cried.

He tutted. “I’m sorry Val. I’m so sorry. I – I don’t know how to help you. In an hour we can go to our hotel and I’ll get you ice and something to eat.”

“Why does it hurt so much?” She whispered, feeling the panic coming back. “You said it would just be sore!”

“I don’t know,” he said honestly. “Can you feel blood? Should I get a doctor?”

She shook her head.

“I’ll see about some pain relief, give me a moment.”

He left and was gone long enough for Valkyrie to cry herself out and find a twisted position on her back, still sort of curled up with one leg in the air, one off the bed, and arms over her eyes to keep the light out. She drifted in and out of consciousness, hearing Solomon raise his voice angrily but too far away for her to hear her. Even longer after that, after a time she must have slept for, he came back and picked her up, wrapping her in a hospital blanket and leaving the clinic with her. She groaned in pain, getting hot flushes from the jolting and angry steps, and then again in the back of a car.

She didn’t recall getting into their hotel, but woke much clearer and out of any pain, a box of regular non-magic painkillers on the bedside table already open and two gone.

“Did I take those?” She asked sleepily, yawning.

Solomon looked over from the window he was looking out of. “Oh. Yes, just a few pills to help the ache. I… How do you feel?”

“Alright actually. I thought I’d be a lot worse off but I’m okay. A bit achy. Did the removal go well?” She asked, taking a long drink of water.

“Yes, they were able to retrieve a few hundred mature and healthy eggs from you. It should be enough for you to have a family of your own,” he smiled.

“That’s more than I thought.”

“Well, to alter one cell into another is difficult work. After picking the most healthy, changing the deoxyribonucleic acid and ultimately changing an egg to a sperm, you’ll lose at least half of the eggs, and then not all the sperm will be healthy, and then only one is needed for one of Nadia’s eggs. And then not every in vitro fertilisation attempt is successful, as it may fail before the cells turn into an embryo, and then you have the normal risks of the embryo not latching to Nadia’s uterus properly, and the obvious but upsetting potential of miscarriage. By the time you have a biological child, you may not have enough eggs for a second.”

“That’s… kind of shitty. Also, can you not turn every acronym into their proper words, it makes this way harder. And also, couldn’t Nadia’s eggs just be turned into sperm and then the embryo put into her? Instead of risking my limited eggs?”

He paused and smiled slightly, the first in a few weeks. “Yes, that would make more sense. I just wanted to be totally honest with you. At any rate, you always have other options if you want more children and can’t have more biologically for whatever reason, or perhaps science will have improved more and every egg cell removed this morning will be guaranteed to end in a healthy pregnancy and child by the time you make that choice.”

She smiled. “I prefer that last one.”

He nodded and stepped over to the small double bed. They were having to share the grotty hotel room, not that it bothered Valkyrie as she had had to share her bed on outings since she joined the Dead Men.

He looked at her nervously. “I have to admit, Valkyrie, something happened while you were under anaesthetic. The doctors didn’t use the correct painkillers. They did the job and have stored the eggs correctly, and they are already in the safe hands of another company… but I am sorry. I should have done further research into the doctors. I was so focused on keeping this a secret I didn’t think to check that the doctors may have a vendetta against you.”

Valkyrie laid back, looking away from Solomon. “They did?” She asked blankly.

“They admitted it after you woke in pain. They said it was revenge for something Skulduggery did to a family member some time ago. But I am to blame here, I should have known and I’m so sorry.”

She looked over and smiled, hoping it reached her eyes. “It’s okay. I don’t even remember it. Can I have some ice cream now?”

He sighed and sat on the edge of the bed next to her, balancing his cane on the bedside table before taking one of her hands in his. They were the same size, but rougher and more battle scarred than her own. “It isn’t okay. So many times through your life you’ve had to suffer in ways no child should have to. You’ve been betrayed, abandoned and orphaned by the people that should be here with you today. And now, you have only me with you,” he said. Her eyes watered at his words but she held his hand fiercely. “One part of the Magic Keeping Ritual is overcoming your fears. It essentially means you have to overcome your internal hang ups and phobias so that all your magic and energy goes into the Ritual. I can’t imagine a doctor doing this is helping the matter.”

“No, I–”

“I can see it in your eyes, dear,” he interrupted softly. “You’ve always fought anyone trying to hurt you in this way. But you’ve never had it happen by a doctor. Or when you were totally incapacitated.”

She stayed silent.

“It’s not your fault. None of it is. I want you to be happy, healthy and live a beautiful life. I’d die for you, Valkyrie, and I am very much afraid of death.” She looked up at him from her pillow, feeling like a little girl.

“You remind me,” she said slowly, “of a memory from when I was little. When that man… the one Tanith and the others killed, and then Aine found out about us. You know the one. After what he did to me, and I escaped, I remember crying and my mum holding me. And then her and Gordon sitting by my bed and asking me what happened.” She took a shaky breath. “Neither of us can change what happened because it already has. We made those choices and live with the consequences, both now and when I was a kid. And if I have to come to terms with what happened for the Ritual, I have no idea how you plan to make that happen in just a few weeks, but I suppose I’ll try. And, considering everything in my life, everyone that’s been in it… I’m glad you’re here now. Because I feel safe with you, and I’m happy here, and I love you like how I should a father. So I’m okay with what happened today. I’m mad. But at least you’re with me.”

She looked up at the end just as a tear slipped down Solomon’s cheek. Seeing him break down made it worse for Valkyrie and she immediately burst out sobbing. He patted her back. “Thank you,” he said simply.

“Why am I even crying?” She asked stupidly, grabbing the water and draining the last bit in one gulp. “I feel so stupid!”

“Oh,” he said with a small laughed, standing and going to the bathroom. “The injection that made your eggs mature is still in effect. By tomorrow you’ll be back to normal, but for today you’ll be slightly more… hormonal.”

“Hormonal?!” She asked in horror.

“Yes. Symptoms have been described as extreme anger, hysterical and continuous crying, mood swings, extreme hunger and thirst, impatience–”

“Yeah, yeah, I know what hormonal mood swings feel like, I was being dramatic,” she snapped. “Can we order McDonald’s? I really want a burger. And chips. Oh, and I really want chicken nuggets. Do you think they do the mozzarella sticks here?”

“I believe they deliver nowadays,” he sighed before turning on the tap to wash his face.


	194. Arriving at the Sect

**Chapter 194**

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

Nadia carefully balanced the last glass on the draining board, stepping back and rubbing her eyes tiredly. Only three days and two nights had passed since Valkyrie had left with Solomon but the loneliness was pressing on her despite moving into Aine’s house. It was strange to not share her bed with her fiancée, it was strange living with people besides Valkyrie and the Dead Men, she desperately missed Laila, and it was so, so strange to have to refer to Aine as Crystal again.

“Are you doing alright, honey?” Beryl asked in a fake simpering voice.

“Yes, thank you,” she said immediately, drying her hands and taking her ring off the kitchen windowsill. “Thank you for making dinner, it was really nice.”

“Oh, that’s fine,” she said, waving the compliment away. “I’m glad someone liked it anyway.”

Nadia had noticed how Carol and Fergus had barely touched their chicken salads. In truth, the meal was bland and needed something to liven it up. A creamy sauce would have turned it around, and some spice on the meat, and she didn’t think Beryl had used a single grain of salt. Then again, the chicken was overcooked and dry, so perhaps it wouldn’t have made a difference, and the lettuce seemed wilted. But she was hardly about to say that to her host. Aine had eaten half of hers before claiming she was full. Nadia would have done the same but Beryl just could not leave her alone, so she chose to keep eating.

She decided not to comment on it at all. “Would you like me to help you with anything else? I could make Fergus’ lunch for work tomorrow if you like.”

“No, no,” Beryl said, going straight for the fridge. “You don’t need to help around the house, I have it all under control. Say, did Stephanie call you today?”

“No,” Nadia said shortly. “She’s going to be out of range for a long time.”

“That’s a shame dear. Well, you’re more than welcome to stay as long as you like.”

Nadia nodded and left the kitchen without another word, rushing past the open living room door and heading up to Aine’s tiny room, flopping onto the futon that had been set up into a bed for her.

Alone, she rubbed her temples tiredly. It was like when she’d been stupid enough to break up with Valkyrie, or the time she’d suffered a brain injury. Alone, cold, incomplete. She’d known Valkyrie since she was thirteen, they’d been as good as dating since the moment they met. It was hard for Nadia to be away from the woman she loved, especially when she was going to be having her eggs removed for their future babies any day, assuming it wasn’t already done.

She felt she should be with Valkyrie for that. It was something couples stood by each other for. She couldn’t help but imagine that something had gone wrong and there were no eggs and Valkyrie was crying about it because of how big of a deal Nadia had made of it all. She felt awful. She’d love Valkyrie, biological child or not. But she’d made a big deal out of it and now Valkyrie was getting her eggs removed alone and if anything wrong happened she would blame herself all because Nadia couldn’t give her a break.

Nadia took a deep breath and counted to twenty, slowly letting the tension out of her body. She kept counting, feeling through every muscle, every part of her body, until she was totally relaxed and her mind was clear. It wasn’t her fault or Valkyrie’s if anything happened. They would come together and comfort each other when the time came. For now, she just had to remain strong and, more than anything, remain safe. That was all Valkyrie asked of her. To be safe and remember she loved her. Everything else was Valkyrie’s choice because she was a capable, practically grown woman of outstanding intelligence and strength.

Feeling better for stopping herself from spiralling, Nadia sat herself up and reached into the wardrobe, pulling out a book on Symbol Magic. Even the books she currently had were stretching her understanding of the subject, which she had previously thought she was fairly familiar with. As it turned out, she was wrong and it was very hard. She had to have a renewed respect of China Sorrows, and usually she was somewhat wary of the woman. She was grateful for her advice and guidance so far.

Nadia read until Aine came up to bed, and then they changed and exchanged a few words before settling down. Tomorrow was her next counselling session, and in the afternoon she was going to study for her driving theory test.

Fiddling with her ring in Valkyrie’s old shirt and shorts, she hoped Valkyrie knew she was thinking of her.

**.*****.**

**_Tanith’s POV, same time_ **

The phone buzzed excitedly on the floor where Tanith had dropped it. Laila, her beautiful, innocent baby, wailed frightfully from the sudden noise of the phone hitting the floor, not settling until her mouth had latched firmly on her mother’s nipple. She didn’t drink, having had a good feed only half an hour previously before she went down to sleep for the second half of the night, but it had been the only thing to calm her child recently, so Tanith spent more of her time in their room shirtless, talking and playing with Laila, letting her lay on her breast for comfort.

“It’s okay honey, Mummy’s got you,” she whispered, keeping her voice from waking the men in the other rooms. “You don’t have to be scared, I’m sorry for waking you with that noise. Mummy just got very angry with someone. When you’re older, you’ll understand. See, someone hurt your Aunty Val this morning and now Mummy needs to decide if she wants to stay with Daddy and your Uncles or if she should go and get revenge. And Mummy doesn’t know which is better right now.”

Laila looked up at her, cooing around her breast, one hand holding tightly to a lock of Tanith’s hair. She had big, blue eyes and a small bit of blonde hair on her head, making her seem like the most innocent, cutest creature on the planet. A few tears were around her eyes but she had stopped crying and instead looking up at Tanith as if she understood the words. It was enough to make Tanith’s mind up, despite the need to avenge her sisters’ pain.

“Don’t worry, baby. I won’t leave you. I’ll always be right here for you,” she smiled.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie’s POV, one week later_ **

“Take my hand,” Solomon whispered into the silence.

Valkyrie, trying to control her pants after their gruelling twelve-hour hike, put her tired, tingling hand in his. She’d have felt bad for being so sweaty and nasty, but he was the one that insisted on walking solidly with only a few hours’ sleep and no food for four days straight.

He didn’t tell her what he was doing so she watched him. He muttered words she couldn’t pick up, holding his Necromancy cane tightly, and shadows wrapped around them from behind the trees and thorny undergrowth. She felt it wrap around her, felt her claustrophobia clawing at her gut, and squeezed his hand tightly.

Time went by, she wasn’t sure how much, and then Solomon released a breath and the shadows disappeared, leaving them somewhere cooler than the Egyptian air they had just been standing in.

“Where are we?” She breathed, unwilling to break the silence. She got a moment of virago and put her hands on her head.

“Underground. We’re still in Kharga, of course,” he said, dropping her hand. “Norma and Helena are meeting us.”

“Is anyone else here?” She asked.

“This is an old Temple, like the ones you learnt of when you came to stay at the Temple in Ireland,” Solomon explained. Subtle blue light was filtering down from signals on the ceiling, but Valkyrie didn’t know what any of them meant. “It’s less of a Temple and more of a Sect really. A small place for a small number of specialist Necromancers devoting their lives like monks to their cause. This particular one is dedicated to some of the oldest Rituals we know of. It’s a closely guarded secret that myself and Norma knew of from some past research we did on other projects, but Helena had to be granted special permission for. She’s been here for the last six weeks, and Norma came a week ago to set up the facilities.”

“Why are they getting it ready now if we’re going to be here for a month or two? It’s going to take ages to clear my head,” she said seriously.

“There are many parts to a Ritual, Valkyrie, not just one magic spell. True, ancient Rituals take weeks. Magic Keeping, thankfully, is relatively simple and was performed relatively recently in sorcerer times. That is, people here have actually performed several of them. Luckily for you, you are only needed for the final part. The rest is just creating and powering the signals,” he explained. “It’ll be painful and hard on your body, but you will be able to get through the pain. I know you can.”

She smiled at the wall, trying to keep her mouth from twisting. “I don’t have a choice, really. With the ‘All Power Capacity’, thingy. Which really, really needs a new name.”

“It does. It’s called the 'Toute la capacité de puissance'.”

“Yeah, but that’s just the same words in a different language. It’s still stupid,” she argued.

“I suppose,” he sniffed, getting a small huff out of her. “What do you suggest? I’m sure Norma would love your input for her life’s work.”

“I don’t know. Just as long as she doesn’t call it ‘The Magic Sucker Three-Thousand’ I’m sure anything else would be fine,” she rolled her eyes.

He huffed a laugh this time. “How about the Magicae Furem Device?”

“Magic-a Fur-em? Is that Gaelic?”

“No, it’s Latin like its current name, and is pronounced _magi-ka fo-yem_. It means ‘magic thief’ and it represents what it does quite accurately. I saw it in Norma’s notes.”

Valkyrie considered it as they turned towards the sound of feet coming their way. “I like it.”

Norma was on them quickly, having run to meet them, and gave them a bright smile that shone even in the dim, drab lighting. “It’s so good to see you again Valkyrie! Solomon’s been keeping me up to date on your progress. We should have you sorted out in just a few weeks!”

“That’s good,” she smiled back. “How’s Helena?”

“Well. She’s honoured to have been given the chance to work in this Sect. As am I, naturally.”

Valkyrie hummed. “Solomon told me you thought of a new name for the All Power Capacity. Magicae Furem Device sounds pretty cool to me.”

She shot Valkyrie a big grin. “Thank you, I just submitted it to the board as a rename. Since All Power Capacity sounds incredibly stupid and we know it is not the original, it should be an easy change.”

Valkyrie nodded.

“How close do you think she is, Solomon?” Norma asked politely.

“Physically, Valkyrie is healthy, in good fitness and should be more than ready. Magically, she has improved significantly but I believe she has a way to go. Whether it is enough for the Ritual to take place or not, I am not certain,” he said factually. Valkyrie listened as attentively as Norma, having no true idea of how far she really had to go before the Ritual could happen. “Mentally and emotionally, I am concerned.”

“Ah,” Norma nodded before smiling kindly at Valkyrie. “For someone your age, I wouldn’t expect anything less. We’ll work on it until you’re ready.”

Valkyrie nodded, somewhat uncomfortable but happy that Norma was willing to help her at all. They could all go to prison for having any part in helping her get a Magic Keeping Ritual. She was grateful for them.

Down in the deep bowels of the Sect, the dark tunnel opened into a cold, slightly brighter but still dim hall with high ceilings. They went up several steps and then had to stop as an elderly man and woman came forward to greet them.

They said something in another language, probably Egyptian considering where they were, unless there was a more local language she didn’t know about, and Norma told them they had to clean and change. Both Valkyrie and Solomon stripped, Valkyrie keeping her eyes on the floor as she felt the embarrassment of being naked in front of strangers and Solomon, and then squealed when frozen water fell from the ceiling out of nowhere. Norma stood in front of Valkyrie, back to Solomon and looking at the ceiling to give her a sense of privacy from the strangers and told them to wash their bodies and hair with the water quickly.

Shivering violently, Valkyrie raised her head and used her hands to rub her body of the sweat, grime and dust of the last week. When she was done, she hugged herself closely and the water shut off. The man and woman she couldn’t understand came forward and gave them towels and Valkyrie quickly dried herself with hers despite it being old and scratchy.

“Everyone wear’s clothes to mark their position,” Norma told them as they were handed new clothes. “Ours are grey, and those further up the ranks get darker uniforms.”

Valkyrie nodded as she pulled hers on and left her old clothes in a puddle to follow the man, woman and Norma. None of them had shoes, but the floors from the shower onwards were flat and smooth, like the walls and ceilings. They were taken down a new tunnel to another large cave-like room which was filled with tables in rows, and off to the right was an open kitchen, and another smaller room with storage. No one was in there but themselves, but the man and woman took them over and gave them a plate that was already prepared, filled with food Valkyrie had never seen. She took it gratefully, her stomach growling, evoking a quiet laugh from Norma. Norma sat with them at one of the benches, but the man and woman stood and watched them eat the food with their hands from a distance like they were some strange creatures.

It was different to what she’d eaten before. But nothing introduced new flavours and textures to a person’s diet more readily than being practically starved for a week. She had been taught how to eat with her hands at least, she’d have made a mess of herself otherwise, like she had when she learnt. She wasn’t sure it was the thing done in this region of the world normally or not, but it went well with the incredibly minimalist living situation.

After that, they left the diner hall and went to _another_ tunnel, which had a cleaning station in which they used on their hands and feet before following to the sleeping room. Rows of beds were set up, full of Necromancer’s, all quietly sleeping apart from a handful of snorers. Valkyrie and Solomon were shown their beds at the very, very back, a few feet further away from the other beds, and were instructed to sleep through Norma who laid down on her own bed next to her sister.

It was silent after that. Some shuffling from the man and woman getting into their beds. No goodnights. Valkyrie was grateful, if a little perplexed, and fell into sleep quickly.


	195. Therapy? Sort of?

**Chapter 195**

Valkyrie woke early and felt some nausea in her stomach. A hand on her shoulder gently shook her and she opened one eye into the dim room and for a moment thought she and Solomon were still on the road about to walk in the night air again, but then she remembered the evening before and put her hand on his. He stilled.

“It’s time to wake. Your first training sessions are today,” he said lowly.

Valkyrie moaned quietly and pulled herself into a sitting position, making her stomach gurgle dangerously, but pushed herself to continue. _I have to do this_ , she reminded herself. _For Nadia, Laila, my brothers, my family. The rest of the world. Fuck._

Sighing, she let the tension out of her body and stood.

“Your eyes are bloodshot,” Norma said as a way of greeting. “Are you well?”

“I have a stomach ache. It’ll be fine.”

“Oh no. They don’t have medicine like numbing leaves here,” she said, coming over and putting a hand on her arm, her sister following behind. “How about some hot tea?”

That was the best she was going to get, so Valkyrie followed Norma as she mothered her and enjoyed it instead, despite the chill of the underground and the eeriness of the light. The tea was also different in taste. Obviously, some different leaf was being used for it, and water always tasted different away from home, and they didn’t use milk with it. She was not a fan. She drank it to be polite and because Dexter had always told her the best way to know a place was through the food and she wanted to train herself to be accustomed to the taste. After all, how was she meant to travel across the entirety of Africa and enjoy every little amazing thing it had to offer if she couldn’t even drink the tea? She considered it good beginner’s practice for all the travelling she’d do in the future.

That was what she told herself as she tried not to gag on the last dregs of bog water called _tea_ she’d been given.

“We’ll start with your physical training,” Norma told her informatively after a brief tour around the Sect. Valkyrie had not been able to take any of it in, considering every tunnel was identical, but it had passed the time for their food to go down and her stomach ache to lessen. “After a short session, we’ll assess your magic, work on extending what you can do, and then we’ll train your mind. Both psychologically and defence wise.”

Valkyrie nodded as they were led into a new cave that had racks of weapons stacked up to the start of the curve of the ceiling, all manners of tools varying from traditional swords to brutish maces to torture devices. Valkyrie, Solomon and the sisters were required to clean their hands and feet again before entering, and Valkyrie washed over her face quickly, and then it was time to spar.

The first, most immediate thing she noticed was loose breasts and training was _different_.

Her own, despite being somewhere between an ‘A’ and ‘B’ cup, still pulled on her skin when they jumped around during her exercises, but she was lucky it only really pulled up to the base of her neck and they weren’t heavy enough to strain. Norma and Helena, who were in shape but not combat ready, also followed some of her and Solomon’s training, and they seemed to be in pain as their more voluptuous chests flopped. It wasn’t arousing, as one may imagine, it just made Valkyrie ache for them.

That was over fairly quickly though, seeing as she was in shape with her four and a half pack – she was working on the rest, it was slow work – and her muscular arms and legs. She was stronger than most and Solomon was happy with that for the point of the Ritual.

Next was magic. She performed as expected, her target practice somewhat accurate as long as she pointed and she had a good grasp of regulating the power. Norma and Helena were quite impressed with that, but they then launched into other areas she may be able to access.

“But I don’t know why my magic manifested this way,” she explained.

“Explain again what was happening when you lost it,” Helena demanded, pacing the room. Random Necromancers were walking through but none of them stopped, bothered them or seemed to even notice they were there.

“A man whose magic is dulling others touched me and I couldn’t use my magic for maybe ten or fifteen minutes. In that time, I was fighting to get information on Solomon’s whereabouts, as he’d been kidnapped,” she said, watching Helena pace.

“It was a traumatic moment, yes?”

“Well, the entire room of, like, one hundred people tried to rape and kill me, so yeah, slightly,” she said bluntly. “When they came at me this magic manifested and I turned someone to dust.”

“So it was a fear reaction,” Helena frowned.

“I think so. That and desperation. And a bunch of panic.”

“Were you injured or in pain?”

“Yes.”

“And do you have a history of past assault before this?”

Valkyrie hesitated and then nodded. She had to be truthful so she could have the Ritual. For Nadia, she’d do it.

“Then I imagine this magic is a result of your emotions and situation rather than any outside source. It’s not unreasonable to imagine you had some suppressed magic that came out when your emotions became uncontrollable.”

“Valkyrie grew up without magic until she was twelve,” Solomon added.

“Even more likely it was suppressed magic. Perhaps you were going to have natural magic like Fletcher Renn,” Norma theorised. “But you learnt magic before that happened.”

“Isn’t natural magic for people that have only non-magic ancestry? Because I have magic in my family. My cousin is a sorcerer now too,” Valkyrie said.

“It’s hard to say for certain, but I have seen books theorising that those with natural magic are not necessarily those that have no magic in their blood, but rather it is _easier_ to find those with natural magic if they are mortal previously. Those who have magical family and are naturally affluent in one area are just seen as a very talented Sensitive, for instance, and don’t look at it past that despite the theory they could have natural magic. Granted, it is exceptionally rare for natural magic to occur. In your case, you had no other magic to use, leaving a gap for this to fill, and your need of it allowed it to surface. I can’t be sure, of course, but it’s a theory.”

“I’m not so concerned why it happened, honestly,” Valkyrie said.

“But it _is_ important,” Norma said patiently. “If you did this out of a feeling of desperation, fear and panic, then the magic itself may be linked somehow to those feelings. To expand your magic, we need to make connections between your life as a child and this specific event.”

“Okay?”

“Such as, your history of assault would, I assume, have certain feelings that remain the same through each experience. Especially as a child, this would form a part of your personality. We just need to make that link with your magic and follow the trail down all the little offshoot avenues.”

“Okay. So, what do you suggest?” Valkyrie asked.

Norma looked at Helena, and then they both looked at Solomon.

He looked at the floor and then back up. “I have some experience dealing with children with sexual abuse traumas,” he said slowly, “but not in this way.”

“Well, how about,” Valkyrie said very slowly, trying to form an idea, “we think of how I’ve acted while under similar circumstances. When me and the Dead Men are fighting in ‘we’re about to die’ circumstances, I’ve been scared and desperate and I’ve done new things suddenly. Like, I was able to sustain these beams of energy that cut through people. Kind of like a flamethrower but not.”

Norma beamed. “That proves the theory then!”

“So, we need to make me think the world is ending and we’re all going to die for me to learn?” Valkyrie asked with a raised eyebrow.

“No, that’s not really going to work,” Norma sagged.

“Perhaps if we work on the mental and emotional side of Valkyrie’s trauma whilst she uses her magic, we may be able to open her up to new magics?” Solomon suggested.

“Excellent!” Helena said brightly. “Valkyrie, please explain your first traumatic experience.”

Valkyrie laughed incredulously at her bubbliness and shook her head. “I don’t know. How do I even know if something a traumatic experience or not?”

“How about your first life changing experience. Perhaps you lost someone close to you or you had an accident you needed to go to the doctors for?” Helena suggested in her sweet voice.

Valkyrie thought for a moment before answering, resigning herself to having to talk about things she didn’t want to. “My dad was killed when I was two but I don’t remember it personally. I remember my mum crying and the police at my house talking to her, but I don’t remember what they said or really being told he was dead. I just sort of grew up knowing. I don’t have any memories of him,” she said. She wasn’t sure how in depth she was meant to go with it before she’d sound weird for going on about personal feelings but she got the impression they wanted her to face all the details so she forced herself to continue. “It feels like he’s not really real, you know? I always had Gordon, and he was my dad to me. I told people at school he was my uncle, but really, he was my dad. But I never said it to my mum because I knew it would upset her.”

Solomon set up the next targets for her to hit and had her begin. “Why wouldn’t you tell your mum?”

“It would upset her,” she repeated, throwing her magic, gasped and jumped out of the way of an attack by him. She missed her next target but rolled to her feet and kept going. “She used to talk about him a lot. I thought she’d be mad at me, or not want me to replace my father. But I really never knew him.” Another dodge and a half-hit target. “Like, I always loved him because he’s my dad and I know he loved me and wanted me, but I just had no connection.”

“Did you hide things from her often?” Helena asked.

“All the time. People being mean at school, people I thought I had crushes on, the boys that got all weird about touching girls butts at break time in Year Three. I just didn’t want to hurt her because she was so stressed with work,” another attack, “and with money, and her sister was dying of cancer for most of my childhood, and the family was mean to her about her letting Gordon look after me constantly, and I was hardly an easy kid.”

“How were you not easy?”

“I was just always moving, always wanted to do something. I was in so many extra lessons, like dance, singing, piano, swimming, a bunch of others,” she tried to explain as the attacks got faster. She tried to talk without thinking but it was hard and she stuttered and paused a lot. “She was always so stressed I felt bad for her. I thought I was making it worse.”

“How would you make it worse? As her child, surely you brought lightness to her life,” Norma asked.

“I don’t know,” Valkyrie panted, missing more targets and getting bruised by Solomon’s shadows. “I was one more thing to worry about when she already had so much. I caused a bunch of trouble at school. And if she hadn’t been so tired and stressed, she wouldn’t have needed anxiety medicine, and then maybe she would have seen the other car and wouldn’t have been hit. It wasn’t her fault they hit her, it wasn’t really the medicine that did anything, but I feel like it might not have happened.”

“So you believe that her death is your fault because you were a difficult child?”

“No. Yes – I don’t know. I don’t think so. I thought I was a normal kid,” she said, tripping on a shadow and falling on her face. She gave up and rolled to look at the ceiling. “I don’t think I was awful. But she was so stressed and I saw her crying a lot. I don’t think I made life easier for her. She’d of been better off without me to worry about.”

The attacks stopped but her stomach ache started to get worse as her anxieties came to keep her company. Solomon continued. “What feelings does that bring back?”

Valkyrie shrugged, not wanting to think about it but pushing herself to anyway. “I don’t know. I never think about it. I don’t think about my mum a lot because it hurts, you know? She was so good and did so much for everyone around her no matter what it meant for herself. But if she hadn’t had me, she could have moved in with her sister and helped her with her treatment. She wouldn’t have been scared about the house being taken away, or when her hours at work were cut, or anything like that, because it would have been easier for just her to live or move somewhere else. But I made it harder. And she had me really young, she was only twenty-two. And a single widow mother at twenty-four. And I always asked her for toys and clothes and lessons to learn to do more. And she couldn’t keep up with that and her sister, and her family, and having friends. I made it really hard. And it made Gordon do a ton for her at his own expense too. I know they loved me, but I didn’t really take into perspective how what I did or said could affect her at the time.”

There was a little silence and Valkyrie noticed there were tears leaking from her eyes and she quickly wiped them and sat up.

“How does that make you feel now?” Norma asked kindly.

“Guilty,” Valkyrie whispered. “I feel so bad for her. I want to say I’m sorry. And I want to visit her grave but I’m too scared, and now it’s been so long and I feel even worse. I never visited. I didn’t even see her get buried because I was too scared and upset. And I spent most of the time being upset over being with my grandma instead of Gordon that I didn’t focus on her and if she had seen me from some afterlife acting like I didn’t care then she might have thought I didn’t love her and – I just–”

Her voice caught in her throat and she held her breath to stop the sobs threatening to break free. She swallowed a few times and a moment later Solomon knelt next to her and wrapped his arms around her tightly. “It’s okay to let it out,” he whispered. “She would know you loved her. That you still do.”

She leant her head against his, only letting a few tears free before demanding they get back to training.


	196. Is it a bird, is it a plane...

**Chapter 196**

**_One week later_ **

Valkyrie laid exhausted and drained in her cot bed. She knew she was dehydrated and hadn’t eaten enough, but the food sat badly with her stomach and the water was starting to make her nauseous every time she had so much as a sip. Solomon had explained that the change in culture and environment made that all fairly normal and the more she drank and ate, the more used to it she’d get, but was hard when everything she put in her mouth made her feel ill. The added headaches from dehydration and the effort of working on her traumas didn’t help the situation. To make her life even worse, she also started her period and was getting pains from _that_.

The one nice thing about the Necromancer Sect was that anyone on their period did not have to work, get up or do literally anything. In fact, it was forbidden. Some of the Sect members had caught Solomon trying to talk to her to continue her therapy side of the preparation and gotten told off. He wasn’t allowed to see her for another few hours as both punishment and as a precaution.

Valkyrie didn’t feel any better mentally whatsoever, nor any closer to being ready to start the Ritual. She couldn’t have any type of pain medication for her head, stomach or uterus, she missed Nadia and the worst part of it all, talking about her mother and her past made her cry a lot. All she wanted to do was cry herself to sleep every day. She had woken the day before and burst out crying immediately. It wasn’t hormones, she was just so emotionally drained from talking and releasing her feelings. She was glad her body was letting her have a break, in its own twisted way.

She felt a tap and lifted her arm from her eyes to see Norma and Helena smiling kindly.

“Hey,” she groaned, feeling the pressure behind her eyes. She’d never had migraines before, but she was beginning to suspect that was what the throbbing pain in her head was. She’d heard people could grow into them later in life. “Do you think I’m getting migraines?”

“Migraines? I mean, maybe,” Norma said, obviously thrown by the question. “It’s probably just stress induced, whatever it is.”

“We brought you some food,” Helena said, putting the bowl of whatever nastiness on the small table that had been dragged next to her. “It’s fish.”

“Thanks,” she sighed. “Is Solomon in confinement still?”

“No, but he has been forbidden from seeing you,” Helena told her. “Are you in pain?”

“Yes. My head mostly, but my stomach is sick too. And period pain. _Joy_.” She sighed again. “I’m always in pain now. I don’t get it.”

“As I said, it’s likely the stress. You’ve been working hard and going through a lot,” Norma said quietly. “We’ll leave you to eat and rest. Do you want us to bring you some tea? You have to drink.”

Valkyrie nodded, knowing the nasty tea was at least better than the nasty water. She pulled herself up and scarfed down her disgusting, unseasoned fish puree, fought the urge to throw it all up immediately, downed the almost boiling tea, almost threw up again, and then put the little leaf of mint in her mouth when Helena gave it to her.

It helped with the gaging a little.

**.*****.**

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

**_One week later_ **

“I’m really sorry,” Aine repeated.

“It’s not your fault, seriously,” Nadia smiled, trying to keep Aine calm. “You did all you could, it’s really not your fault.”

“I know, but I feel so awful! I can’t believe Mum and Dad would do this,” Aine fretted. “Valkyrie isn’t even here!”

“It’s just an excuse to have two parties, that’s all,” Nadia said reasonably. “When Val gets back, she’ll try organising another for the two of us, just you watch.”

“I know, but it is kind of weird. I mean, if your family organised an engagement party for just you it would make some sense, but my family organising an engagement party for you when Valkyrie isn’t here is just weird,” Aine said. “We can leave if anyone says anything bad.”

“I’m sure your family will be very welcoming. They know it’s a wedding between two women anyway, so if anyone has an issue they just won’t come.”

“Oh no, I mean like if they get drunk and say gross stuff. Not homophobic things. Or well, anything _too_ homophobic. Our family has a bunch of gay and transgender people in it,” Aine shrugged. “It’s almost strange how much of the family is trans. It’s, like, a _weirdly_ significant amount. We don’t even blink when family comes out anymore, it’s so normal. They say it isn’t inheritable because of the gay gene controversy, but our family doesn’t exactly help promote that.”

Nadia nodded, not entirely sure what to do with that information. “It’s nice you are so open about these things. I remember Gordon telling me something like that at your reunion party a few years ago. My family is also very accepting so the ability to choose gender and sexuality so I can relate.”

Aine shrugged. “It’s how it should be. I mean, it was still scary when I started liking girls, but I was never scared of being kicked out I suppose.”

“I’m glad.”

“Anyway. They’re going to get really, really drunk and they’re going to tell you old stories and most of them will be made up. And it’s at a golf course so they’re probably going to go putting after they get wasted and then throw up everywhere.”

“It won’t be that bad,” Nadia rolled her eyes.

“That happened at the last party. In fact, it was the groom-to-be that threw up on the bride-to-be. In her hair. The time before that it was some Great-Uncle on some kids.”

Nadia grimaced. “Great. Well, I’ll be staying clear of any of that. I just want to have a nice time and get to know your family before we have to disappear of the face of the earth.”

Aine paused. “What do you mean?”

“Well, because we don’t age. Because we have magic,” she said, looking at Aine strangely. “Your family doesn’t know you have magic so they’ll have to be tricked into thinking you’re dead at some point.”

Aine sagged and sat on her bed heavily. “Oh.”

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

**_Six days later_ **

Valkyrie looked around the room in shock. She was in the air. Just… hovering. Her legs were shrouded in white light, almost like a fog, and she was in the air.

“I’m flying,” she gasped.

Like her strings had been severed, the light cut out and she fell to the floor with a shriek that echoed through the hall and tunnels.

Norma and Helena clapped and Solomon offered her a hand up after softening her landing with a bed of shadows.

“That was very well done,” he grinned. “And a massive breakthrough.”

“The first of many, I’m sure,” Norma encouraged.

“I can actually fly,” she gaped. “I mean, not very well, but I can _fly_.”

“It seems that way. Hopefully this line of magic will lead to more breakthroughs and we’ll have your magic sorted in no time at all,” Solomon smiled. “Now, try to do it again.”

**.*****.**

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

**_Same time_ **

“Nadia, darling,” China smiled at her. Sun filtered through the large glass windows of her apartment to illuminate her.

“Good afternoon, Miss Sorrows,” she said politely, fighting the urge to curtsy.

China laughed. “No need for that, just call me China. Are you well?”

“Yes, I’m well, thank you. And yourself?”

“As well as I can be, considering the circumstances,” she smiled. “Have you finished the books I gave you?”

Nadia hurriedly put them on the coffee table and nodded. “Yes, they were really interesting. Especially Anabella Token on the variations of tools on different surfaces. I’m not sure I remember everything she said but I made a graph to start trying to memorise,” Nadia told her quickly.

“I’m glad you enjoyed them. Tell me, have you heard from Valkyrie? No need to panic, the Dead Men already informed me she and Solomon Wreath had a private mission elsewhere.”

“Um, I haven’t, no,” she stuttered out, entirely unsure what to say.

“Where are you staying?”

Nadia went to answer and then shut her mouth and looked at the ground. “I can’t tell you.”

“That’s quite alright,” she said, standing and moving to her desk. “I merely wanted to check you are safe. I have been given some information. The Torment has sent his mercenary group, the Wild Brothers, to find Valkyrie and bring her to them. I tried to get a hold of the Dead Men but I can’t get through to them. I assumed Valkyrie would have spoken to you.”

“No, she can’t contact anyone until the end of her mission. I don’t even know where in the world she is,” Nadia answered honestly.

“It’s to do with her magic, I presume?”

Nadia hesitated.

“And she is working with the Necromancers on it also? I only believe so as someone Solomon Wreath is spending rather a lot of time with just applied for a name change of the 'Toute la capacité de puissance' to become the Magicae Furem Device. I rather agree with the change, but it makes me think that there is a link. Would I be correct?”

Nadia closed her mouth and didn’t dare say anything. She put her hands under her legs and couldn’t tell if her face was drained or flushed.

“No need to be so frightened dear, I just wanted to point out that their trace is being followed. I know a fair bit about the Magicae Furem Device, at least as much as anyone can possibly know, but I cannot work out why The Torment is suddenly sending out his best to find Valkyrie when news of this Device is published? Why does he want Valkyrie, Nadia?”

She made the mistake of glancing up and saw China’s perfect face frowning at her critically. “Because her magic might be Pure Magic,” she burst without meaning to. China raised her eyebrows. “Please don’t tell anyone. If the – if this thing is used on her, it could give The Torment or any of his people Valkyrie’s magic, and if it _is_ Pure Magic it could mean he has unlimited power to take. Valkyrie is getting a Ritual called Magic Keeping so no one can take her magic. It’s to protect people.”

China sat back in her chair, seemingly in shock. Some time went by and Nadia resisted the urge to scratch her arms, instead digging her nails into the back on her hand. “Silly girl,” she heard China whisper before sitting up and addressing her again. “I assume we won’t be able to find her, which is the most important thing right now. If we cannot find her, no one can. I imagine this is why The Torment has kept Craven around.”

It wasn’t a question but Nadia answered anyway. “I think so. They have people working on it too, we think. To enhance it. But they shouldn’t know Valkyrie has Pure Magic, there’s no way they could unless someone betrayed them, so why would they send out mercenaries to get to Valkyrie if they don’t know?”

“They may just want to capture her for bait,” China said. “And it would work. I expect they also know about Solomon being close to Miss Normandie Gwydion, and with her having just submitted a work on the Device… I cannot be sure, but he may think Gwydion and Wreath are working on a countermeasure.”

“So why send mercenaries out for Valkyrie if they’re looking for other people?”

China shrugged a delicate shoulder. “Not all rumours and information is totally accurate. It does seem unlikely that The Torment knows of Valkyrie’s potential powers, but if he is going to stop Wreath and Gwydion, he may as well take Valkyrie hostage at the same time. Strategically, it makes sense.”

“Can we find them first? Tell them to hide?” Nadia asked with wide eyes.

“Unlikely. Solomon Wreath is an expert fighter, specialising in running away and disappearing. Valkyrie is safest with him right now, completing the Magic Keeping Ritual. We simply have to wait.”

The anxiety in Nadia’s stomach doubled.


	197. Continuing to learn

**Chapter 197**

**_Two weeks later_ **

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

They’d been at the Sect for thirty-four days.

Over a month.

No news.

No updates.

And the Ritual still hadn’t taken place.

Valkyrie sighed. Over a month and she was getting impatient.

“I don’t care how long it takes, Valkyrie, we cannot do the Ritual until you are ready, so we keep working until you are,” Solomon said sternly.

“How will you even know when I’m ready? There isn’t a tape measure of exactly how good at this or that I have to be, and I could easily pretend to have good mental health, so what does it really matter? What are you waiting for?”

“ _We_ are going to wait for your magic and mind to mature,” he said, eyes narrowing at her from across the table. “And if you think I can’t tell when you’re lying to me about your mental health you are very wrong. I’ve been alive long enough to know what that looks like.”

She rolled her eyes. “How are you going to wait for my magic to mature? Seriously?”

“A sign of mature magic is when the sorcerer has opened all the connective pieces and is at least vaguely proficient at them,” Solomon explained.

“And how will you know I’ve unlocked all these added extras?”

He shrugged. “I can’t be sure. But we need to open as many as possible or you very well could die during the Ritual. Would you like to try it and see what happens right now?”

Valkyrie paused. “I mean…”

“No, Valkyrie. Just keep your head down and keep working. That’s all any of us can do right now.”

Valkyrie grumbled and ate her bean and beef stew. This dish was a significant improvement on most of the other food and she was enjoying it. Someone must have noticed her finally finish an entire meal without gagging and brought her seconds without her even having to get up. She wasn’t sure if she should have been glad someone was concerned enough to be making sure she was taken care of or creeped out that someone was obviously watching her eat.

Later that afternoon, Valkyrie found herself pulling her body back into a seated position, releasing the hold she had on her magic. Helena had been teaching her to meditate for the last week, drawing on Valkyrie’s past, and short lived, experience of meditating with Skulduggery back when she was twelve and wanted to be just like him right down to how he spent his off-time. It was meant to help with her anxiety and persistent migraines, but she didn’t quite have it down. It was not too hard to grasp, as Helena was a kind and patient teacher that helped her to get into a meditative state, but some things took time to be actually competent at. She’d never been good at turning her brain off.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she said again, looking at Helena. She was a beautiful woman, youthful with large eyes. Valkyrie found herself wondering yet again how someone so sweet and kind could be in the same league as the late Irish Necromancers she was more used to. “I mean, I can relax but if I go too deep I can’t focus on my magic, and if I wake up enough to focus on the magic, I’m not meditating.”

“I know it’s difficult,” Helena replied, “but it may be another way to follow your magic. And it’s a break from talking about the past.”

Valkyrie grunted.

“Let’s try again.” Helena closed her eyes.

Valkyrie breathed deeply and settled back, clearing her mind as much as she could and focusing on her breathing. She listened as Helena told her to feel her body and how it moved, instructed her to release the tension in each little muscle starting with her toes and working up to her head. She was told to feel how only her brain was left, pulsing and working, and Helena’s voice was distant as she told Valkyrie to let as much of it go as she could. Valkyrie did that, powerless except to obey Helena. Helena told her to feel her magic, the energy it flicked through her nerves, and to release that.

It flowed out of her mind, giving her an otherworldly experience. She felt herself breath slowly and shallowly, but other than that she didn’t feel herself at all. She felt the room. Felt each nook and cranny of the dirt walls, felt Helena’s presence in front of her, felt… felt someone walk into the room.

Shocked, Valkyrie opened her eyes without meaning to.

She screamed.

“I can’t see you!” She said, jumping to her feet. Helena, or where she should be, had been replaced by an orange blob of light, and the person that had come in had been too. She took a moment to steady herself and breath. “I – you’re – you’re not you anymore. I can’t see you.”

“What do you mean?” Solomon asked. He was the second orange light.

“I don’t know. The room’s darker than it was and you two are these bright orange lights,” she said in forced calm.

“Breathe deeply Valkyrie,” Solomon instructed. “Release it. This is just another area of your magic, that’s all.”

Valkyrie sighed, feeling the pounding rush into her head as she released her panicked hold, and when it was gone, pain took its place. “My headache’s back. But the light’s gone.”

Solomon nodded as Valkyrie lowered herself to her knees and breathed deeply through the intense and sudden pain. She should have been used to it after their hours of work only to reduce her to a painful mess, but it still caught her breath. “I have an idea.”

“ _Not now_ ,” Valkyrie breathed. “My head.”

They took a long break, letting Valkyrie rest the whole night before meeting back up first thing in the morning after breakfast in the same work room to continue to the conversation.

That made it day thirty-five.

“I want you to try and do the same thing again,” Solomon said.

“No way. When I did it yesterday my headache was so bad I threw up two times in the night. No way am I trying again,” Valkyrie said with a glare. “I still have a small headache.”

“Ah, but I have a theory,” he smirked in a very Skulduggery-esk way. Valkyrie rolled her eyes and indicated to continue. “I believe that your headaches are being brought on not just by pain, but also by an overstore of magic. Usually when a person learns a magic, they learn from a young age and work on it up to their Surge. Essentially, they have the background knowledge to path the way to an easy, gradual build-up of skill and power. What you have experienced is a very sudden drop in magic which was replaced by this new magic. It filled the gap so suddenly you couldn’t even use it for a while. It is connected to you at a raw, emotional level in a way most peoples are not. So as it had built up to the same power it naturally should be for someone as strong as yourself in a post-Surge way, you have none of the previous knowledge or teachings to use this magic and it’s now trying to break out.”

“So you think my magic is like a physical pressure trying to escape?” Valkyrie asked.

“I do. Perhaps metaphysical is a better description, but the science of what magic is aside, I think that we’ve been going about this slightly wrong. We’ve been trying to get you to learn new skills as if this is a new, normal magic as a child would. Trying to teach you how to explore your magic and how to push yourself. But really, your magic already _is_ mature. You just don’t have any of that prior knowledge to access these new branches.”

Valkyrie thought about it with narrow eyes as Helena and Norma started looking excited. “So… I have mature magic? Like I need for the Ritual?”

“I think so. But you don’t know what that magic is, how to use it or what it can do,” he said certainly. “We need your mind and body to play catch up and work it out.”

“I have some of it down. The flying and zapping and whatever weird eye thing happened,” she said slowly.

“You have a very small idea of what you can do. I have a better idea of how to push you now. I was thinking last night, for instance, of how you can have a physical appearance of magic. In order to fly, the magic is around your legs. It is physically there, moving your body. When you shoot targets, it is a physical thing. Those aren’t two separate things; they are two different uses for the same piece of magic. The amount of power you use, and the way you direct it, is the difference.”

“I think I understand,” Valkyrie frowned.

“Try to see the orange light again.”

Valkyrie sighed, scared of the pain but knowing it wasn’t a real choice. She held her breath and imagined how it had felt, how it had looked and after a few grunts and lip bites, a filter flicked into position and the three adults in front of her were suddenly orange orbs. “I’ve done it. I see the lights.”

“Are you in pain?”

She thought for a moment. “A little. Right here in my head,” she said, pointing to the pressure on the left side of her brain. “But it’s not like before. It’s the same as my headache when I woke up.”

“I think that when you suddenly found this side of your magic it caused a release, and this put you in a great deal of pain. Now that it has released its pressure, so to speak, it shouldn’t do it again. Try turning it off.”

Valkyrie was able to do it almost immediately this time. “Did it. What am I even seeing though? Like, I get that the physical magic thing is all connected together as the same thing used differently, but how is this eye thing connected?”

“I think it’s some Sensitive magic,” Solomon stated.

“Really? I haven’t seen any visions.”

“Not all Sensitive’s see the future, do they? I believe that the physical side is you _using_ magic, and the psychic side is you _seeing_ magic,” he said.

There was a lengthy pause. “You think,” Norma said, beginning to pace, “that Valkyrie’s Pure Magic is able to tap into more than one area of normal, Adept magic?”

“Yes and no,” he said, watching Norma move. “I think that Valkyrie doesn’t have Pure Magic at all, or else Pure Magic isn’t what we think it is. Obviously we know Valkyrie is a powerful individual that was at one time up for consideration as the Death Bringer. She had the same level of Necromancer powers people far, far older and experienced possessed, and she did that as a fifteen year old. That is just one example of her power levels. During training you have also seen how she is able to continuously use her magic without tiring the way an average person would, or even one that was considered fairly magically powerful. Valkyrie’s only real issue is tiring her body, not her magic. So, she has a large store of it. But is that Pure Magic being an unending, raw supply, or is it just how Valkyrie is? I am starting to think it is just Valkyrie. No Pure Magic influences.”

“We can’t know if her supply was affected Pure Magic to begin with, so that doesn’t mean anything,” Helena said quickly.

“I know it doesn’t by itself. Our entire idea of Pure Magic is simply that it is an energy. Pure, unfiltered, untouched magic straight from whatever plain of existence it comes from. I don’t think that’s what Valkyrie has. I think her natural, large supply of magic made us think it _could_ be her magic, but really, it isn’t.”

“So what are you saying?” Norma frowned.

“I think that Valkyrie is something similar,” he said, pacing in Norma’s place. Valkyrie chose to sit so she could take in all the information. “I think it is a new, different and an entirely unheard of branch of magic. I think there is a potential for her to be an Adept, or else this is a third, new type of magic. Potentially something like witches or Warlocks are born with but that she only unlocked later in life. I don’t think that part matters entirely. Putting together her psychic and physical magical ability, I think she has an underlying ability to tap into any type of magic, in a small way.”

“And what does that mean?” Norma asked.

“I’m not sure. But I think that if she is able to apply her physical magic in such a varied and controlled way, she should be able to do it with her psychic magic.”

“What does that make her?” Helena asked. “If not someone with Pure Magic?”

Solomon paused. “I think it’s too early to know that. But I think this is a sure theory that holds a lot of merit, and more than a few possibilities for Valkyrie. We need to explore them.” He came over to Valkyrie. “If I am correct, I do believe the magic itself may be as pure as a creature of this planet can cope to use, but I don’t think it is legitimate Pure Magic. Just something very close. This may be a better version of it in terms of practicality in real life, if such a thing as Pure Magic even exists. We need to explore your psychic side, Valkyrie. And when we’ve achieved that, we find the sweet point where the physical and psychic meet in the middle. That, I think, is where we’ll find the true answers to what your magic is.”


	198. Nadia's counselling

**Chapter 198**

**_Four days later_ **

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

“Are you sure you want to go?” Beryl asked Nadia in her sickly-sweet fake voice.

“I am,” Nadia said firmly.

“Well, here’s your clothes out the dryer,” she answered, placing the small, folded pile on the chest of drawers. “Did your friends say anything about Stephanie?”

“No, they have no contact with her either,” Nadia repeated for the millionth time. “They said thank you for having me while they were working though.”

“You’re always welcome dear,” Beryl grinned. “You're almost family now! Let me go get Fergus to carry your bags.”

“No, no, that’s… fine,” Nadia trailed off, but Beryl didn’t listen. Alone again with Aine, Nadia sighed deeply. “Are you absolutely sure you don’t want to come with me?”

“No,” Aine whispered, “but I can’t leave my parents alone with those people out there.”

“I know. I just… I’m just feeling awful about leaving you here,” Nadia said quietly, leaning against the drawers heavily. “I know it’s your home and all but you don’t seem happy.”

“They’ve always been pushy,” Aine said with a small smile, referring to her parents. “But they mean well. I mean, Dad’s not been that bad, and I thought he’d have worked out about my, you know, _involvement_.”

Nadia hummed. “I think he suspects. But he doesn’t want to say anything to you just in case.”

“Well, I’m not going to let him know. If he does, he’ll bubble-wrap me and never let me out the house again.”

Nadia smiled slightly, imagining her own parents would very much like to do the same before shipping her out of the country and away from the looming fight. They heard Fergus’ feet coming up the stairs and stopped their conversation. Nadia thanked Valkyrie’s uncle for his hospitality and for helping with her bags. There was an awkward last cup of tea where Beryl chose to start berating Aine for not making enough money at her ‘job’ – which was just her cover to get magic tutoring – and then there was a knock at the door.

“I’ll get it!” Nadia cried, shooting out of the living room.

She threw the door open and saw Saracen and Dexter standing on the Edgley’s front step, hand in hand. “Hey, Nadia,” Dexter smiled, holding one arm open for her to hug him.

She launched herself at him and wrapped her arms around his torso as hard as she could. He almost stumbled, but then laughed and held her tightly, and Saracen’s arms wrapped around her too from the other side. “I missed you so much,” she said into his collar.

“Nah, we missed you too,” Saracen chuckled, pulling away. He looked back into the house. “I’ll put your bags in the car.”

There were quick goodbyes, mostly centring on Aine since she was the only one they liked, and then Nadia got into the battered, sputtering, twenty-something year old car that used to be Gordon Edgley’s, and they left.

“You have to tell me everything that’s been happening!” Nadia demanded from the back seat next to Erskine. He was holding her hand, much to Nadia’s delight. She felt practically touch-starved!

“Nothing really _has_ happened on our end,” Saracen admitted. “Tanith and Ghastly making jokes about their past relationship is the biggest change. The American’s let us leave the country easily enough, we completed all our missions, only one person made reference to the god-weapon fiasco that went down in England. A criminal insinuated Laila would grow up to work at a, err, _adult dancing facility_ and we may or may not have tortured him slightly.”

Nadia rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “Led primarily by Ghastly, I assume?”

“Yep,” Erskine smirked. “Tanith wasn’t there on that one. Anton was the second worst.”

Nadia rolled her eyes and decided she didn’t need to push for details. “But what about the war? What’s happening? I can’t get to the Sanctuary and China was incredibly vague on her opinion of when it’ll start.”

The men shrugged as one. Dexter spoke for them. “That’s China for you. The thing is, Nadia, we’re already at war. We’re fighting, both literally and politically, just not outright. When someone’s going to turn around and announce we’re at war is completely up in the air right now.”

“Solomon predicted three weeks from now.”

“It could be three hours or three months,” Saracen said seriously. “It depends on the Spiders and this Supreme Council.”

“Is that really a thing? Valkyrie mentioned something like that, but I don’t remember–”

“It’s real,” Saracen interrupted, his happy mask dropping like a bucket of icy water. “Again, not officially. But China and a few other sources, that being friends of ours, have told us the Grand Mage’s and most Elders have been having extended virtual meetings at the same time as each other all around the world. But again, they’re not doing it outright yet. I think, and this is just my opinion, that once they announce the Council, we’ll be days from war.”

“And how soon are they going to announce the Council?” Nadia asked.

“We don’t know. Meritorious is still well liked and influential, as is Corrival, and Feie has a small following of his own and isn’t Irish. But, Corrival and Feie are most well-known for their war efforts so bringing both of them onto the Irish council is a way for people to twist our intentions.”

“Oh,” Nadia sagged. “So, we’re still thinking weeks then? And we don’t know where Val is or how long she and Solomon will be gone. And we don’t know if Skulduggery will _ever_ come back. And besides the rest of the world trying to wage war, there’s still the Spiders who must be really mad at us for taking the god-weapons.”

“They’ve been suspiciously quiet,” Erskine said, frowning at his lap.

“We’ll just have to wait and see for now,” Dexter said darkly, joining the motorway.

**.*****.**

**_Two days later_ **

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

Day forty-one. Just four days into Solomon’s revelation and she could feel the difference in herself and her magic. Her headaches were still bothering her but to a lesser extent and she’d worked out that what she was seeing, all those lights, were people’s Auras. Norma had tried to insist they were souls, but Valkyrie had point blank refused to have any association between her magic and seeing something as controversial as the soul. Luckily, both sisters understood and were calling it her Aura Vision instead.

More than that, though, was the Aura Manipulation.

It started simple enough, just her curiously reaching out and brushing the side of Helena’s Aura, but she had stiffened, fallen to the floor and gotten a nosebleed instantaneously later. At first, Valkyrie thought she’d killed her and almost had a full-on breakdown, but when Helena recovered she’d been nice to Valkyrie and reassured her she was okay but to not do it again without permission. That had led to them realising if she could see Auras and touch them with her hand, she must have some strong psychic powers linked to _doing_ something with Auras.

“Release your magic,” Helena breathed, and Valkyrie did it, falling into her meditative state happily. Some moments went by and she opened one eye slightly with her Aura Vision on. Three Aura’s sat before her, the larger in front of her. Solomon. “Reach out gently with your mind and feel what you can. Don’t try to change anything, just feel.”

She did. Her magic seeped out of her and she felt almost out-of-body as her magic reached Solomon’s Aura and she gently touched it. His deep orange flinched away from her, getting light where her magic touched him as if in revulsion. She patiently waited, not leaving where she was touching him, and the Aura flowed back to normal.

It felt… warm. She could feel Solomon’s essence, in a way, but she wasn’t sure how. She wasn’t sure what the essence of him was saying or doing, but her magic seemed happy with it and moved over him, slowly encasing his body. He felt stiff but didn’t try to fight it. Helena’s voice spoke quietly, keeping her in her meditative state.

Suddenly, her magic felt a snag. Valkyrie paused, eyes closed, and felt around the snag. Something about it was calling to her. She let her magic wrap around it, pulling and fighting the snag, trying to get something out of it, and a pressure was building in her head, and she heard Solomon’s grunt of pain and then–

Warmed flowed through her and she opened her eyes in shock, pulling her magic out of Solomon instantly.

He cried out and put his hands out to stop his fall from his kneeled position.

Valkyrie gasped. “Sorry!” She panicked. “Oh my god! Are you alright? Did I hurt you? Say something! Oh my _God_!”

He sat up slowly, waving her hand to get her to stop freaking out. “I’m fine,” he said. Sweat drops framed his face. “It only hurt for a moment.”

“Oh,” she said. “Um, this might be really, really weird, but I – I feel like… Can you give me your cane?”

Solomon raised an eyebrow but offered her the jewel side. She took it and immediately the Necromancer power flooded her veins. “I’m not sure what this means, Valkyrie.”

Valkyrie stood and wet her lips before wrapping the shadows around herself and wreathed to the other side of the room, then back, then to the top of the dim, curved ceiling and stopping to look down, the shadows holding her in place on a solid, shadow-platform.

Solomon’s mouth hung open. “You’ve never wreathed before.”

“I never made one of these hoverboards either. When I felt your Aura, I felt like I suddenly knew how to use your magic. All these different things I’ve never even dreamed of doing before. And I can do them, just like you can!” Solomon let out a small, awed laugh and watched as Valkyrie suddenly felt the knowledge leave her body and she lost her hold on how she was making the solid platform and fell four feet before her white magic took the shadows place and guided her to the floor safely. “Err, I think I just forgot all the stuff. Here.”

Solomon took his cane back. “That’s incredible,” he breathed. “You can’t just see our Auras, but you can take our magic and use it for yourself!”

Valkyrie shrugged.

“Do you have a headache?” Norma asked quickly.

Valkyrie paused. “Not really, no. I thought I would but I feel sort of, I don’t know, different? Like I have more headspace to think.”

The sisters grinned massively. “That’s amazing!” Norma congratulated. “A return to normal health can only mean you’re on your way to having accessed all your magic!”

“Not necessarily finished,” Solomon clarified quickly, before putting a hand on Valkyrie’s shoulder and squeezing it. “But it sure looks like we’re close. I’m proud of you.”

Valkyrie grinned.

**.*****.**

**_Same time_ **

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

“Can I have a look?” Sermon asked Nadia in her soothing, soft American voice. Nadia didn’t know where she was from, but she wanted to go there and be surrounded by people with her accent.

“Sure,” Nadia swallowed, handing the letter over.

“Do you mind if I read aloud?” Nadia said that was fine. “ _‘To Mum and Dad. Hi. How are you? How is Daadii and Daadaa? I don’t really know what to tell you in this letter. I don’t know what I want to tell you. My therapist told me to do this letter, and it seems like a good idea to try and help you see how your actions are hurting me, but I feel ridiculous. I don’t think you’ll listen, and even if you do, you’ll just use my words to try and manipulate me into doing what you want._

_“‘I’ve realised something since you first sent me to Finishing School. I spent a long time just sitting on my bed, thinking, feeling numb. I realised that you’ve always done things to manipulate me. When I was young, Mum always made me do things I didn’t want to, like wearing clothes I didn’t like and talking in ways I didn’t want to. As I got older and started to fight back, Dad took over and you were more subtle. Such as, I’m allowed to wear what I want with you, but there’s always this requirement that it has to be proper and something that Daadii would like. You push the blame on other people so I can’t see you manipulating my opinion. I never noticed it and really, that made you right when you called me naïve, uneducated and too young to understand. You’ve always used that to your advantage._

_“‘I do know that you want the best for me, at least to an extent, but I feel that you’ve gotten so used to forcing me into everything that you’ve forgotten I’m your sentient daughter that has emotions of my own. If I want to act on my thoughts and feelings, I shouldn’t be manipulated and emotionally blackmailed just because you don’t agree, even if you think it puts me in some danger. I am an adult now. I think, really, the main thing I want is some independence. Every time I thought I had it with you, it was just me thinking I had control when I was actually being manipulated by you. Honestly, I feel like so much of my life with you is just a lie. I feel violated. I feel I cannot trust you or your word. I want to desperately, but I know full well that I’m just in denial. The moment I let you back in, you’re going to slowly start pushing me to do what you want again, and I can’t do it. Even though I want to._

_“‘There is so much I want to say, but I don’t know how to even put it on paper. I am so betrayed and upset with you. How could you leave me in that school? Why didn’t you care? Why didn’t you come get me? Why didn’t you ask how I was even once when I was still answering your messages? The only answer I can come up with is desperation to control me, even if it means weakening me to the point I am harming myself. You want to lower me to the point I am a malleable tool you can command without having to fight. And I think, despite how much I love you and want us back together again to be a family, I hate you. And I hate myself for wanting you back._

_“‘Nadia.’_ It’s a powerful letter.”

“It’s a bit long,” Nadia swallowed.

“It’s good. How do you feel about sending it?”

“No,” she said instantly. “It would hurt them. I don’t want to put any more fuel in the fire, you know?”

“You said something similar in the letter to them,” she smiled, pointing to the table. “Do you want to dissect it with me today, or leave it for another time?”

Nadia thought about it for a moment. “Today I think. While it’s fresh.”


	199. The Ritual commences

**Chapter 199**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

**_One week later_ **

They were finally performing the Ritual.

Valkyrie inhaled in through her nose and out through her mouth, focusing on her breathing. All she had to do was sit in their circle with signals painted on her skin and wait. It was obviously going to hurt, but she didn’t need to do anything other than stay still. She could do that.

She’d come close to asking Solomon if she could leave for a few minutes to call Nadia and talk to her, just in case something happened to her, but he said there was no way. There had been a spattering of murders in the villages and tribes not too far from their secret base – she had no idea how far ‘not far’ was considering how massive Africa was compared to her home – but it put them both on edge. They had known it wouldn’t take long for someone to realise she was missing from the Dead Men’s care. They couldn’t know for sure if it was someone from the Spiders, or just anyone in general that wanted her or Solomon dead. But it felt too suspicious to be coincidental.

“You’ll do fine,” Norma told her in a no-nonsense way.

“I know,” she whispered. Valkyrie wished Helena was with her instead. Helena was that bit younger, that bit gentler, and she seemed to have a soft spot for Valkyrie even though they were no longer theorising her magic was Pure Magic like Norma hoped. Meanwhile, Norma was still kind and nice, but wasn’t exactly as interested as before. Valkyrie understood, though, if Valkyrie had had Pure Magic then it would have meant all her work could mean something. Instead, it was just going to be another string of theories in the Necromancer’s extensive libraries. “How much longer?”

“I’ll be another five minutes,” she said in a strained voice as she concentrated. “I have to make sure this last bit links up with everything else.”

Valkyrie nodded and looked at the ceiling. Normally a pen of sorts would be used to draw signals onto the body but this Sect didn’t do modern technology. So Norma had had someone make up a traditional paste and was now dipping her finger into it and running it along Valkyrie’s body. It was as weird as it sounded, made more so by the fact she had to cover every area of Valkyrie’s body. Including under her feet, between her toes and fingers, into her hairline, between her legs and all up and around her butt. It had not been what she expected from this part of the Ritual but considering some of the things Norma knew about her from her ‘therapy,’ she tried to think of it as a further bonding exercise. Also, pretending she wasn’t as hairy as a werewolf helped slightly. The only tutoring lesson Tanith had ever seemed to truly enjoy teaching Valkyrie had been feminism so she just repeated what Tanith had ranted about for hours on end in her head until it was over.

It was about to get more embarrassing though. She had to be naked for the whole thing. In front of her not-really-but-as-good-as-dad. Gross.

She shook her head and took another deep breath to clear her thought. The weird Necromancers didn’t care less about her body, seeing as how they were all celibate and she was underaged. Norma, Helena and Solomon also saw her as a child. In fact, Valkyrie was pretty sure Solomon very literally saw her as his daughter, so it wasn’t that weird, fathers knew what their children looked like, that was normal. She repeated that next to Tanith’s voice to herself in her head to try and make it convincing as Norma stood back and looked her over.

“This is really weird,” Valkyrie muttered, closing her eyes.

“Try to relax,” Norma said softly. “I know it’s strange for you, and you’re not used to being naked, but I swear it’ll be over before you know it. And no one is going to come near you, you’ll be as safe as you possibly can be in the Ritual bubble.”

“Honestly, it’s more the fact people will see me naked at all that I don’t like.”

Norma smiled. “A couple years from now and you won’t care less. Bodies are bodies, and you are still a child with growing to do. No one will ever think about your body again.”

Valkyrie frowned. “I know you’re being nice but a part of me is kind of offended.”

Normal laughed. “You can’t have it both ways.”

“Sure I can.”

Norma smirked. “Well, I’m not getting into that. Are you ready to go in?”

“Yeah,” she nodded with fake confidence. “Sure I am.”

The hall was full of Necromancers all standing around to observe the Ritual. Most of them were just watching for fun, Valkyrie knew, with just five mid-level Necromancers performing the Ritual in the middle of the room and five reserves who would take someone’s place if they became drained or something happened.

“Valkyrie,” Solomon greeted gravely. “Are you sure you want to do this? You can still back out if you want to.”

“I have to do this,” she said quietly. “If The Torment gets my magic…”

“He’ll have no idea your magic is worth taking,” Solomon whispered to her.

“I’m a target, he’ll come for me eventually and work it out. I might not have Pure Magic, but we both know it’s similar, and even though I have a bottom to my magic reserves, it goes way deeper than most people’s and fills back up too fast to be safe. You know it’s safest for everyone, even if it’s not fun for me.”

Solomon nodded slowly, despite obviously hating it.

“It’s for the best,” she said, giving him a small half-smile.

He looked at her a moment longer before turning and leading her to the middle of the room where there were intricate swirls and whirls on the floor. She went into the centre with as much confidence as she could muster, knowing every eye in the room was on her, looking critically at the signals on her body, checking the quality of Norma’s work for themselves. Surprisingly, she didn’t feel nearly as anxious as she would have a few months ago. And when she thought about Nadia instead of her situation, she felt so painfully lonely and desperate to see and hold her again, she almost forgot all about the cold.

She knelt, facing Solomon.

“You’ll stay, right?” She asked nervously.

“Of course.”

“And you won’t let me leave?”

“Only you can make yourself stay in the boundaries,” he said, indicating the signals on the floor. They were a similar swirling, looping design inside where she was sitting, then a circle around that with angles and sharp lines where the five Necromancers sat. She had to stay inside her bubble, and the five Necromancers had to stay in theirs, unless they very, very carefully switched out. “But I believe in you. I think you can take this pain, and then we can go home.”

Valkyrie nodded and gave him a watery smile. “What happens if I die?”

“You won’t die,” he said immediately as the others in the room began to sit and get ready to settle for the next few hours. “Don’t even think about it. You can do this.”

“But what if I do?” She asked, feeling her heart jump painfully. “What if I left Nadia in Ireland crying hysterically and never get to hug her again? She’s waiting for me.”

“Valkyrie.”

“What if I never get to see my brothers again? Erskine won’t cope with losing me. He can’t take that sort of loss. He still hasn’t gotten over losing Larrikin and Hopeless,” she said, her voice hitching. “What about Skulduggery?”

“I promise you, the people here know what they’re doing, and I’ve been researching this Ritual for months. You’re going to be alright. A lot of people have done this before. No one is going to lose you and you’ll get to see your family again,” he said with a firm voice.

“I didn’t even hug you this morning. I should have. Now, if I die, I’m going to do it without having had a hug.”

They looked at each other and Solomon said nothing as he hitched his ratty trousers and sat to stay with her as the Necromancer’s began to chant, completely uncaring that she had begun to cry.

She took deep breaths, closing her eyes and telling herself it would be alright. A couple of hours from now, Solomon would scoop her up off the ground and take her to the showers and clean her up and help her eat and drink and put her to bed. All she had to do was take this one bit of pain and she’d have protected herself and everyone else. Her magic was too powerful, too close to anything even remotely like Pure Magic to be allowed to stay free and open like it was.

It was for the best.

She could do this.

Her breath hitched as the first wave of pain rolled through her, and then she let out a scream.


	200. An old friend returns

**Chapter 200**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

Intense, awful, mind-shattering pain. It was utter torture like nothing she’d ever experienced before, more than Serpine and more than Remnant-Kenspeckle combined, and she hated every second of it. There was no room in her brain for thoughts of anyone, of any breathing technique or comforting thought. Just pure pain. Her body writhed and thrashed on the cold floor and she wasn’t even strong enough to force herself to run or ask for help.

She just had to lie there, convulsing, frothing at the mouth, eyes rolled back into her head like it was some awful seizure.

Suffering.

**.*****.**

**_Tanith’s POV_ **

Pippin Black, possible leader of the Wild Brothers. The only one, they now knew, no one had ever captured on camera or film, much less arrested. No one had lived through it yet.

Around him, eight men and one person. They had thought for a time Black was a misogynistic man, someone vile and horrible that Tanith could add to the long list of sexist men she’d had to deal with. It turned out he was exactly those things, but he also valued gender expression, and his closest partner-in-crime was a non-binary person. Who was also misogynistic. Tanith had never had to arrest a sexist non-binary person, but she didn’t mind adding variety to her day considering, according to the prison talk they’d found out, both Black and all the people he brought in to work with the Wild Brothers were chosen specifically for their shared values on women, children and torture techniques.

All their attitudes sucked, essentially, and she’d be thankful for a chance to take them out.

“Tan,” Saracen said lowly. Tanith looked down at him from her perch on a wall looking out of a window that had likely never had a pane in it. “Ready?”

She nodded once and prepared herself. They were on the border between Sudan and Libya, called by the Sudanian Sanctuary when the five of the previously captured Wild Brothers had been picked up on security tapes based on Frightening’s description. The same five that had taken the God-Killer Sword two or so months ago. There should have been video footage of the leader then, but he’d sent someone in his place to mask his lack of involvement. Not that the English told anyone the Wild Brother’s had been in their Sanctuary.

They didn’t have the Sword with them, but they had expected that.

The Wild Brothers walked like the cockiest men Tanith had ever seen, perfectly fitting the stereotype of what a mercenary should be. They all looked pale and had taken their shirts off to soak in the sun. Probably from being stuck in some Spiders hideout.

They were getting closer.

No one made a sound. They all held their breaths. Black froze fifty yards from the abandoned building. Tanith could just about see from her new perch on the roof where his boots stopped. The other men, and person, went silent as their boss considered whatever feeling he was having. Tanith readjusted her grip on the sword.

“ _INCOMING_!” Someone from in the building screamed, and then there was a pop from a gun, a short fizzle, and an explosion.

Tanith threw herself out of the small window and fell to the floor, rolling in the hard sand before coming to a stop not far from the Wild Brothers as the building exploded into flames behind her. She didn’t think as she threw herself into the fight, gutting the nearest man with her sword.

**.*****.**

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

“What is it, honey?” Nadia asked sweetly. “Are you hung-y?”

Laila looked at her and squealed loudly without giving any indication of what she wanted. Nadia looked to Ghastly. “Any ideas?”

“She just wants Tanith,” he said tiredly. “She keeps spitting out the bottle and I don’t think she likes the taste of the new formula for her age bracket. And the new reusable nappies she got don’t fit her legs right.”

He closed his eyes and appeared ready to pass out. Nadia hummed and looked back at the baby. At six and a half months, she enjoyed sitting alone and didn’t need any cushions to keep her upright anymore, she could move her head around and follow people with her eyes and was beginning to gain some good strength and hand to eye coordination. She’d also been reluctantly forced onto her belly, put herself into the prime pose of hands and knees to begin crawling, and then put her feet in the air while her knees stayed on the floor and just sort of jig. No quite moving yet, but she was getting there.

“You’d think it wouldn’t be separation anxiety considering she has multiple food sources, so to speak, and she’s well bonded with everyone around her.”

“Must be the milk then.”

“Maybe she’s getting teeth?” Nadia wondered, but didn’t check. She didn’t want to get up quite yet to wash her hands. “Why are you being so naughty, miss? Hmm? You’re a naughty baby.”

Laila looked at her with her big eyes, still baby blue, and then looked at her father who she’d kept awake all night and the night before while her mother rested.

“Laila!” Erskine squealed, getting the baby’s attention. Laila’s face split into a big gummy grin and she held her arms out for Erskine to take her. He scooped her up and kissed her all over. “Who’s the bestest baby in the whole world? Who’s the prettiest and the _smartest_? You, that’s who!”

“Please shut up,” Ghastly begged, getting back to his sewing. “Nadia, could you get me the box of silver threads?”

She got up and found the box in its organised place within the front area of Ghastly’s shop. She brought it back.

“Pick one out.”

“What’s it for?”

“A pattern on the front, floral. It’ll have clear sequins.”

Nadia looked within and found a pretty one that was all silver and no grey and gave that to him.

“Thanks.” He sighed deeply. “Not long until Valkyrie and Solomon are back.”

“I know, but it’s been so long,” she muttered. “One and a half months. And they said it would take two months tops, but we’ve heard nothing.”

“That makes sense. They wouldn’t send a message or it’d be like sending a flare gun right at The Torment blaring their location,” he told her. “Even if they needed help, it would be safer to remain hidden and in danger than send for help and have every enemy we possibly have, and some criminals that just want some fun, home in on them. It’s too risky. And it puts more people in danger.”

“Makes sense,” she muttered, taking her seat again as Erskine took Laila upstairs to give a bath after noticing she’d done a particularly nasty poop. Probably went with Ghastly’s theory of her hating the formula. Maybe it was making her sick. Could she be allergic? “Have you heard from the Sanctuary?”

“I’ll tell you when I do,” he said softly but firmly. She’d been asking him a lot for any report on Tanith, Saracen and Dexter’s mission in Sudan. “Anton’s turning off the Hotel. Did I tell you that?”

“I heard people wondering if he should do it. Too many criminals and enemies are in Ireland as it is,” she said darkly.

“Mm. He strongly believes in free travel around the world. Boarders encourage an ‘us versus them’ attitude, and that encourages territories, violence, racism, a breakdown in understanding of cultures. This is his way of helping that. It’s something he feels very strongly about. But in this case, it stops criminals getting to Ireland. It also stops people getting out though. _And_ it sends a message to other Sanctuaries. The Dead Men are preparing for war.” He stopped to look at her seriously. “This is the last order I have and then I’ll be closing the shop. It’ll send the message we wanted to put off as long as possible. We may not be controlled by the Sanctuary in reality, but it’s not what people will view this as.”

“How long do we have now?”

“We had weeks before. It’ll stay the same. The other Sanctuaries… they want this war. They want Ireland. There’s no stopping it now, Nadia. I really feel you should reconsider staying here. You are such a big target right now. Nothing will ever stop you from coming back when it’s over.”

Nadia glared at him. “Not a chance.”

“I know you feel passionately about this. But remember, if anything ever happens to you, Valkyrie will never forgive herself. She’s lost too many loved one’s to cope with losing you. Personally, I don’t want another Skulduggery.” He sighed softly and went back to sewing. “It is still you’re choice. But I wanted to at least encourage you to think very carefully while you still have the chance. Soon, you won’t have that luxury.”

Nadia looked at the table and blinked slowly, knowing it was the smart and mature thing to do as he said even if she didn’t change her mind. It was too heavy of a topic though, one she only wanted to have one feeling and thought about because it just made her life easier to not consider other options.

She was saved by the bell and got up to check the front door for Ghastly.

She stared.

“Nadia.”

She tried to think but couldn’t get anything out.

“It’s… good to see you again. I hope this isn’t too out of the blue,” he said quietly, almost a whisper. “I am… truly sorry for what I’ve put you through. I would understand if you don’t feel you can forgive me. But I would very much like to try and earn your apology.”

Nadia swallowed and sat shakily on the small armchair. “Ghastly,” she croaked out.

A moment went by and Ghastly came through the door and froze as well before sighing deeply and shaking his head. “Skulduggery,” he said, going to him. “Old friend.”

They embraced tightly.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

Eight hours, they said it took. Eight hours of torturous pain. She was covered in sweat, had clawed at her arms, made herself bleed. It hadn’t mattered as the signals had taken effect and were as good as worthless the moment they sunk in at the start of the Ritual. She’d wet herself, and laid in it, a few times over.

Despite the mess, Valkyrie could vaguely recall Solomon going to her when the pain suddenly, sharply vanished. That had been so frightening. She’d thought she died, too weak to continue. But no, it had been his voice, his hand softly stroking her hair. He had washed her off in the privacy of the shower block while everyone else ate, dried and dressed her, and put her into her bed.

She clung to him now, her hands shaking slightly. “Is it done? Did I do it?”

“Yes, honey, it’s all done now,” he said softly. He was on his knees beside her bed and held her gently. “You’re all done here. Your magic is sealed. The Ritual went well.”

She said nothing for a long moment. “Good.”

“Try to sleep,” he whispered, stroking a thumb over her eyebrow.

She closed her eyes obediently. “Solomon, when this is done,” she said slowly, clutching his shirt tightly, “will you adopt me?”

There was a longer pause where she might have fallen asleep, and then she heard his voice again. “Let’s talk when you’re rested. Sleep, now.”


	201. The return of the Queen

**Chapter 201**

Solomon had been going to take them south but after they started that way and ran into an old ‘friend’ of his and heard of some conflicts in that direction, they chose to risk going north towards Europe instead of the safety they’d hope to find in Frightening Jones in the south.

That had posed a whole other slew of problems, but thankfully, Solomon was more than capable of smuggling them out of Africa, then all the way through Europe posing as father and daughter backpackers to the moral authorities, and onto a stolen boat and into Ireland. They had then walked all the way from the harbour to the nearest town, found a taxi, and got to what they could only hope was a safe place.

It had been a two and a half week endeavour.

Thankfully, Corrival’s mansion had been safe, and they’d found him coming down the grand staircase in his Elder robes on his way out just as they came through the doors – filthy, exhausted, hungry and badly dehydrated. Valkyrie’s short hair was wild, and greasy, on her head.

“Valkyrie! Solomon!” Corrival exclaimed, getting down the last few steps quickly. “My god, you’re alive!”

“Just about,” Valkyrie rasped, swallowing drily.

“ _Ravel_!” He shouted behind his shoulder. “Come, sit down, you look dead on your feet. Are you alright? How was your mission? They still won’t tell me what you were doing, you know.”

“It was safer that way,” she said simply, not wanting to get personal with it. “But yeah, it went well enough.”

“Good, good,” he nodded and took a seat before jumping back up as fast as his dodgy hip would let him. “You need something to eat and drink,” he announced and left the room.

“He must have been worried for you,” Solomon said lowly and Valkyrie responded with a small smile. She wanted badly to take her shoes off but she could only imagine the stink inside them. She hadn’t taken her clothes off in a week, and they hadn’t been washed with real soap since she left Ireland two or so months ago. She hadn’t worn them for most of that time, but the old stink had settled deep into the fabric. She wasn’t sure even Ghastly could save them. What she wouldn’t give to breathe in Nadia’s coconut and vanilla bean scented shampoo, her matching conditioner, her mint body wash, and of her perfumes. To be wrapped in the smell of her fiancée and her arms.

“Valkyrie!” Erskine shouted, throwing his body into the room a moment later. Her body ached and protested, but she stood up and held her arms open for him. He was immediately holding her tightly, murmuring how happy he was to see her. “Did it go well?” He asked after a moment. “Did the Ritual work?”

“Yeah, it’s fine. And the, you know, bits before it,” she said with a small smile while Corrival was out of the room. “We found out some new things about my magic that’s different from before, but it was still too dangerous not to do the Ritual. So we did it. It was painful but… it was painful.”

“Ah, honey,” he whispered, running a hand through her greasy, nasty hair. “You did what you had to, and you did amazing. I’m proud of you. You should be proud of you.”

She swallowed thickly and held onto him tightly. “I know.”

“So much has happened while you’ve been gone,” he said quietly, pulling away but holding their bodies together still.

“The war…?”

“No, not yet, or officially at least. We had a spy come that we found, but they were hardly not trying to be found. Working as maintenance, of all things, in the Sanctuary.” He rolled his eyes. “I mean, there’s nothing for them to find out, if anything they seemed sympathetic to us.”

“That’s good, right?”

He shrugged and gave her a small smile. “As good as we can hope I suppose. And, um… well, no, we should probably let you get washed first,” he smiled, obviously nervous. “Something else happened. Not to Nadia or Laila! They’re fine. It’s nothing bad, necessarily, I suppose. Just… come on. Let’s get you cleaned. It’s nothing that can’t wait.”

He took her upstairs and helped her change, not wanting to be away from her. She didn’t mind particularly, Erskine was her brother, and he didn’t look at her. He did comment on her having lost weight.

“Yeah, I know,” she grimaced. “The food was nasty.”

He snorted a laugh and looked away while she got her shower, sitting on the floor with his knees to his chest while he waited. When she turned the water off, he got her a towel and wrapped her up tightly and followed her to the bedroom he claimed Nadia was staying in. Not much of their clothes were there, but it was enough. Nadia had her dirty washing was in a pile in the corner, and the bed had only roughly made. Valkyrie’s heart clenched. “God, I miss Nadia,” she whispered.

Erskine laughed softly. “She’s missed you too. Badly. Practically lives in your clothes.”

“She’s a cutie.”

“For sure. Ready?”

“Can you dry my hair?”

He used his magic to dry her hair quickly and took the ball of water out of the room, giving her enough time to finish getting dressed before they went downstairs. Corrival had gotten her and Solomon some food and drink, which they ate quickly, and then they got in the car to the Sanctuary. Corrival even drove so Erskine could hold onto Valkyrie.

He seemed well considering the stress and pressure he was probably under, which was good. He was going to have to be prepared to fight. He was strong and more than capable, but if he was having an episode, they just wouldn’t be able to bring him with them. Then again, Valkyrie wouldn’t be upset if they had to leave such a good fighter with Laila and Nadia. Of course, her brothers knew Erskine best and they had always said, even at his worst, if he _had_ to pull himself together, he could force it. It wasn’t fun long term, but fighting a war wasn’t meant to be easy on anyone.

Roarhaven was as drab and grey as ever.

Inside the Sanctuary, people smiled at Valkyrie as she passed, and she smiled back at them as best she could through the exhaustion. She heard her brothers before she saw them and rushed through into the room, running directly into Anton’s back. She bounced back and then jumped into his arms when he turned, breaking into a big smile.

The rush of welcomes and kind words and hugs came, and a flurry of kisses all over her cheeks and temple. She ended up with her back to the room and Dexter hugging her from behind.

“Aww, long how big and strong you are!” Saracen laughed, pointing at her and Dexter’s heads. “You’re, like two inches bigger than Dexter!”

There was laughter all over from her brothers, Tanith and Corrival, and then Nadia pushed her way through the throng and Valkyrie felt her heart melt.

It was so good to see her again. It was like it had been years, despite being only a bit over two months, but it also felt like the first time all over again. Nadia was so changed from when they met on Valkyrie’s thirteenth birthday at that ball, but she had the same gorgeous big brown eyes, thick dark brown hair, perfect cheekbones, full and well-defined lips. Her breath caught in her throat for a moment before she broke out of Dexter’s hold and cupped Nadia’s face gently to kiss her.

Nadia’s hands gripped the collar of her jacket. Weeks of tension, the hours of trauma, the mental stress of everything in the world, it just seemed so insignificant for those few fresh moments Nadia was wrapped in her arms. She fit so perfectly, standing on her toes to reach Valkyrie’s lips.

The moment ended eventually when Valkyrie heard Solomon’s expression of “Oh.” It sounded so off for him it practically made her flinch and she looked up from Nadia despite her fiancée obviously not being finished with getting reacquainted with her lips.

His face was pinched, obviously uncomfortable. She swirled her head to the other side and felt her mouth open in shock.

“Oh, fuck,” she said automatically, shocked to see Skulduggery standing by the small table. Meritorious was there also but slipped out of the room, muttering about giving them a moment.

Skulduggery cleared his throat as Valkyrie continued to watch without talking. “Valkyrie,” he said quietly, glancing at the floor and then back up at her. He was in a nice suit. Possibly a new one. The hat was certainly new, sitting on the table. “I realise you must be quite shocked to see me here. I had hoped someone would have been able to tell you before you had to see me. I hope this isn’t too much.”

She continued to look, clenching her teeth together. Nadia shuffled in her arms, resting her hands flat on her chest above her breasts, looking carefully at her face, but Valkyrie didn’t look down.

“For what it is worth, I am so sorry Valkyrie. I’ve been terrible to you, to Nadia, to our family, and I have let us all down, myself included. I know I have no right to ask for forgiveness, but I am sorry. I–” He stopped himself and rephrased. “How are you?”

She swallowed and suddenly realised she had bile in her throat. She swallowed again and blinked a few times and looked around at her family. They looked solemnly back at her, letting her make her choice as they always had. Ready to stand with her.

But at the same time, she sensed Skulduggery had been back a while. And they had all accepted that. A part of her found that so wrong, not fair. But then… she also didn’t. She recognised that although she was mad, that didn’t have to have anything to do with her family. They were welcome to forgive and to forget as much as they wanted, or not to if the positions were reversed. It didn’t mean it didn’t hurt in a weird hypocritical type of way. She was old enough and mature enough to know that.

She breathed deeply and looked down at Nadia. They held each other’s gaze, Nadia’s brown eyes holding so much concern, so many questions. She couldn’t tell how Nadia felt about it all and it put her off balance.

“Skulduggery,” she said slowly, her voice breaking halfway. “I didn’t expect you here.”

He nodded. “I got back to Ireland two weeks and a day ago.”

She took another deep breath and blinked a few times.

She didn’t want to deal with this right now.

“What’s the updates on the Spiders? Pa didn’t tell me much,” she asked the room instead.

“Nothing much to tell you,” Dexter said after a beat. Valkyrie noticed he had been gripping Saracen’s wrist anxiously but now let it go. “They’re still evading us, we don’t know where they’re staying or how they keep staying out of view. There’s still a crimewave happening all over the country both from new criminals entering and what we think is the Spiders going on killing sprees. There’s at least one spy that’s not so inconspicuously undercover, and two agents of the Supreme Council turned up three days ago.”

“What’s the Supreme Council?” Valkyrie asked darkly. She knew this couldn’t be good.

“Every country except Ireland and a handful of the very, very small countries around the world. Places with less than five mages, essentially. They created a board designed to assess every Sanctuary and evaluate if they are competent enough at running their country. It seems to be headed by Germany, England and America.”

“That’s not a surprise,” she muttered. Nadia rested her forehead against Valkyrie’s sternum and Valkyrie put a hand on the back of her head. It felt good.

“They’re just waiting for an excuse,” Saracen said seriously. “I don’t think it’ll have anything to do with us anymore. One criminal doing too much damage in public, any scandal from literally any Sanctuary employee, a mystery taking too long to crack. It won’t take much to make the whole board tip.”

“We are literally on the edge then,” she nodded. It had been coming for a long time, but it was starting to feel a lot more real. And she wanted to visit her parent’s graves before it began. Would she even have time? “Anything else I need to know?”

“Nothing from our end,” Dexter said slowly. “Are you going to tell us how everything went with you?”

She shrugged, knowing she couldn’t say much with Corrival in the room. Or Skulduggery. “It went fine. All of it did. We found out my magic wasn’t what we thought, it’s actually something a little different, but everything went as we planned anyway. You don’t need to worry about it.”

They all nodded and there were some mutterings along the lines of being glad it was all fine, but it went quiet again.

After a long, almost awkward silence, Skulduggery chose to break it. “Valkyrie…”

“Don’t,” she said quietly. “I need to think.”

“I’m not sure we have that time,” he continued. “I don’t want to push you, but it may be better to–”

“Oh, no, you do not get to tell me what is best for me,” Valkyrie glared, feeling even ounce of her anger over the last few months rear up. It had been one of the only things Solomon hadn’t been able to crack, apart from her claustrophobia and a few of her other fears that had at least been made more rational in her mind. But Skulduggery? None of her thinking towards him was logical or rational. It was all emotional and an utter mess. “You had your chance to do what was best for me and you fucked it.”

He chose to remain silent this time.

“And you know what?” She said, unwrapping herself from Nadia who quickly stepped back. Laila made a squealing sound of annoyance, but it didn’t deter Valkyrie’s enraged mind. “I want an explanation for all of this. For why you couldn’t just stop. Just leave when you obviously knew you had to. You did it in the end, so why did you have to do all the shit you did first, hu? Why did you have put us through that?”

“I am so sorry, Valkyrie,” he said sincerely. “I never meant to hurt you like this–”

“Erm, no, I actually think that was exactly what you were trying to do at the time,” she snapped.

“I was not in a good place mentally then, and I made some wrong choices. Choices I will always regret for the rest of my life.”

“Yeah, to go along with every other story to tell me of your past. Give me a break Skulduggery, I’m sick of this back and forth. It’s not just right before you left, you know. It’s also the way you treated _me_. I was just some tool to make you feel better about yourself at the heart of it, wasn’t I? There were so many warnings too. You would always take Dexter and Saracen on adventures with you, but the moment I showed up you dumped them for me. And the moment Solomon came, you dumbed me for him. I can’t believe I let you trick me into thinking _I_ was in the wrong. I knew you were in the wrong the whole time but I let my love for you blind me into letting you get your way, and where has it gotten me? Just another person to add onto the list I can’t depend on after they tell me they’ll never leave. You’re sick. Just a sick, horrible man.”

“I agree.”

“Yeah, I fucking _hope_ you do. You abandoned us without a goodbye so you could go to therapy, and while I am really glad you went because you did need it, surely you could have been aware enough to know that we, your family, would have wanted to say goodbye to you? I honestly can’t believe you think you can come in here, tell us you’re all cured and expect me to just believe you! You’re a notorious liar, Skulduggery, why the hell should I believe you?!”

“I never said I was cured,” he said calmly. “I received word that the war is about to break in Ireland and I came back to help. As soon as it’s over, I will need to return to the rehabilitation centre for further treatment for my PTSD, anger issues and other mental health problems. But even despite not being cured, and I doubt I ever will be fully cured, I am a lot more aware of how my actions have hurt you and the rest of our family in recent years. I should have spoken to you more, I should have made sure you had avenues to therapy when we met you properly and you came into our care, I should have given you the chance to have me in whatever way you wished. I shouldn’t have forced myself into the mould of a friend when what you needed was a father.”

“No,” she spat. “Don’t you fucking dare try that on me. You will never be anything like a father to me after what you did to us. You don’t fucking deserve it.”

Valkyrie turned on her heel and stalked out of the room, pushing past Nadia and her brothers on the way. There was silence behind her as the door slammed shut and no one in the halls seemed all that surprised when she went stomping out the building.

She couldn’t believe the nerve of him, and promptly kicked a brick as hard as she could and watched it go skidding down the street. A part of her wanted to run and scream but she was so angry she was shaking. It didn’t help she was so exhausted she was close to tears. _Which has nothing to do with Skulduggery, I am not about to cry over that twat again_ , she thought to herself angrily.

“Valkyrie!” She heard.

Growling, Valkyrie picked up speed, intent on stomping her way all the way back to civilisation and then getting a taxi to a hotel no one would find her at. Skulduggery came running for her though, and she didn’t have time to go down the next alleyway before he said her name again from right behind her.

“Leave me alone,” she snapped, feeling the sudden urge to cry. She sneered at the pavement as she quickened her step, hoping he’d get the message. Her tears had nothing to do with him. It was just a lot of emotions to deal with at once and she was overemotional and overwhelmed, and she wasn’t even really crying!

“I can’t let you wander off alone, Valkyrie, it’s too dangerous right now.”

She turned on him so fast he had to take a step back to keep a polite distance. “For the second time, you do _not_ get to tell me what I can and cannot do, Skulduggery. You lost all your rights to me and my life. Don’t you _dare_ try and tell me these things. I _know_ what I’m doing.”

“I know that, but you’re letting your anger at me put you in a bad place,” he said quietly. “Roarhaven has had more than one disappearance, all of young women with your complexion. You can be mad at me all you want, rightly so, but that doesn’t mean I want something to happen to you. Even if you don’t believe me, it is how I feel.”

“I don’t think I care how you feel anymore, to be honest,” she said, sticking her nose up at him. They were almost exactly equal height. But she was taller. Just enough. “You snuffed all my love for you right out of my soul.”

“You may be being a tad dramatic.”

“Stop trying to downplay everything I say or I’ll punch you so hard your teeth will fall out,” she glared. He didn’t answer her that time. “Just leave me alone.”

“I already said I can’t do that,” he repeated softly.

“Why, so you can throw me to the wolves easier? Do you have another little surprise in store? Are you going to fuck my life up even more than it currently is for your own amusement? Because I am done with your games. Don’t.”

He sighed when she turned and began her fast pace through Roarhaven again. She knew immediately that he was following but decided to ignore him because that was the best thing to do. When she found a taxi, she’d lock herself in and not let him come near her. She’d tell the driver one place when Skulduggery could hear, and as soon as he was eating dust, she’d tell the driver the new destination, somewhere far away.

Comforted by her ideas, she continued through the last of the streets silently until they got to the main road and she had to wait a moment for a car to pass before crossing.

Skulduggery tried to talk again. “If you like, I can drive you wherever you want to go and leave you be once your safe.”

It was too much on her weary soul, and she twisted and punched him straight in the face. One of his teeth fell out of his skull.

“Stay away from me, Skulduggery Pleasant,” she growled, getting in his space and forcing him to take a step back. She must have been an inch taller than him, as Solomon had said. It was so strange. “I don’t want you here. I don’t need you here. You’ve ruined enough of my life and I’ve wasted enough of my feelings on you.”

He tilted his head sadly.

She sneered at him and stepped into the road to get away before turning and continuing on down the street towards oncoming traffic. Not that there was any coming to Roarhaven.

He continued to follow.


	202. They're... adorable?

**Chapter 202**

“I can’t believe you,” she growled at him, getting out of the taxi aggressively. Skulduggery was forced to stay in there long enough to pay the man, giving Valkyrie ample time to go Solomon’s house, slam the door shut and bolt it.

She heard as the taxi door was closed after Skulduggery but couldn’t hear his steps after that. He’d been using his facade and she didn’t know where his missing tooth was. Probably in his pocket.

She sighed to herself and went up the stairs. A door wouldn’t stop him, but it would take a little while for him to pick the lock. He’d have to do the backdoor unless he wanted one of the neighbours to call the Gardaí on him.

She shed her clothes on the landing and threw them into the guest bed she and Nadia had occupied last time they were together. She felt like an idiot. She should have taken Nadia’s hand and taken her with her.

Heaving a big sigh, she shook her head and went to the shower. Someone had cleaned in there since she was last in Ireland. She remembered leaving nail polish remover on the windowsill, and she’d had bottles on the floor, because Nadia took all the space on the shelves. A quick check under the counter found the healing stones. She turned on the bath and filled it halfway, threw in a full stone because she was too lazy, exhausted and emotionally drained to break it, and sat herself in. The little radio was still suckered onto the glass of the shower, so she grabbed it and set it to some station playing Queen, cranked it up way high so she wouldn’t have to hear if Skulduggery got in, and closed her eyes.

She didn’t even need a bath but she felt so grimy and dirty still.

Some time went by before she could motivate herself to get her somewhat less sore body out of the bath and into the shower to wash. She methodically used the guest shampoo and body wash, scrubbing all over her body as roughly as she could, before turning off the water and towel drying. If Nadia were with her, she’d dry them both off and hold her tightly. Instead, she settled for quickly towel drying it so it was sticking up in all directions, still way too short on her head but beginning to grow out now, and wrapped the towel around her body. After opening the window and turning on the fan, she snapped off the radio.

She didn’t hear anything. Trying to act as if she didn’t care, she left the bathroom and went straight for the guest. She and Nadia still had a few items of clothing in the top draw of the dresser, which was strange because it seemed as if Nadia had otherwise moved out of Solomon’s, but she didn’t question her luck as she finally pulled on some pyjama trousers and a crop top. It left her armpits and the strip of hair up to her bellybutton exposed, but she was so tired she didn’t care. Her family had always rolled their eyes over her self-consciousness towards hair anyway.

She wanted to continue being full of rage, but she was just tired.

The only issue was, she promised herself a hot chocolate before bed when she got back. And some food she enjoyed. She had hoped to order dinner and a smoothie but didn’t have her phone as she’d left that in her bag which was now at the Sanctuary. So she had to either go downstairs or not get her wish.

She really, really wanted to not see Skulduggery, but in the end, the need for food was too great and she quietly padded down the stairs.

He wasn’t in the living room or office, and for a moment, she honestly thought he wasn’t there. But when she went into the kitchen and saw him making her a drink, she wasn’t surprised.

She looked at him for a moment, noticing the tooth gap, before making the decision that his drink wasn’t good enough for her, despite knowing he almost certainly made it exactly how she liked it in a way she didn’t know how to replicate. He must have gone to the corner shop and bought new milk and whipped cream as well, and a Flake.

She sniffed as he set it on the table and let him sit himself down before putting her nose in the air and got about making a new hot chocolate. Technically a cocoa as she refused to use his milk and used boiled water with her powder instead. No cream for her either… or chocolate Flake.

Her phone was on the counter.

He must have gotten it from her bag before he followed her out of the Sanctuary. _Is it too petty to not use it just because he brought it to me?_ She could replace it. Pick that one up like it had something nasty on it, put it in the bin and wash her hands. _That isn’t too petty, is it? Surely not._

The kettle finishing brought her out of her distracted thoughts and she poured the drink before stirring and deciding that while it wasn’t at all too petty to never touch the phone, it was just as good to not thank him or acknowledge that he brought it, and it let her get food without involving him or getting dressed. Standing with her back to him, she purposefully ignored all the messages on her phone and ordered a takeaway for herself instead.

When she was done, Skulduggery graced her with his thoughts. “Valkyrie,” he said incredibly softly, his velvety voice low, “sit with me. We don’t have to talk.”

She ignored him and went to the living room instead.

After settling on her favourite chair and wrapping a blanket around herself, she placed her phone on the floor to ignore and raised her mug to smell the drink without having to put the burning liquid in her mouth. Skulduggery followed again.

Right before he spoke, she interrupted him. “This is nice. You following me around like a dog. Are you enjoying it?”

“I can’t say I am,” he said just as softly as before as he took a seat on a sofa to her right. “But it is nice to see you after these last few months.”

“I’m not that happy about it.”

“I can tell.”

“I’d rather you just left actually.”

“I see that.”

“Why are you still here then?”

“Because I love you.”

“Do you? Do you though?” She said in a mocking voice. “Seems to me you just pick me up and drop me when you feel like it.”

“I know, I’ve done a lot of wrong,” he acknowledged. “I’m not ever going to say I haven’t. But I can’t try to salvage our relationship if I don’t try. And I really do want to try.”

Valkyrie grunted noncommittedly.

“It’s okay if you can’t forgive me,” he said slowly. “I would understand if you hated me even. But for the sake of working together for the war coming to us, we may need to find a way to at least talk civilly.”

“Who says I want to work with you at all, hum?” She asked, lowering the mug and resting her head back on the sofa with her eyes closed. “I have a lot of options. You could take Tanith. I could stay with Nadia and the baby. It means nothing to me if I don’t work with the Dead Men.”

“Please don’t blame your brothers,” he asked softly.

“I’m not blaming them,” she said mildly. “I’m not upset with them either. They can do what they like. But if you’re already set on going when the time comes, you may as well. I can do something else without the Dead Men and it makes no difference to me.”

He was quiet for some time. “You don’t mean that.”

She swallowed and felt burning in her chest. “I suppose not. But that doesn’t mean I’m not willing to do it. Whether I’m with you or anyone else, it won’t stop someone from dying, so it hardly matters. I may as well go where I’m wanted rather than with someone who might drop me at a moment’s notice who-knows-where. It’s probably safer, actually.”

“Your brothers would be disappointed you think that.”

“I hope you’re not trying to guilt me right now.”

“I’m sorry,” he said after a moment. “That was… not particularly well thought on my part. I just mean to say, you’re our family and you have been since you were just a few days old and we met you. Honestly, before that even. As soon as Gordon told us about your mother being pregnant with you, we were looking forwards to seeing you. We all fell in love with you the day we met you. I might have messed up along the way, but I truly didn’t mean to Valkyrie. I don’t want to act like I’m making excuses, but I was not mentally capable of making good decisions, and I made choices regardless of that fact. And you suffered for it.”

“Yeah, I bloody know,” she tried to say, but it came out as a whisper.

She looked over at him, tears pricking at her eyes. All that anger and upset, it was still there, but she had waited for him to come back and say that.

“I want to believe you,” she said slowly, swallowing back the feeling in her eyes. She wasn’t going to cry again. She meant that. “But I’m not sure I trust you anymore, Skul. You’ve really hurt me. You hurt my family. All of us. You weren’t here for so much. But I’m glad you were at therapy so now I’m just confused.”

“Would you like a hug?” He asked, opening his arms.

She considered not accepting for a moment, but suddenly felt desperate for it. She just felt empty and so, so tired and she so wanted him to hold her.

Nodding pathetically, she put the horrible cocoa on the coffee table and fell into his arms.

After adjusting for a moment, he had both his arms around her and she had her head on his shoulder. The panicking she had felt inside stopped and she took some deep breaths.

“There we go,” he whispered. “I’ve got you, Valkyrie. I’ll do anything to help you see I mean it. I promise you. I love you so much.”

“Thank you,” she replied, putting a hand on his chest. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too, honey.”

“I have something to tell you,” she whispered.

“What is it?”

“Me and Nadia are engaged.”

He squeezed her tighter. “Nadia told me. Congratulations. I’m so proud of you.”

She smiled.

**.*****.**

“Hey,” Nadia said cautiously, poking her head around the door into the living room. She saw Skulduggery and Valkyrie curled up together on the love seat, blanket wrapped around them. “Oh. Have you talked?”

“Yeah,” Valkyrie smiled tiredly. She opened her arms and Nadia came over, the rest of the family including Solomon but no Corrival following in behind her. She leaned over to give Valkyrie a hug but Valkyrie pulled down despite her shout, forcing her to sit on Valkyrie’s lap.

“This doesn’t work,” Nadia complained.

“Shush,” Valkyrie commanded, wrapping the blanket over Nadia and holding her tightly. “Ignore him.”

“Kind of hard, I’m practically on top of him.”

“Eh,” she shrugged and leaned her head back on Skulduggery’s shoulder.

After a moment, Nadia sagged and apologised to Skulduggery. “It’s quite fine, Nadia. I’m not sure Valkyrie is awake enough to think things through right now.”

“Shut up, bone face.”

“So tired,” he said in fake misery.

Valkyrie smiled slightly. “You’re a dick.”

“I’m a skeleton,” he said matter of factly.

“It’s good to see you Val,” Tanith said quickly, coming over and kissing Valkyrie’s cheek before putting Laila on top of Nadia. From her new vantage point on Nadia’s lap, Laila looked at Nadia and Skulduggery before turning almost fully to see Valkyrie’s face, giving her a critical stare. After a moment, she turned back to her mother as if to ask ‘ _what am I meant to do now?_ ’

“Hey, baby, do you still remember Aunty Val?” Valkyrie asked Laila. Laila didn’t even look at her.

“I’m sure she remembers you,” Ghastly reassured her. “She’s really starting to get curious about her surroundings.”

“I can see, she’s so big.” She got another hug from Erskine from behind which included Skulduggery, Nadia and Laila in it before everyone started sitting down, throwing her take out rubbish on the floor. “Go on then. Tell me the damage.”

“We already did,” Dexter smiled. “Skul coming back was the only extra thing.”

“Yeah, no, something happened,” she smiled.

“Just the usual. Terrorist attacks, crime waves. Oh, Tanith was held hostage for a day, but _I_ singlehandedly rescued her before help got to us,” Saracen said smugly.

“Ooh, well done,” she grinned at him. “Did you have fun Tanith?”

She shrugged. “It wasn’t so bad. They just tied me up basically. They were in Sudan. Solomon was saying the attack actually happened close to where you guys were?”

She looked at Solomon. “I don’t know, if he says so.”

“It was.”

“It was,” she relayed to Tanith. “In case you didn’t get it the other two times.”

“I’m glad to know, I was really worried I’d never find out.”

“Bet you were,” she nodded before taking a sip of her strawberry smoothie and then offering the straw to Nadia who took a sip, who then took it, popped the lid, dipped a finger in and put the little bit of smoothie up to Laila’s face. She looked at it a moment before opening her mouth and shallowed Nadia’s entire finger into her mouth. “Damn Laila,” she said without meaning to. “Calm down.”

There was some laughing and Laila made a fuss over getting more smoothie which Nadia gave her.

“She’s eight months old now,” Nadia smiled. “You missed her having her first real foods. We took a bunch of photos and videos though.”

“Good,” she smiled. “I’ll be there for other things.”

“Of course,” Nadia smiled, resting her head back on Valkyrie. “Did you and Skulduggery make up?”

“We spoke,” she said simply.

“Well, that’s good,” Nadia replied. “How did all the stuff go? The operation and… stuff?”

“It was fine. It was done as quickly as we could,” she said with a sigh. “I hated the food. It was gross. We had fish puree.”

“Fish stew,” Solomon chipped in.

“Fire puree, it was just whipped fish flesh, it was disgusting, and I hated it and they served it like ten times.”

“Twice.”

“And everything was communal, so it was weird. And they don’t do chemicals or anything so we just had water to clean with and the water tasted so gross it made me feel physically sick.”

“You were ill the entire time we stayed there.”

“Yeah, no, I threw up at least thirty times in the last two months, it was bad,” she admitted. “I never want to go back.”

“You will not ever be able to go back, it is as good as a sacred place to Necromancers,” Solomon told her.

“What happened?” Skulduggery asked.

“No one told you?” Valkyrie asked, looking around the room. After everyone shook their heads, she thought about it a moment but came up blank and chose to just tell him. “I had to have a Magic Keeping Ritual to bind my magic because the Spiders have this thing that steals people’s magic and we thought I might have Pure Magic. It turns out I don’t, but it is pretty close and I can do a shit ton more stuff than I thought I could do, so we decided to do it anyway because by then it was almost certain someone would let something slip that I may have had _Pure_ Magic and it was safer to just not let The Torment have it. Even though it isn’t Pure.”

“Valkyrie has the strange ability,” Solomon took over, “to essentially sponge other people’s magic. She can touch their souls, it seems, and take the information on how to perform and use that person’s magic at the level that person is at. For instance, she did it to me and was fully capable of doing every advanced Necromancy I have ever learnt, things I know she didn’t know before her magic locked onto this. She can do it to other people also. However, after some time, she loses the information and abilities and goes back to how she is normally.”

“Temporary intelligence.”

“Quite.”

“That’s cool,” Tanith grinned. “We could walk on ceilings together.”

“Yeah for a minute and then I’ll fall on my head!” She exclaimed with a frown. “I’ll die!”

“Naa, you can do a sick flip down to the floor, you’ll be fine.”

Valkyrie raised her eyebrows in agreeance.

“That’s quite a big Ritual,” Skulduggery said, keeping the conversation on track. He was obviously trying not to show that he didn’t approve.

Valkyrie snorted a laugh and rubbed her eyes. “You don’t have to pretend to like it. Solomon hated it too. So did everyone to a degree. But it had to be done. As soon as any of us uttered the idea I might have Pure Magic it was too late. I had to protect myself.”

“Yes, but there are side effects.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I sorted out as much as I can. Don’t worry about it, okay?” After a moment, he nodded and settled back so she could rest her head on him again. “Did you notice I’m taller than you now?”

“Yes, I did.”

“You are smol. But not as smol as Tanith, the smolest of us all,” she smiled.

“Laila’s the smallest,” Tanith said, rolling her eyes.

“Laila doesn’t count, she’s a baby. You’re the smolest and there’s nothing you can ever do about it.”

“I can wear platform heels and run in them. I’d like to see you try.”

She let out a laugh. “Imagine if I learnt to run in platform heels and wore them everywhere, I’d be a giant! I could be seven foot!”

Nadia laughed and pulled herself from Valkyrie’s arms, standing up and taking Laila with her. “Come on, you need sleep, Val. You sound delirious.”

“Oh, come on, me in platform heels is hilarious.”

“Yes, it is, but you’re practically slurring your words.”

“You’re no fun. I’ve slept like three hours in five days, that’s plenty.”

“I hope not,” she said disapprovingly.

“What you gonna do about it?” Valkyrie teased.

Nadia almost laughed but watched Solomon as he sat himself in Valkyrie’s place besides Skulduggery, although he sat properly and not over Skulduggery. Skulduggery looked at Solomon as he sat. Solomon turned to him and said, “You’re an idiot,” then leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Don’t do that again.”

Valkyrie looked at Nadia and gave her a smirk and they left the room quickly after throwing Laila at Anton.

“He sounds like a tween tv show,” she giggled on the landing. “He should have slapped Skul first, to make it complete.”

Nadia covered her mouth to keep from laughing too loudly. “Shut up, they’re being cute.”

“They’re cringy,” she grinned.

“Yeah, but it’s adorable.”


	203. Militsa calls

**Chapter 203**

It took some time to catch Skulduggery up on everything that had happened in the almost nine months he had been gone. He’d had two weeks with his brothers to get most of it, but Valkyrie quickly realised they had missed out some key information and had to go back over it for him again.

Valkyrie and Nadia took time to slip away a few times. Once they stayed at Solomon’s while everyone slept at Corrival’s, as her family had been prior to her and Solomon returning to Ireland, and another time they rented a hotel room as Skulduggery and Solomon wanted Solomon’s house. It was a weird game of wanting alone time to very obviously have serious conversations or have sex, but no one would verbally say why they were leaving, just that they were going to “check-up” on the house. Dexter and Saracen would go to Dexter’s old apartment in Dublin on occasion. Which were most nights.

It wasn’t any of their faults for being obvious. Corrival forbid “ye old hanky-panky” from his house, Dexter had told her with a casual shrug. It was also comforting to have big discussions as a couple without anyone else around to interrupt or overhear, and the same went for more intimate moments. Plus, no one wanted to pretend they were working or sleeping if there was an emergency so they could help, so it was a useful and unsaid code between them.

The rest of the time they were either sleeping or, most importantly, working.

“So Samuel Grievers has been incarcerated?” Skulduggery confirmed.

“Yes, through the American Sanctuary, straight to one of their strongest and most hidden prisons. I’d give it at least a few years before we hear his name again, assuming he has as much influence as it’s always been rumoured,” Meritorious explained. “He’s one of those that should be in a world-owned prison, likely Coldheart.”

“My thoughts exactly,” Skulduggery nodded.

“We have to pick our battles,” Valkyrie said quickly. “Myra’s also in prison.”

“Yes, she’ll die there,” Corrival said bluntly. “It may help send a message that we’re not taking this lightly, all the things the Spiders are doing. Hopefully it’ll discourage other young, impressionably lives from joining them.”

“Perhaps,” Valkyrie agreed. “So whereabouts are we? Did any of the Wild Brothers get caught when they blew up Tanith and Saracen?”

“No, they all got away, and killed some good operatives,” Elder Feie said darkly. “We did confirm they were the same people that took Pleasant hostage and broke into the English Sanctuary when you attempted to get to the God Killer Sword, however. Their leader runs under the name Pippin Black, born in Africa although we don’t know where, but seems to have been brought up in England. Has never been seen on camera and wasn’t at the English Sanctuary during that debacle, sending someone else in his place. His righthand person was born Welsh, named Merrik Swifthand, is the smallest person of the group, the only non-man to ever be in the group as far as we know, and in the top five. They are the brains behind much of the group and they’re on record for suspicion of killing multiple people and performing some high value heists. They were never caught, however. The other three seem to be purely brawn and are not instrumental to Black or Swifthand, named Juandré Opperman and Lemae Van Wyk, both Elementals, and Wikus De Villiers, an Adept seemingly proficient in invisibility, although we can’t be certain for obvious reasons.”

“They don’t seem to be horribly tough magic wise,” Valkyrie said. “The Diablery where significantly stronger and we took them down.”

“Always the optimist,” Skulduggery complimented unnecessarily. He’d been doing that randomly. “These people seem to be less aggressive and more dependent on weapons and their ability to escape. A different brand of mercenaries.”

“Gross.”

“Quite.”

“What’s the chance of us tracking them? If we could take out some of the Spiders players before they can begin openly fighting, that would be useful.”

“Unlikely, I’ve been on their trail since I returned to Ireland and haven’t heard a single thing, and neither has China. She did dig up some dirt on Stolen but he seems to have been silent for a long time.”

“Working on the Magicae Furem Device, no doubt.”

“That worries me,” Corrival said, sitting back in his chair. “We have no idea where the Spiders are despite the rumours they’ve all been travelling into Ireland, have no way to identify them when they aren’t using magic, they have the God Killer Sword, and we know they have talented engineers such as Stolen, who we know is good working with signals, an inventor and a competent thief, as well as possibly an assassin. Whatever he’s doing to the Magicae Furem Device, I would guess it’s going to be significantly more powerful than the Necromancer’s theorised.”

“What should we expect from it then?” Valkyrie asked.

He shrugged. “No idea. There’s no way to until it comes out and is used. At minimum, we believe it strips the victim of their magic and can somehow transfer the power to a selected person. Whether it’s just raw power or abilities, or how it works exactly, we cannot be sure. We have some limited information at the grace of the Necromancers, but it’s purely theory based on images and concepts. Most researchers seemed to have only glimpsed the _box_ the Device is in once in their lives. I feel that makes the research rather useless.”

“Potentially, but it does all come from some of their top people, and Necromancers are amazing scholars if nothing else,” Skulduggery added.

They decided to leave their meeting there and Valkyrie and Skulduggery split up – Skulduggery to continue with the still rising number of crimes occurring all over the country, and Valkyrie to Corrival’s mansion.

She’d already completed her triple shift. The Dead Men were all working shifts to cope with their raising workload. She’d had all day yesterday, all night and all of that day, only to be pulled into a meeting at the end of it. It had been two weeks of working and she was starting to get burnt out.

“So fucking tired,” she groaned, throwing the front door open.

“Val!” Nadia called.

Smiling instinctively, Valkyrie went through to the parlour where Nadia was minding Laila. She was now almost fully weaned, although Tanith had told her she hadn’t particularly wanted to stop breastfeeding, but she had too much on her plate to continue. It allowed for Nadia to be a fulltime babysitter so her mother could get back to work full time. “Enjoying baby duty?”

“Obviously,” Nadia smirked. Laila was sitting against the back of the sofa and staring at the television in a daze. “There’s leftovers in the kitchen.”

Not wasting her energy on replying, Valkyrie went through and found the chicken pasta and heated it up quickly before coming back. She set it on the table and went upstairs to shower, knowing it would end up cold but too strained to bother with anything else, and came back in her pyjamas.

“Where’s Tanith and Ghastly?”

“They’ll be back sometime tonight, I think,” Nadia replied, handing the re-warmed up plate to Valkyrie. Valkyrie thanked her. “Ghastly was here last night looking after her. He does nights, Tanith does days. And I do as much as I can.”

“You’re amazing,” she whispered before kissing her roughly.

Nadia moaned and pulled away. “That is not appropriate.”

“She’s a baby, she doesn’t understand.”

“I don’t care, it’s weird,” Nadia said with a roll of her eyes.

They sat in companionable silence for a while, Valkyrie eating her food and Laila dropping off to sleep and taken to bed by Nadia. Sometime later, after falling asleep on the sofa, Valkyrie felt her phone buzz and it roused her back awake.

“Ehh what?” She grumbled sleepily.

“Oh, um, Valkyrie?” A female voice asked on the other side. She didn’t recognise it.

“Yeah? Who is this?” She asked, sitting up and blinking quickly. The television had been turned off and someone had put a blanket over her.

“This is Militsa Gnosis. The Necromancer. I know you never said about calling you and stuff but something bad’s going on and I didn’t know who else to talk to.”

“Oh, Militsa!” She said, suddenly awake. “I didn’t expect you to call. How are you? What’s happening?”

“I’m alright thank you. Well, no, not really. It’s kind of complicated. I don’t know if you heard, but a lot of Necromancers in Australia are going missing and it’s been happening for a few weeks now, but the Sanctuary doesn’t want to investigate because they say it’s a Necromancer problem, but we can’t do anything about it. I know you’re probably busy, but maybe you could ask if someone could help us?” Militsa said it all very quickly with barely taking a breath and it took a moment for Valkyrie’s brain to catch up with the sounds she heard coming from the phone.

“Yes, yeah, sure, let me call Skulduggery and we’ll see about coming over and helping. I mean, I might not be able to, because, you know, our country is on the brink of war, but I can see,” she said, going to get some coffee. “Would you be able to meet us somewhere? At the least, I can get you out of Australia, put you in a safe house.”

“Do you think it’s that serious?”

“Oh yeah,” she said as if it was the most normal thing in the world. It didn’t feel that way on the inside. “Whole worlds about to go to shit, Mil. It’ll be mostly Ireland at first, but Australia is a Cradle country as well. I doubt it’ll be long until they get to you.”

“That doesn’t sound good.”

“Nope,” she said. “Let me make some calls and I’ll get back to you, okay?”

“Okay. Thank you, I really appreciate this. Are you doing alright?”

“Yeah, I’m okay, very overworked is all.”

They had a few more pleasantries and then finished the call.

“So,” Nadia said from behind her and Valkyrie screamed and dropped her mug in the sink.

“Fucking hell, Nadia!” Valkyrie shouted. “Since when were you a ghost?”

She snorted a laugh. “Was that your ex?”

Valkyrie hesitated for a moment, and then laughed. “I mean, we didn’t date, but yes, it was Militsa. Apparently a lot of Necromancers are going missing and the Sanctuary refuses to do anything about it. So, she called me. Is that… is that okay with you?”

“What? Of course, go help her,” she shrugged. “Did you think I’d get jealous?”

“No, but I’ve been wrong before,” she smiled, kissing her gently. Naida rolled her eyes and hugged her tightly.

A quick call to Skulduggery and he was interested enough to decide it was worth a few hours of their time to see if they could get anywhere with it, but warned they’d likely not get to the bottom of it with their time constraints.

It was enough though, and Valkyrie had caught a few hours’ sleep, so she got her work clothes on and made out with Nadia until Skulduggery got to Corrival’s and Fletcher popped in. He looked incredibly frazzled, said something about Peregrine refusing to help with the war efforts, leaving it all to him, and slapped a hand on their arms. They popped into Australia and he was gone again before the heat had even washed over her.

“He seems stressed,” Skulduggery quipped, and began walking.


	204. The new case

**Chapter 204**

“She said she’d be out in a moment,” Valkyrie said, putting her phone in her pocket. She had on her protective jacket, a dark green one with about twenty pockets for various things, and some midnight blue protective trousers that looked fairly similar to jeans, at least when not up close. Her work boots, brown, finished the look nicely, and her white top had been approved by Nadia. Ghastly had been working on making her some casual looks to add to her list of protective outfits, and she appreciated the effort as it made her feel as if she were a normal young woman going out instead of constantly on the job. It made being on permanent call a lot nicer.

“Considering how deep these caves go, I expect she’ll be more than a moment,” Skulduggery groused. He had on the same suit he’d been wearing for the last four days. It had only a small cut in the hem of the waistcoat and his shirt had been slashed open, however his suit jacket hid that. Valkyrie wasn’t sure where his hat was and didn’t comment on it. “Have you heard from Saracen recently?”

“No, but I saw Dexter two days ago. Or three. I can’t remember,” she said, looking at the view. “It’s beautiful here.”

“It is,” he agreed, pulling out his phone to check the time.

Valkyrie looked out over the cliff edge, admiring the vast desert around them. It was nearly thirty degrees at two-thirty in the afternoon. “I always thought deserts would be really hot and dry. But there’s foliage and life.”

“A desert merely needs to have little rain to be considered a desert,” Skulduggery told her.

“I know that,” she said. He went quiet and she began to feel guilty for being short with him. “I just assumed there wouldn’t be so many plants. Because of the lack of rain.”

“Life is rather impressive,” he said quietly.

She looked at the dusty ground and didn’t say anything for a few moments. “I’m sorry.”

“Whatever for?” He asked, looking at her.

She glanced at him but looked back down, shoving her hands into her jacket pockets. “For being rude.”

“If I thought you had been rude, I would have told you,” he said with a shrug. “There’s no need to apologise. Especially when we’re all feeling rather snappish at the moment.”

She shrugged this time. “Well yeah. But I’m still sorry. I don’t want it to seem like I’m mad at you when you’re trying to make things better. Because I’m not mad at you, I’m really glad you’re trying, and I’m grateful for it. So I just wanted to say I was sorry so you don’t think differently.”

He tilted his head to show his smile. “Thank you for clarifying Valkyrie. But know that I already understand your appreciation so you don’t need to fret.”

She kicked the dirt awkwardly. “I wasn’t fretting.”

“Of course.”

“Just didn’t want to fuck it up.”

“You may have to work on your language. I have noticed you’ve begun to swear a lot more recently. It’s not good for the baby.”

“Yeah, I know,” she said, trying not to sound too grumpy about it. There was a silence and she chose to change the subject. “I wonder why Mil’s here. She told me she had an apprenticeship with the Sanctuary.”

“The Northern Australian Sanctuary is not particularly far from here,” Skulduggery said, “however it is a rather small branch. From what I gather, it’s considered a bit of an outpost and people only work there for the potential benefit of transferring to one of the larger Sanctuaries. For Miss Gnosis, it is also a useful location for her continuing her Necromancy studies I expect.”

“She is quite studious,” Valkyrie commented. “She wanted to be a teacher. I expected her to live in a city or something. She made it sound like she wouldn’t be with a Temple anymore.”

He shrugged. “Perhaps it’s a matter of convenience.”

They heard feet patting their way towards them and turned to the three large, flat rocks precariously balanced in the vague shape of a wonky triangle, leaving only enough space on one side for a person to materialise and step out of. It was harnessing magic, Valkyrie was sure, just as Militsa’s skin surely was as she was no longer the epitome of the pale, freckled, redheaded, stereotypical Scot. She’d browned in the sun to a dark olive and her freckles had reacted by coming out even more than before, covering every inch of skin in little dots. Her hair had bleached lighter in the sun and was almost afro-like in nature, holding its frizzy form around her head through some fight against natural gravity. The combination of orange-ish red hair, combined with its volume, and coupled with her darker skin and freckles made her appear like a whole other person with an ethnicity Valkyrie wouldn’t be able to name. She was, in a word, stunning.

“Oh wow,” Valkyrie said without meaning to, getting an immediate laugh out of Militsa. “What happened to your hair?”

“It doesn’t like the heat,” she grinned, holding her arms open.

Valkyrie met her in the middle and wrapped her in a hug, her face getting enveloped by the curls. “It’s good to see you, I didn’t expect you to call.”

“I know, things have been a bit wild,” Militsa said, glancing at Skulduggery before looking back up at Valkyrie. “Have you grown? I feel like you’ve grown. And I like your new haircut.”

“Oh thanks, I hate it,” Valkyrie nodded. “How have you been? Apart from the, you know, disappearances.”

“I’ve been good, I’ve got my apprenticeship still in Relations, it’s been really good. I mean, it’s not exactly what I want, but it works. I’m saving all my money so I can apply to university to be a teacher soon, I think I’ll be able to in the next year or so.”

“That’s good to hear,” she nodded.

“How have you been? Did you, you know…? I mean, I heard some rumours, but I wasn’t sure…”

“You mean Nadia? Yeah, we were able to meet again and we’re together. We’re engaged, actually,” she said, before feeling her face get red.

“Ah, that’s so sweet!” Militsa smiled. Valkyrie didn’t see a trace of jealousy or lie. “Congratulations, how did it happen?”

“While I’m all for you two ladies catch up,” Skulduggery interrupted before Valkyrie could begin, “we do need to begin our investigation.”

“Oh, sure,” Militsa nodded. “Sorry, I just got a bit carried away. Um, I would invite you in, but no one’s allowed.”

“That’s quite alright, I wasn’t expecting it. What can you tell us?”

“Well, I know at least fifteen people are missing, maybe more,” Militsa said, her face becoming serious. “It’s hard to know because some of the people live in Temple’s and others don’t. I know two of them were recluses too, so if more of our scholars living alone are gone, it’s almost impossible to find out.”

“I see. Tell me the circumstances. Walk with us.”

“Well,” she began as they made their way to the edge of the cliff, “I didn’t notice anyone talking until a few weeks ago–”

“How many weeks exactly?”

“Four weeks ago, I think. It was then that I overheard some Clerics in the library whispering to each other and I listened in. They were talking about how they were sure one of the reclusive scholars I mentioned was ‘ _gone_ ’ with ‘ _the others_ ’. Obviously, I got concerned and I listened some more.” They all jumped off the edge and used their own magic to land safely before Militsa continued to talk. “They were arguing about where all these people had gone and from what I put together, about ten people were missing at that point, and only one of the reclusive scholars. They were arguing over who could have done it and were talking about Witches and vampires, and then one of the Clerics suggested it was the Sanctuary trying to slowly kill us off. The others thought it was unlikely, but they started talking about how the Sanctuary had already outright refused to help find out who’s doing this because it’s only a Necromancer problem, so they don’t have to help. They left at that point but I’ve been listening out and more people are talking now. In the last four weeks, four more regular people have gone missing, including a fifteen year old, and the second reclusive scholar on top of that. And both of those scholars were easy to reach, that’s the only reason we know. All the recluses could be gone and we just don’t know about it.”

“I am concerned the Sanctuary is refusing assistance in light of a child going missing,” Skulduggery said, walking quickly the way they’d come towards the rented car they’d abandoned on the side of the dirt road. “Do you know whereabouts the disappearances have taken place?”

“Not exactly, but I do know nine of the ones we know about happened in Alice Springs. Obviously the recluses were somewhere private that I’m not allowed to know, and as far as I know, no one knows when or where exactly the other four were taken or killed. We’re only assuming they’re dead because we don’t know what someone would want with that many hostages. We haven’t had any ransom threats from what I’ve overheard, but that isn’t something the Clerics would want to share with anyone lower down.”

“I understand. I think it would be best to begin our search in Alice Springs,” he said, pulling out his phone. “Luckily, I happened to know of a good Sensitive that may be able to help us.”

Militsa nodded and they continued in silence, letting Skulduggery attempt to call his contact and, when they failed to pick up, send some messages. He did check that Militsa was happy to help them, and she was, and Valkyrie was privately happy as she wanted to catch up with her. Almost half an hours later, they made it to the car and got it. Valkyrie could feel the sweat all over but Militsa didn’t seem bothered, clearly used to the sun.

After sitting in the back of the little car together, Skulduggery set the air conditioning to high, as per Valkyrie’s instructions, and he began driving.

“Well,” Militsa said with a small smile. “Will you tell me all your news now?”

Valkyrie laughed quietly, not wanting to break Skulduggery from his musings. “It was all very sudden I guess. I literally ran into her at a pizza place before summer and we immediately got back together and it was a bit slow at first but we worked everything out. Honestly, it feels as if we were never apart most of the time. I ended up getting injured and had some temporary memory loss for a while.”

“No!”

“Yeah, it was pretty bad. And Tanith and Ghastly broke up while I was in a coma too. Or maybe that was when I was awake but not myself? I forget exactly, but I wasn’t me, you know? Anyway, Nadia stood by me the whole time and didn’t leave my side. She did almost everything for me, she left home and refused to move countries with her family to be with me even though no one could be sure I’d ever be the same again. She became my carer, I suppose, in the last few days I had memory loss and had to help me with everything. She was amazing.”

“That’s so sweet, she obviously loves you a lot,” Militsa said with a small smile.

“For sure. Well, not long later, I quit my job at the Sanctuary, Tanith had her baby, and she is so cute by the way. I’m her godmother, but not in a Christian way. We had to go to America for some Dead Man work and we had a really scary moment where I was held captive and tortured, the baby got kidnapped and so did Nadia. They were selling Nadia to someone horrible, we don’t even know who exactly, and the baby was almost killed and the whole thing was just a mess and a half. We all got out alive and alright, but it was just a massive shock and I decided not to wait anymore and to just ask her to marry me.”

“Did you do it on the spot?” Militsa grinned excitedly.

“No, no, I put a _bit_ of planning into it. I got the ring immediately, though only because I happened on the right one when I went out the first time, then took her to New York for her birthday week, and on her birthday I tricked her with a car so she’d think that was her big present and wouldn’t suspect anything else was going to happen, and took her to the Natural History Museum. She’d told me for years it was her dream to go there, so we spent the day and then I got her into a room alone with a view over the city, and everywhere was white with snow, and I asked her. She screamed and said yes.”

“Aww, that’s so romantic! I can’t believe you’re going to get married, you’re younger than me and everything. Do you have a dress yet?”

“No, Nadia’s doing some light planning but we’re keeping it fairly quiet as we haven’t told her family yet. They might find out, and we’re okay with it, but we’re not doing any wedding stuff until after the war and Nadia’s able to reunite with her family. It’ll be a several year engagement I expect, assuming this war doesn’t take years like the last.”

“But it might not be a war though. There’s got to still be a chance this can be talked out,” Militsa suggested questioningly.

Valkyrie shrugged, her face falling slightly. “I doubt it. Or, really, my family doubts it. They say its tensions from the last war doubling with greed from non-Cradle countries, alongside blatant unwillingness to admit there could be a legitimate threat of war from the Children of the Spiders. They’d rather believe Ireland’s just incapable of looking after itself and then attempt to take it forcefully in the name of stopping us hurting ourselves than admit they might need to help us against the Spiders without any benefits for themselves. It’s a lot of factors at once and everything we do gets twisted by them into making us look worse.”

“It’s really going to happen then,” she stated quietly.

“I think so, Mil,” Valkyrie said with a kind smile, putting a hand over Militsa’s. “Do you think you’ll be safe at the Temple?”

“I don’t know. I guess it depends on who’s taking the Necromancers,” she said fairly matter of fact. “If it’s the Sanctuary, I guess I might try and leave the country, maybe pose as a mortal and go to University there. It’ll be an adjustment, and my education won’t be worth much, but I guess I could do something like maths or a language, something that doesn’t involve magic so it’ll still be transferable. It would keep me out of any fighting. But I don’t really have those types of resources.”

“I would offer to help but if you’re seen getting too much help from us, it could bring you unnecessary attention.”

She waved a hand. “Don’t worry about that. I knew before I called you it would bring me problems. You and Skulduggery Pleasant sort of attract trouble, don’t you know.”

“Yeah, we’re good like that,” Valkyrie smiled. “We’ll help as much as we can. Maybe even crack the case.”

“Hmm, that would be good. Maybe I’ll learn something exciting along the way.”


	205. *Sweats nervously*

**Chapter 205**

Valkyrie watched as Militsa grimaced at the rundown apartment building and stepped out of the car and into the heat. The temperature wasn’t as bad in the city as it had been in the desert, but when they stepped through the sliding doors to be faced with a sign stating the air conditioning unit was out of order, they both sighed.

“This is going to be horrible,” Valkyrie muttered, feeling the sweat almost immediately. “It’s like, ten times hotter in here!”

“Maybe the psychic has a separate, plug-in AC,” Militsa suggested hopefully, stepping aside so Skulduggery could take the lead up the stairs. “At least they picked up the phone.”

“Yes, we’d be in trouble if we didn’t know where she lived,” Skulduggery said, starting up the stairs.

“Isn’t there a lift?” Valkyrie said, following him up.

“It’s also out of order. Didn’t you look?”

Valkyrie groaned and followed him up, heaving lungful’s of stiflingly hot air and feeling her clothes sticking to her sweaty skin. She didn’t even hold her jacket properly, letting it drag over the dusty floor up to the fifth floor where it was so hot she could almost feel herself start to panic that she’d die, much like how she would if she were trapped in a space too small.

Skulduggery, utterly unaffected, knocked smartly on the door to apartment nine. Militsa joined them up the stairs a moment later, obviously hot and bothered herself but not nearly to the same extreme.

The door was answered but not by who they expected – a young boy, perhaps six years of age, in a loose blue vest and baggy green shorts. He opened it wide, looking at Skulduggery facade covered face and then to the young women.

“Ah, hello,” Skulduggery said to him. “I don’t support your mother is home?”

He said nothing, just stood and watched Skulduggery’s face. From inside, a woman called, “Jackson, did you open the front door? How many times have I – oh, Mr Pleasant!” The woman pulled the door open wider. “I didn’t expect you so soon. Come in, please. Sorry the house is such a mess, I have two kids these days, and the AC’s been out all week.”

Their home was as hot as outside, no breeze or private air conditioning unit to speak of. It was something of a mess but seemed to have some order. The small kitchen to the left had one clean side of surface where the lady obviously cooked, and the other side was stacked with dishes and rows of baby bottles and a tin of formula for a one year old baby. The dining area was a mess with dried and dropped food on the chairs and floor, but it was limited to only that area. The living room beyond had toys scattered around but it was an obviously cleaned and well-loved area for the woman and her children.

“We’re sorry for intruding. I just had to talk to you about an emergency case and we need a good Sensitive’s help,” Skulduggery said pleasantly. “Would we be able to talk in private?”

“I’m not sure that’s really possible,” she said, putting a hand on her sons head as he leaned into her, still looking at Skulduggery’s face with his big eyes, “but I’ll try my best. Honey, can you go to your room for a moment? I’ll tell you when to come back out.”

The child was not impressed and tried putting on a tantrum to get his way but his mother picked him up and put him in there, telling him to play with his toys until she let him out. They politely pretended to not hear him throw something soft at the door when she closed it.

“Sorry about that,” she said. “Oh, I’m Kes by the way.” She shook Valkyrie and Militsa’s hands. “You must be Valkyrie Cain.”

“I am, and this is my friend, Militsa Gnosis. Have you heard of the recent Necromancer disappearances?”

She looked shocked. “No, I haven’t. Although, I don’t have much to do with the magical world at the moment. It’s just safer for my kids, with the unrest and such. Um, come sit on the settee, just throw those toys on the floor, they won’t break. Goodness knows my kids do!”

They all settled on the sofa, Militsa and Skulduggery looking incredibly put together compared to the exhausted Kes and melting Valkyrie. “We wanted to know if you’d had any visions of the kidnappings,” Skulduggery said, “or if we’d be able to help induce one.”

“You can certainly try. I haven’t had anything recently, but you know how that is,” she said. She picked a hair band off the sofa and began wrangling her tight curls into a bun on top of her head. “Have you ever induced a vision before, Valkyrie?”

“No, I haven’t,” she replied.

“Well, for me, I have to lie down and you tell me everything you know about the case and then I’ll need all three of you to touch my skin. My magic will feel your want to find answers and I’m sometimes able to draw out a vision from the strength of other people’s wills.”

“Cool,” she nodded, standing so Kes could lie down. They waited for Kes to meditate, as she instructed, and then Skulduggery began to explain everything Militsa had told them, and then Militsa added some small detailed they hadn’t previously known, such as what Temple’s the missing people usually resided at and other such information. A small frown appeared on Kes’ brow as she dove deeper with her magic and when she held her hand palm up they all gently pressed their hands to her skin, thinking carefully of how much they wanted to find the Necromancers and know what happened to them.

Kes muttered occasionally but was mostly quiet, until all of a sudden, she held her breath. Valkyrie didn’t notice for a moment, but then Militsa nudged her roughly and Valkyrie caught on.

“No,” Skulduggery whispered. “Don’t distract her. She’s having a vision.”

Valkyrie and Militsa watched wide eyed as Kes lay on the sofa, lipped pressed together tightly. After a moment, Militsa looked away and closed her eyes. Valkyrie followed suit, thinking even more of how she wished to help so they Kes might have a better vision. She didn’t know if that was how it worked, but she hoped so.

Not many seconds later, Kes drew in a heaving breath and coughed, sitting up quickly and pushing them away. Valkyrie rushed to the kitchen and grabbed a clean glass, filling it was water from the fridge tap. She took it to Kes who thanked her between coughs and stood back.

“Did it work?” Militsa asked when Kes finally caught her breath enough to take a sip of water.

“Yep, I saw something. It wasn’t much, just flashes, but it might help you,” she said, setting it down on the tile floor at her feet. “I didn’t feel any magic from you Valkyrie. Did you not participate?”

Valkyrie frowned for a moment before she realised what had happened. The Magic Keeping Ritual. She had already forgotten that her magic couldn’t be transferred or touched by another person or object, meaning she couldn’t help in a situation like this one. She struggled to think of an excuse. “Oh, sorry, I guess my, er, hand slipped.”

The dark-skinned woman paused for a moment and then gave her an unbelieving look only a mother could pull off. “You slipped?”

“I’m very sweaty.”

She paused again. “Right. Sure. Anyway, the vision Skulduggery.” She turned her entire body away from Valkyrie to address only the skeleton. “I saw four sections. The first was of a dark room, cut into natural rock. It had a desk, chest of drawers, chair, bed and a walking cane made of some reddish wood with some Signals drawn into the sides of it. The room had no occupant or window. I think it was a still vision of the present time. The second section was of some cliffside next to a river. There were shadows of three people, but I did not see them. It was also a still image of what I think is the current time, or perhaps within the next few minutes. The next two are more interesting. I saw a Lemon Flowered Gum tree. Just one, in a very treed in area, with a red wood shack. I had the suggestion of Wiluna, it’s a gold-mining town in Western Australia. And the last was of the oldest Faceless Church in the country. Funnily, not far from Wiluna. I had no details to it, other than it was dark and both took place some time tonight.”

“That’s actually very helpful,” Skulduggery said with a nod. Kes immediately grinned. “Thank you for your time Miss Gazali.”

“It’s Mrs now, but that’s alright. It’s nice to be helpful,” she smiled. A baby started to cry in another room and she rolled her eyes. “I’ll let you out before I release the monster.”

Valkyrie smiled, trying not to appear any more like a weirdo than she already had, following Skulduggery and Militsa out of the boiling apartment. They didn’t speak until they were in the car again.

“Right, so what the hell does any of that mean?” She asked.

“Well, I expect the first vision of the empty room is either a place our kidnapped Necromancer’s are being taken,” Skulduggery began as he turned the car on to start the air conditioning back up, “or it’s the bedroom of a person that’s been taken.”

“I think it’s someone that’s been taken,” Militsa said immediately. “I recognised the cane she said. I think that might have been Cleric Daku, he came and taught once a few years ago at the Temple I’m at and people still talk about him all the time.”

“I am more on the side of it being a vision of another person taken,” Skulduggery agreed with a nod. “Perhaps that was the place he was taken from. If we visited, we could find some clues. The second vision I don’t think we’ll be able to do anything about, as we don’t have enough details and it just isn’t very useful.” Valkyrie nodded. “The third with the tree could mean something, perhaps another kidnapping or murder. We should try and be there by tonight to prevent it. And the last of the Faceless Temple.”

“It’s worrying.”

“Very. But we shouldn’t jump to conclusions. Although it would be unusual for a Necromancer to be invested in the Faceless religion, it isn’t impossible. Or perhaps our criminal or criminals intend to throw us off the scent with a different victim. We’ll be visiting the Church soon.”

“Sounds good to me. How do you intend to find this singular tree and hut combination then?” She asked with a raised eyebrow into the mirror.

Skulduggery looked back at her, raising his fake one in return. “By going into the town and asking.”

She rolled her eyes. “Of course you are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feel free to leave me comments, by the way, I love hearing from you!
> 
> And thank you all for the kudos, you're very kind! :)


	206. Lemon Cake

**Chapter 206**

“This may be one of the most dumbass things he’s ever done,” Valkyrie said with an unintentionally twisted smile. “Like, how far does he actually think he’ll get just asking people about a hut with a tree? We’re in the middle of literally nowhere. There aren’t even any trees, how far back would we have to go to find it?”

“To be fair, I’ve never heard of a Lemon Flowered Gum tree,” Militsa said, hands behind her back and bouncing up and down on her tiptoes. “Maybe it’s rare and rememberable.”

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow at her. “And you know a lot of tree names?”

She cracked a smile. “No, not really.”

“That’s what I thought. I really doubt he’s going to find much like this. We’re better off just going straight to the Faceless Church and making sure we’re not late. Maybe scope the area a bit before it gets dark and all the demons come out.”

Militsa just shrugged, looked around the almost deserted, dusty street as if something more exciting might come along. “What are we going to do then?”

“I don’t know. There isn’t much to do other than question people and Skulduggery said he had that covered, so…”

“Right.”

“Sorry. I’m sure you were hoping to see a bit more action than this.”

“What? No way, I’d rather leave the detecting to the detectives. I wouldn’t want to mess it all up or get in the way,” Militsa laughed. “We could, I don’t know, get a drink and sit around until he calls? Maybe gossip or something?”

“You don’t get to do much outside of the Sanctuary and Temple, do you?” She teased. “Let’s get something to eat, we have no idea when there’ll be time next.”

“I’d like that,” Militsa said with a sweet smile.

Valkyrie smiled back but felt as if Militsa might have been reading into the idea more than Valkyrie felt comfortable with. She tried to think of something to say about it as they began walking leisurely down the street but failed to think up anything that she could casually fit into conversation. She didn’t want to simply state that it wasn’t a date, as it was very clearly not a date and she felt she’d only sound horrible if she did that. So she chose to ignore it in hopes she was the one looking into it too much. Which she likely was, as she wasn’t entirely sure how to navigate being friends with someone she previous kissed while broken up with her now fiancée. This was just something they would have done while they were not-dating. They could still do the same as friends.

“You alright?” Militsa asked. “You’re nodding to yourself.”

“Yeah, I was just thinking. I doubt we’re going to have much luck finding a restaurant. This place is so tiny. It’s smaller than the village I grew up in.”

The young women walked in companionable silence, only muttering about where they might find something until they came upon a small café they gratefully took a seat at. They were told the selection of food and they were both quick to choose and order. Out of respect of their different places in life, Valkyrie made sure to pay for them both. If Skulduggery had taught her anything, it was to not allow a friend she knew perfectly well had less money than her to pay for their meal. Once in a while for it to not seem like charity, but certainly enough to not create a financial problem. Dexter had chimed in when he’d told her that and said it was called “not being a dick to a bro.” Anton had rolled his eyes so hard she had laughed herself into crying.

“Do you and Nadia get to go out often?” Militsa asked with a small smile.

Valkyrie looking down at her drink. “Not really. We’d love to go out every week but, my job gets in the way a lot. We still find time when we can though.”

“Yeah.”

“We had a date a few months ago that was really nice but then Nadia got arrested.” Militsa choked on her drink and coughed loudly, demanding Valkyrie tell her what happened. Through a grin, Valkyrie did. “Well, do you remember me telling you that I was once attacked at a swim competition? So we went on this really nice date…”

Valkyrie told her the story, finding herself laughing along with Militsa like they were long-time friends. Militsa was still giggling to herself when their food was served.

“I think me and Nadia would get on really well,” she said, gently touching her toasty to see how hot it was. They’d both chosen the same basic cheese and tomato with salad on the side. “She seems really funny.”

“Yeah, I’m not sure she really intended to do that,” Valkyrie smiled fondly. “But I’m not mad about it. I’m just glad the girls didn’t press charges or we’d have been in a bit more trouble. I think she’d like you too. She liked the idea of us going out to the movies one day with some friends.”

“That would be fun. I can’t say I’ve had much of a chance to make friends yet, but once I’m a teacher I’ll have a lot more time to do that.”

“Have you been to a cinema?” Valkyrie questioned around a mouthful of food.

“No, I haven’t had the chance. Walking into town is a bit of a trek so I try not to do it on my days off,” she said. “I don’t mind too much, I have loads of time in the future to do something like that. So, can I ask why the lady didn’t feel your, _you know_ , earlier?”

Valkyrie looked down at her plate without meaning to, knowing immediately that she’d given herself away. “You’re codewords really aren’t as good as you think they are. But to answer your question, I’m not allowed to talk about it.”

“Dead Man secret?”

“In a way. It could get people in a lot of trouble even though I did it for protection. I get the impression it’ll get out _eventually_ , but I would just like a bit more distance between what happened and now first. I’m sorry if it doesn’t make sense, but I don’t want someone to get in trouble for trying to protect me.”

“It’s fine, we don’t have to talk about it. I mean, you have that fancy new _discipline_ anyway, I’m sure whatever it is can just be blamed away on that,” Militsa suggested without skipping a beat. “I’ll change the subject. What’s your prediction for who’s responsible for the, err, case we’re on?”

Valkyrie laughed slightly over the phrasing of the question. “Oh my god. I honestly don’t know. It sounds as if there’s at least three people based on the description of the shadows, but that could mean anything really. I’m predicting a couple of people are involved, maybe even splitting up to cover the most ground, but considering they’ve gotten some fairly well versed fighters so far, I expect they’re working in a larger group to overrun their victims. I can’t help but think the Faceless Church being involved is suspect, but I have been consistently told how bad they are so who knows? Maybe they’re innocent victims?”

Militsa shared a smiled with her. “Yeah, they’re not really known for being that great. I’m sure some people are, but as a general… they’re kind of known or being insane. No offence to any Faceless Worshipers or anything.”

“I wouldn’t apologise. Well actually, maybe it’s better for you since you’re not much of a fighter. In case someone ever overheard and attacked you.”

“That feels like a generalisation.”

“I think it might be. I’m not that concerned about calling all Faceless Worshipers dickheads though,” Valkyrie smirked. “I don’t mind if I go to hell for it.”

Militsa quietly agreed into her mouthful of bread and cheese and they were quiet for a moment. Valkyrie felt her phone begin to buzz.

She checked it, thinking it may be Skulduggery, but it wasn’t. “It’s Nadia.”

“You can take it,” Militsa said quickly, taking another barely graceful mouthful of toastie.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to be rude.” Militsa waved her concerns away with a wave of her hand. Valkyrie answered the call where she was. “Hey honey, everything alright?”

“Yeah I’m fine,” Nadia’s voice said. She sounded small and lonely. “Are you busy?”

“No, no, just having a sandwich break while Skulduggery asks about a tip,” she said. “Are you sure you’re alright, you don’t sound it?”

“I just had a nightmare,” she said despondently. “I’ll be alright. I think Erskine gets home soon so I might ask him for a hug.”

“I’m sure he’d be happy to talk,” Valkyrie said. “Is there anything I can do? You can tell me about it.”

“I dreamt something awful happened and you died. It was stupid, I know it wasn’t real. It had an octopus involved, it was really weird. It doesn’t really matter, I know it didn’t happen and you’re alright, it just wasn’t very nice. Tell me how your case’s going. Is Militsa alright?”

“Well, you don’t need to worry about me, nothing bad’s going to happen to be any time soon. The case is fine so far, nothing to report really. Nadia asks how you are.”

“I’m good, thank you,” Militsa said with a smile.

“She says she’s good,” Valkyrie told Nadia. “What time is it with you?”

“Eight-thirty in the morning.”

“Do you have the baby today?”

“No, she’s with Tanith all day I think. I get the impression she’s rethinking the whole going to war thing. She was holding Laila like they hadn’t seen each other in weeks when I went to check on her.”

“It has to be hard to choose what to do,” Valkyrie said. “Um, I don’t want to be rude, but I’m sort of in the middle of a café.”

Nadia ended the call shortly after, leaving Valkyrie and Militsa to talk quietly and enjoy the last of their meal. Valkyrie texted Skulduggery a sarcastic message asking if he was any closer to finding their location as it would take them almost an hour to get to the Faceless Church, and he told her he had not so she suggested they order another drink and desserts.

“I heard some things happened. With Skulduggery,” Militsa said quietly, looking at the table.

Valkyrie sighed into her menu. “I assume you know everything.”

“I don’t know. I don’t hear much from my position at the Sanctuary. I heard about Cleric Wreath being kidnapped and Skulduggery not long after. I know he was made to blow up the Sanctuary. Things were a bit iffy on if he was actually forced or not but I’m assuming he didn’t since he’s free. And then I heard he did something the Sanctuary didn’t like and ran away and I didn’t really hear anything else for a long time until people started saying he was back.”

“Yeah well. That’s about everything,” she said darkly. “Did you hear about my injury?”

“Yeah, a little.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Valkyrie glanced at her and only saw sincerity in the gaze. It made Valkyrie sigh. “Not really. I’m alright now. I’m just being a little funny about it because me and Skulduggery are just trying to get back in the groove of things. I was really angry and bitter about how things went, and I had a lot of questions he wasn’t able to give me answers to that I liked. I punched one of his teeth out when we saw each other when he got back not long ago. Like, we’re not angry with each other or not talking. I’m actually really happy for him. For getting therapy I mean, and trying to better himself in more positive ways rather than holding onto his past anger so much. I guess it’s kind of awkward at the moment.”

“I can understand that.”

“It doesn’t help that there’s a lot of expectations and unknowns and we don’t really know each other’s boundaries properly anymore. We used to be really open and close but it’s harder now. And we’re both working so much on our own cases we can’t talk very much. We’ll get the hang of it and get through it, and we’ll fight together, and when this is over, and it will be over soon, he’ll go back to therapy for a while.”

“That’ll be good for him.”

“Yeah, three hundred years of trauma from when his wife and kid died. That can’t be healthy. It’s no wonder he had a breakdown and did what he did. It must have been horrible for him but sometimes I find it hard to find sympathy. A part of it feels like he brought it on himself. The current stuff that is not the… not the stuff with his family. The breakdown.”

“I can understand that,” nodded Militsa. “What are you going to get?”

“Lemon cake, I think. Feels apt.”

Militsa gave her a smile. “I was thinking the same. But the banana bread sounds good too. We don’t have that at the Temple.”

“How’s it been there? You didn’t really get on with anyone in Ireland.”

“It’s better than before but not what I want. I love my discipline but I don’t like the culture,” she said with a shrug. “But it’s not too bad. I’m older now and I have an outside job and it’s a smaller Temple so people aren’t as selective with their friends as with other Temple’s. I’ll be alright.”

“Okay. Well, you know I’m only a phone call away,” she said with a little concern.

“Thanks Val. You’re a good friend,” Militsa replied, giving her a small smile before putting her menu down. “I’m getting the banana bread. I think it has chocolate chips on top and I need chocolate.”

Valkyrie laughed. “Sure, of course. I’ll stick with the lemon. I hope Skulduggery doesn’t take too long though. I think he might just be being stubborn to prove a point and it’s a little annoying.”

“Yeah, but at least he’s not dragging us with him,” Militsa winked.


	207. Into the Unknown

**Chapter 207**

Valkyrie stood in front of the little red hut with its tin roof and rugged door. She couldn’t believe Skulduggery had actually found someone who had known what he was asking about in that tiny town, but he had.

“You realise whoever we’re looking for might find out because of all your talking?” She pointed out. Militsa was standing until the Lemon Flowered Gum tree and inspecting its leaves. She followed Skulduggery to peer into the front window with him. “And you realise this is probably just another home of someone that got kidnapped right?”

“I’m hoping for that,” he told her, taking a step to the left and pulling open the unlatched door.

“Did you bring any Rainbow Dust?” She asked.

“Of course.” He took it out of his inside jacket pocket, took a pinch to throw to the left, and another to the right.

“It’s showing something, but it’s faint,” Valkyrie noticed. She stuck her head in and looked more closely. “I don’t really know what it means.”

“It means no magic has been used in a while,” Skulduggery said quietly as he stepped in, “but I’d say it was a few days ago.”

“So I was right.”

“Perhaps,” he said stubbornly. “Let’s not rule anything out yet. Could you ask Miss Gnosis if she feels any death here please?”

Valkyrie went out and asked her.

“No, I don’t, which is strange,” she said as she held out her hand that had her Necromancy object, a gold band bracelet, out.

“No, it could be good,” Valkyrie said. “Oh actually… could you give me and Skulduggery a moment? It’s a Dead Men secret.”

“Sure,” she said with a shrug, turning and going to inspect some small bushes they’d passed on the way to the hut.

“Skul, what if they’re being collected,” she asked quietly, “by the Spiders.”

“Ah,” he considered, looking up and tilting his head slightly as he considered. “That would be a good theory. Why collect Necromancers from Australia if the Magicae Furem Device is in Ireland though?”

“Maybe it’s not? They might have made it so it collects magic and doesn’t need to transfer it immediately. No one knows how it works anyway, so it’s entirely possible. And there aren’t really any Necromancers in Ireland anymore. Maybe they want to cause enough problems in Australia that the Australian’s don’t want to send people to help us if the war breaks because they feel they have to fight problems here instead, since we’re normally allies. Or maybe they were hoping we wouldn’t notice and catch on.”

“All very good points. So, if we theorise the Device is in Ireland with The Torment, as it wouldn’t be like him to let his valued possessions go far, how do you think they would get their prisoners from here to Ireland without making it obvious?”

“Death threats? Necromancers are way scared of dying. Or, or,” she said excitedly, “they kidnapped them and attached bombs to them and shit! Like proper terrorist tactics. They’re so scared of dying from the bombs they’re willingly going along with the Spiders in hopes they won’t die. Norma and Helena don’t think people die with the Device is used anyway so it adds up.”

“That is some good thinking. I’m willing to go along with this so far. How do you think this would link with the Faceless Church?”

She hesitated and sagged. “I don’t know. I guess it doesn’t. There’s no reason for any Faceless Worshipers, let alone the Church itself, to follow the Spiders. I mean, maybe they might because if they think the Spiders have a chance they might join forces, but we haven’t heard a peep from them in ages and you always made them sound a lot louder than that.”

“I agree. Our secondary theory, then, shall be that the Faceless Priests are up to something. What that could be, I’m not sure, but it’s something to think about,” he said as he began his walk out of the hut and back the way they came towards Militsa.

“It could also be neither of them though,” Valkyrie said after a moment, getting an interested hum from her partner. “Maybe it’s someone that got a bit twisted. They think all Faceless Worshipers and Necromancers are evil so they’re kidnapping them. Just because this guy didn’t die in his hut doesn’t mean they’re not being killed somewhere else.”

“I agree,” he said simply. Valkyrie suspected he wasn’t as certain of that idea as their other two. She couldn’t help but feel the same.

They drove quietly to the Faceless Church after agreeing that Militsa wouldn’t be a particularly useful fighter seeing as how she didn’t know how to fight, a point Militsa made before they even asked, and she suggested staying at a local bed and breakfast to wait for them. After she was gone, the car felt insufferably quiet with only the air conditioning blowing out mindless white noise.

Valkyrie had never been so grateful to arrive at a stakeout. They left the car in some bushes, Skulduggery pulling up some of the undergrowth to help conceal the metal and they continued the rest on foot. The sun turned the sky orange before their eyes and the environment around them, mostly sand and patches of plants, took on the same hue.

When they came close to it, she stood close to Skulduggery so he could activate a cloaking sphere around them.

“We really need to talk to Kenspeckle about getting our own enhanced invisibility ball,” she said.

“I believe Meritorious actually already commissioned him to do just that,” Skulduggery said. “I think it would be best for us to sneak without leaving footprints in the ground, so may I suggest flying?”

Valkyrie rolled her eyes at his new trick. “Sure, we can.” She pulled on her magic and began hovering next to him and raised an eyebrow. “Coming?”

He tilted his head to indicate his grin and manipulated the air to join her. Together they carefully flew around a large cluster of trees that wrapped around a large bolder and Skulduggery guided them to a surface covered in thorns. “I’ve never been here before,” he said slowly, “but as far as I know, this is the only entrance to his particular Church. Well, only known one anyone’s ever mentioned. I’m sure there’s dozens.”

“So… are we going to wait here?”

“If we do, we’ll see anyone coming in and out and can arrest them for questioning. Potentially stop someone from being kidnapped or murdered by following them to bait out the criminals if they happen to be a Necromancer. It would be a good plan.”

“But we could also break in and sneak around.”

“That wouldn’t make for a very good stakeout.”

“But it would be more fun,” Valkyrie countered.

Skulduggery was silent for a moment, then shrugged and held a hand out to test the air. While he worked out how to get them through the secret door, she flicked her Aura Vision into place and looked around only to reel back.

“Valkyrie?!” Skulduggery gasped, grabbing her before she could completely fall out of their slowly disappearing bubble.

“I tried to use my magic, but you’re red! You’re Auras red!” She cried out, scrunching her eyes closed. She’d turned off the magic but the bright red light had left blotches of colour in her vision. “Oh my god. I just didn’t need to use it since we got back to Ireland and I was standing so close to you it was like I was inside it and it’s _really_ bright.”

“It’s alright, nobody heard you. Take a moment and we’ll begin again.”

Valkyrie took some deep breaths and hugged Skulduggery for a moment, breathing in the faint scent of his cologne. A part of her felt awkward over it, because she knew perfectly well being as intimate with him as they previously were made her uncomfortable still, but she loved him just the same. She chose to ignore that discomfort. She knew Skulduggery and she loved his hugs and no matter the new relationship they had, his smell and his arms around her made her feel better in ways nothing else could.

Sighing deeply, she pulled away, not looking at him in the face as she turned back to the rock to try again. Skulduggery returned to finding the door and Valkyrie much more carefully looked into the gigantic boulder with her Aura Vision in place. She didn’t see anything at first, but Skulduggery muttered for her to look down also and she tried that, straining to see through the ground into anything that might have people in it, until she ultimately gave up.

“This could be good though,” she said as Skulduggery finally found where the door was, and, not a moment after that, the signal that removed the plants and patch of rock. He pressed it.

“I’m a genius,” he said simply.

“You’re a dead guy that found a hole.”

“I’m a genius.”

“You didn’t do anything special.”

“I found a secret entrance.”

“That’s been around for hundreds of years. We could have found that way easier if you had just looked from the start instead of using the air. If anything, you’re an idiot for not doing it the simple way.”

He shook his head. “Where’s your positivity? We found a secret entrance Valkyrie, let us enjoy it and do crime.”

“I do rather like crime,” she said more chipperly and they went in together. “Trespassing is a rather boring crime to be fair. Do you think we could, like, steal something? For fun?”

“It depends what you want to steal.”

“I don’t know. A priceless book maybe. If there’s anything on signals I could give it to Nadia.”

“Ah, she is learning the discipline under China,” he stated.

“Yeah she’s enjoying it. Right, shut up, we need to focus.”

They both nodded to each other and began into the rock, going down the short corridor and down a steep set of stairs quickly so they wouldn’t have to encounter anyone on them. At the bottom there were wooden floors, painted walls, and lights through signal’s in the ceiling. Valkyrie doubted they had electricity at all, much like the Necromancer Sect she had stayed at.

They went quietly and slowly, sticking to the shadows when their bubble shrunk around them and activated it as soon as it was entirely gone. They didn’t encounter any room of significance whatsoever, finding only entirely empty rooms with no lights on or furniture and a kitchen that had no food in any of the cupboards when they looked around. They frowned at each other, Skulduggery in his skeletal way, and continued down into the spiralling labyrinth.

On the third or fourth floor down, Valkyrie heard light voices and they moved forwards quickly, pocketing the cloaking sphere entirely to get ready to fight. She crouched and stuck her head around a doorframe.

Inside, four people knelt on the floorboards, backs up straight and staring at a large painting of a black orb that had half engulfed a screaming man. It was partially like a Dementor, but it had a more chaotic look to it. The longer she looked at the man in the painting, the less he seemed to be having his soul removed, and the more it seemed as if the Faceless One was going into him, merging the two into one.

Looking away from the gruesome image, she tried to profile the four people. Three women, one man, different races, all wearing black robes not unlike Necromancers.

She turned and shrugged at Skulduggery. Worshipping the Faceless Ones was not a crime, and she couldn’t tell if they were Necromancer’s. Skulduggery leaned around her and looked for himself before shaking his head and they quickly moved past the door. Some way down the hall he very quietly muttered to her, “We need to be deeper. All Faceless Church’s have dungeons, and one this old will hold a lot of secrets.”

“Don’t we break some religious rights laws doing this?” She asked equally as quiet.

“Of course. That’s why we need to not get caught?”

Valkyrie almost rolled her eyes but saw a movement out the corner of her eye and Skulduggery pulled her back into another empty room. Unsure of what they were waiting for, she held still and listened. Only a moment later, soft footstep started coming towards them.

Skulduggery, feeling the air, silently moved towards the open door and waited, still as a statue. When the steps were on them, he darted out, locking an arm around the man’s throat and cutting off his ability to cry out. Valkyrie instantly snapped one cuff around one of his hands, cutting him off from his magic, and then rushed to close the door for privacy.

“That was fast,” she complimented with a wicked grin.

“Ubumnyama Isono,” Skulduggery growled through gritted teeth. “You’ve been wanted for a long time.” The man gurgled and tried kicking backwards at Skulduggery, so he kneed Isono and pushed him to the floor, kneeling on his back and not taking his arm from around Isono’s neck. Valkyrie reached between them and put the shackle around his other arm so he was fully shackled. “I would love to put a bullet in the back of your head, but in consideration that we’re here on a larger mission, I’m going to make a one time deal. If you tell me what I need to know and don’t cause any attention, I’ll be willing to let you go. If you agree to this deal, stop struggling. If you try to shout or don’t cooperate, I won’t hesitate to kill you.”

Valkyrie held herself get anxious goosebumps from his words. Isono stopped struggling after a moment and gave a slight nod of the head. Slowly, Skulduggery sat up, giving the man room to breathe and speak.

“Pleasant,” he rasped. “I thought I’d never see you in a place like this.”

“In a place filled with criminals?” He asked sarcastically.

“You’ve always hated the Faceless Church,” Isono spat. He had an accent Valkyrie couldn’t identify. “You have as many prejudges as any of the rest of us, but you’ve always thought your so much better than everyone else. Even if I wasn’t who I was, I have no doubt you’d want to kill me simply for being in this building.”

“I don’t have time for your banter,” Skulduggery said in a forced monotone. His voice was slightly too deep for it to have been genuine. “Who’s the leader of this Church.”

“The same as ever. Damocles Creed. You’re losing your touch if you don’t even–”

Valkyrie took a step, crouched and punched his head into the ground. He didn’t pass out but his eyes glazed over for a moment. “Where is he right now?”

His throat gurgled and then he answered thickly. “I do not know.”

“Where _might_ he be?” She asked in a hard voice.

He grinned, dark eyes flicking up to look at her face. “My my. You must be the infamous Valkyrie Cain. A pleasure. I had hoped to meet under more… private circumstances.”

The look in his eyes made her stomach roll but she didn’t look away from his gaze. “Answer my fucking question, bitch. And before you think of continuing your monologue of all the ways you would want to violate me, think about how my partner would torture you for laying a finger on me before you decide if it’s worth it.”

He attempted to chuckle darkly, but Skulduggery applied pressure to the back of his neck and he went red as he was deprived of oxygen. Valkyrie raised an eyebrow at him and he more willingly gave into her question when he could next speak. “I don’t know. Maybe his office or workshop. I don’t know much about him.”

“But he offered you sanctuary,” Skulduggery commented.

“Anyone can come here, it’s a Church,” Isono snarled. He spat over his own face in the process. Valkyrie’s sneer turned disgustful. “Not everyone are bigoted savages.”

“You mean not everyone is willing to accept a war criminal wanted for cannibalising the enemy,” Skulduggery said. “You’re hardly someone most people want to be around.”

“Technically,” he said slowly, “I didn’t cannibalise the enemy. I just cooked them and served them to _other_ people. There’s a fine difference.”

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and Skulduggery chose to simply render him unconscious and they left him in the darkest corner of the room. They continued the same way as before, keeping an ear out for any noises. Valkyrie had expected more traps or people, but she considered as they walked through the spiralling building that there were better locations, and locations further away from a mining non-magic town. As Faceless Worshipers tended to be inherently anti-mortal. This Church was just a relic, something to preserve but not use the way it used to be.

When they got to the seventh floor down, and after Valkyrie had to pop her ears from the pressure, they started finding a few new people. The biggest change was the Hollow Men. The partners took them out quickly, trying not to draw attention to themselves in the process, going around them for the most part to avoid detection. Finally, on level nine, there were no lights. No sounds. No anything. The temperature dropped at least ten degrees between the level above and their current one, giving Valkyrie a sense of impending success.

They stood for a moment at the bottom of the stairs and then silently walked forwards, following the labyrinth around the level. This one was different, however, instead of following around to another staircase, this one was a short hallway and directly to grand, black wood double doors.

Skulduggery glanced at her but Valkyrie strode forwards as if they were meant to be there despite holding her breath. She quietly opened the door, pushing it confidently. It was perfectly dark as the two of them went in. Skulduggery clicked a flame to life and Valkyrie realised they were on a balcony looking down into a theatre type of room. For a moment her eyes couldn’t adjust to the darkness, and then she smirked. Valkyrie pulled on her magic, whipping it out in great gusts around the room with her eyes closed to concentrate and when she opened them to see how astonished Skulduggery would be, she was instead met with a gargantuan room below her packed full of thousands of people in straight, uniform lines.

She shrieked and Skulduggery put a hand over her mouth. “Quiet! They’re just experiments!”

That didn’t help whatsoever, and she turned her panic eyes to him, yanking her head from his grasp. “What the actual fuck does that mean?!” She said as she looked back down at the now once again dark pit below.

“This is what the Faceless Church did with the help of Mevolent,” he said lowly. “They believe that the Faceless, when they were on our planet, possessed people and then bred. The children, though the centuries, became normal humans but deep within there is something called the Faceless Gene. If the correct person was tested on, they thought they’d activate the Gene and it was the most realistic way they would bring the Faceless back to our planet to rule. But they never managed it and the practice was outlawed.”

“And these people…”

“Failed attempts.”

“And they kept them. All these thousands of people.”

“It’s said they’re still alive. But not human.”

Valkyrie went back to the balcony railing on shaking knees and sent a shot of light out the end of her finger, watching it dart to the floor harmlessly. A section of people were illuminated.

They were faceless.

She put the power off and stood back in horror. “Why?”

He shrugged. “I can’t say I understand.”

“Smart people believed in this. _China_ believed in this. _How_?”

“Sometimes it’s easier to follow someone than having to do it alone. If you had been punished for thinking independently, for wanting a life outside of your parents control, you would grow into an adult that was incapable of free thought in the same way a person like yourself has been raised. It is why now China defends her freedom away from many of Mevolent’s old supporters so viciously.”

Valkyrie paused to take in his words, trying to understand how a person could grow from such an insane doctrine of thought into someone smart and well respected, but it was cut short by the sudden slamming open of side doors on the left and right of the balcony and Hollow Men gushing out at them.

Immediately they launched themselves into the throngs. Valkyrie jumped into the air out of their reach and pushed magic out of her palms, melting through the things. They unravelled at the slightest touch of her magic. In the middle of their stomping feet, her pounding heart, Skulduggery’s gun, the consistent ripping of the Hollow Men’s skin and the hum of her magic, she heard in the distance a girl screaming.

“Skul, I hear someone!” She called, pointing at one below her and sending a beam of magic straight through it. His skin cracked and ripped in half. “I’m going to find her!”

He gave a muffled shout that could have been an agreement and she sent a wave of magic to clear a path, flying through them as fast as she could even when her eyes were watering and she was holding her breath. Getting through the left door, she heard a sound again and followed it, falling to the floor and grabbing her flip blade to stab her way through the now thankfully more sporadic Hollow Men.

Running quickly, she dove under a heavy fist, slamming the knife into what would have been the Hollow Man’s gut, not stopping to see it deflate before jumping onto the next and the next. They never learnt her pattern and she sidestepped them and ran too fast for them to overwhelm them.

Unfortunately, she didn’t consider that the trail led to a trap before she was already in it.

Isono’s grin was the first thing she saw when she swung around the corner and she immediately tried punching him in the face only for him to lean to the side very slightly and let his companion roundhouse kick her in the side of the head. Her ears rang and toppled over with a small cry to the sounds of multiple people laughing. Before she’d fully recovered, she forced herself to her feet and sent a stream of magic at her assailant. It hit him in the chest and he jigged once before collapsing from the strength of it.

Six men and two women remained. One of the woman, dark skinned with a Glasgow smile that went past her docked ears, pressed a finger to the wall and Valkyrie felt as her ability to use magic left her. She almost sagged.

“We can talk about this,” she said pathetically before turning and running.

Not a single second went by before she felt her face in the floor and her nose crunched on impact. Screaming unintelligibly, she didn’t make out what any of the people said, even after she had gritted her teeth and stopped screaming. They put duct tape over her mouth, grabbed her nose and wiggled it like an annoying grandparent might do to a child’s cheek and put a black bin bag over her head. They laughed loudly, mocking her, but all in a different language. She foolishly imagined that Skulduggery would do something to help her as she was marched away and thrown into a room close by. She sat on her knees waiting, straining to hear something useful, only for the group to get loud jeer when their companions came to meet them. The door opened and Skulduggery fell on top of her with a grunt.

The door slammed shut.


	208. Skulduggery makes a bad plan

**Chapter 208**

A group of men were sent to Valkyrie and Skulduggery to ‘prepare’ them for their esteemed leader. Neither of them were able to talk, but Valkyrie was a good enough detective to understand whoever the leader was someone important and evil.

Both of them had the dust brushed off of their clothes, Valkyrie’s hair was brushed and tied back up in a ponytail and they were switched rooms to somewhere cleaner and prettier. It was still a room barren of furniture, but there were chairs and a desk in the corner. It was also nice that Valkyrie didn’t have to wear a bag over her head.

Valkyrie knew when the leader had arrived by the _click click_ of heels coming towards them. For a heart sinking moment, she thought it was China by the way the woman walked, but when the double doors were opened to reveal her identity, she was pleasantly surprised to find someone new. Almost unnaturally auburn red hair framed a small, wide eyed face. She had a spattering of brown freckles, light makeup, diamonds in her ears, and her frame and dress were remarkably close to China’s. Her beauty came close also but didn’t have a certain something that caused her to fall in love.

“Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain,” she simpered, walking to them with an obvious feeling of power. “I’ve been waiting for the day you two would turn up at my doorstep.”

Neither of them could say anything around the tape over their mouths. Valkyrie made sure to look at her with bored indifference.

She stopped when she was close enough to reach out and touch them. “I _would_ wonder what it is that brought you to my doors today, but I’m actually on a rather tight schedule. I am so glad you popped by in time to fit into my plans. I think I’ll be able to get a significant price for your heads. But where are my manners? We haven’t met, have we, Valkyrie? I’m Eliza Scorn.”

She reached and ripped the tape, and any hair on Valkyrie’s top lip, off in a quick motion. She couldn’t stop the wince. “I can’t say I’ve heard of you.”

Eliza rolled her eyes and Valkyrie couldn’t blame her. Practically everyone, even Fletcher, knew who Eliza Scorn was. She was just as infamous and powerful as China, and they had been for a time in the war against Mevolent. China had even told Valkyrie stories of them together. “I’m sure. I noticed you hurt my little pet Ubumnyama.”

“I don’t even think I could pronounce his name,” she said mildly.

Eliza gave her a pretty smile. “I see you’re a perfect copy of your partner. I noticed you disliked the Kith downstairs. I would rather like to keep you and see if someone with Ancient blood would be able to be activated successfully, but my… business partner has already stated, hoped even, that you would fall into my lap for him to take.”

“I assume that’s The Children of the Spider?”

“Of course,” she smiled, as if delighted Valkyrie worked it out. “We had hoped the Australian Sanctuary would specifically ask for assistance, but their selfishness outshone even _my_ assumptions! Thankfully, your beautiful little Necromancer friend asked for you to come and help.”

“I swear to god if you hurt her–”

“You’ll destroy me where I stand, I’m sure,” she rolled her eyes. “You wouldn’t be able to touch me if you tried, darling. At any rate, I’ve got better things to do than gloat. I just had to see for myself that either of you were truly tied up at my humble Church. I’ll be seeing you, I’m sure.”

Valkyrie didn’t bother asking any follow up questions as Eliza swept around and out of the room, leaving only the delicate scent of her perfume Valkyrie wasn’t ashamed to admit she rather enjoyed. She waited for the door to be closed but it never happened, instead some of the same men and one of the women came back in and immediately applied new tape to Valkyrie’s mouth and re-bagged them both for transportation.

**.*****.**

**_32 hours later_ **

Valkyrie flinched as someone touched her. The hands didn’t respond other than to continue, tugging at the tape around her neck to take the bag off of her head.

It was so dark she couldn’t see who was in front of her at first, but when a soft hand trailed from her cheek to her mouth, for a wild moment she thought it could be Nadia.

Then the hand roughly pulled the tape from over her mouth and Valkyrie knew it wasn’t. Nadia would have been far too concerned about hurting her and wouldn’t have simply ripped tape off of her lips.

“What the fuck?” Valkyrie whispered into the dark.

“ _Shhh_!” A female voice hushed, quietly stepping over to Skulduggery to get his bag and tape off.

“Militsa?!” Valkyrie quietly exclaimed.

“Shut _up_! They’re outside!” Militsa snapped breathily.

Valkyrie waited for her to finish with Skulduggery, who barely made a grunt as the tape was pulled from around his head, keeping his jaw shut, and shuffled from side to side uncomfortably as Militsa carefully cut the handcuffs she and Skulduggery were wearing with her shadows.

“I need to pee,” she immediately announced to them. “Like, yesterday need to pee.”

“They are right there!” Militsa snarled under her breath.

“Cool, well, I literally cannot fight or do shit right now because I need to pee so badly that if I stand, I will wet myself. What do you think we should do?” Valkyrie snarked back.

Militsa muttered something unintelligible under her breath.

“Valkyrie, just pee in the corner. Militsa, where are we?”

“And get trapped with it?” Valkyrie countered. “We need to get out, you can fight well enough to do that surely?”

“And if I cannot? Would you like to wet yourself like a two year old in the middle of trying to kick someone?” Skulduggery asked with a mocking voice of interest. “Because I’ve seen that happen and it was truly an awful experience for everyone. Honestly, I never heard of or saw that person again, I think the embarrassment killed them.”

Valkyrie paused to attempt to think through her dehydration on what to do and then sagged. “Don’t watch me though.”

“I really don’t want to. Militsa, what did you see on your way here?” He asked, his voice deepening dramatically as he kept his voice down.

“We’re on a big boat,” she whispered quickly, “with hundreds of cargo containers. I think it might be mortal, but I’m sure the guards outside your container and mine are mages.”

“How did you get away?” Skulduggery asked as Valkyrie tried not to feel anxious about unzipping her trousers.

“I still had my bracelet when the men that kidnapped me came for me. Since we didn’t think they’d been killing the other Necromancers, I just pretended a ring I had was my Item and they left it at the hotel. I figured they’d take me to you, or you’d find out I was gone and come for me, so I pretended to be helpless and when I thought it was safe, I was able to get out of my restraints and my container, I locked my guards in after knocking them out and looked around for where you might be. I used the windows up there to look in and Shadow Walk inside.”

“That was quite clever,” he complimented.

“Thanks, it was really on the spot to be honest,” she quietly glowed. “Um, I could, like, Shadow Walk us both outside the container and we could take out the guards and lock them in here if you like?”

“I think that would be a good idea,” Skulduggery said and she heard the gentle rustle of their clothing as they stood together and then nothing more.

Valkyrie listened carefully and when she determined they had actually Shadow Walked out, she frantically yanked down her trousers and hunched over, positioning herself with unfortunate ease as to not pee on her clothes. The relief she felt at emptying her bladder was so great she was able to completely dismiss her earlier anxieties over peeing in front of Skulduggery and Militsa and instead just felt much better.

She grimaced when she pulled up her clothes, since she wasn’t able to wipe and that was nasty, but it was also a part of doing a lot of her work in rural places. Sometimes she had to do what she had to do. After getting herself together, she went to the front and hoped they’d be able to work something out so they wouldn’t end up in the container with her pee again.

The doors opened and Valkyrie stepped back. Skulduggery bodily threw one of the guards in and another fell from the air beside the first when Militsa let them drop, and Valkyrie joined them outside. Skulduggery closed it and they quickly made their way around to the side where they’d be hidden from view.

All around them were metal cargo containers. Valkyrie didn’t see anyone when she left theirs, nor around the corner, and she had no experience with ships to know if that was how it would remain or if that meant something was wrong. “I don’t think we should try to fight,” she immediately told the other two.

Skulduggery tilted his head. “Whatever do you mean?”

“I mean I want to find a hidey-hole and bunker down until we get wherever we’re going and then when we dock, leave the boat with everyone else, or even get Shadow Walked behind a pillar or something. There’s nowhere to run here and I don’t feel comfortable trying to figure anything out. And anyway, there’s only going to be lackeys here, not any big people. What if we take someone out that’s an actual crewmate and then the boat smashes into the pier?”

“I doubt that’ll happen.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I would simply guide the boat to a perfect stop.”

Valkyrie looked at his deadpan. “You would not so don’t pretend. If you used magic someone would notice anyway. Can we find somewhere safer to discuss this? This is really not a good idea!”

“There is nowhere to go, Valkyrie. They’ll know we’re gone as soon as they notice the guards missing and check. We’re better off searching who is here and taking them out now than waiting like sitting ducks to be found. I appreciate that the situation isn’t the best, but it’s what needs to be done.”

Valkyrie took a breath before nodding, despite feeling as if Skulduggery’s plan would get them captured faster. Militsa stayed quiet and stayed by Valkyrie’s side as they quickly ran down the gap between the containers to the end where they dropped to the almost immediate edge of the boat and into the ocean beyond.

Of course, they were immediately noticed by someone.

To the sounds of shouts and Militsa’s very scared gasp, they ran in the other direction, all unable to use magic in case of mortals abord. They ducked, dived and pretended to be really good jumpers with the help of their magic to get away from the slamming feet against metal but it wasn’t possible to escape them forever.

Barely a few minutes of circling the same block of containers and someone Valkyrie recognised as a mage from the Church of the Faceless jumped into their path. Skulduggery went to punch him but he put a hand out, palm facing Skulduggery, and Valkyrie saw as the air shifted towards him and Skulduggery ceased moving.

Valkyrie jumped in and went to kick the man, but a hand grabbed her leg and she was blocked. A man stepped out of nothingness and went to punch her in the face, which she ducked under and went close to punch him in the jaw. He took the hit without a flinch and kneed her between the legs.

She grunted painfully as her eyes welled up and her knees buckled. Militsa made an attempt to fight but got distracted when some ship staff came to gawk and she was swept off her feet. They were all placed in handcuffs before Valkyrie had stopped her pain-reaction tears.


	209. Evaporated

**Chapter 209**

**_Elsie’s POV_ **

It was a beautiful spring day and they were standing on a flat roof. Kites were being flown in the distance and there was the faint rustle of leaves when the cool breeze hit them.

“Do it,” said Kitana. Her voice was low but urgent, tinged with an excitement that bubbled up from somewhere within. Her straight white teeth bit lightly on her bottom lip. Her face was flushed. Her eyes sparkled from eagerness to learn new ways to hurt people.

Doran turned to the chimney and held out his hand. He grunted, his face going red and the muscles in his neck standing out. It looked pretty funny until his hands started to glow. There was a light under his skin and it got brighter the more he concentrated.

“Oh, great,” Seán said loudly. Likely so Kitana could hear him as they were on opposite sides of the roof to each other, Doran in between them. “We have the power of flashlights. Let the world beware.”

“Quiet,” Kitana said sharply. “Let him focus.”

Elsie could see by his expression Seán didn’t like it when Kitana dismissed him like that. He was obviously angry, embarrassed and hurt. If Elsie had ever used that tone on him, she doubted he’d even notice. Not that she ever would treat him like that. She wasn’t like Kitana, who could spend a whole day mocking him and then, with one smile the next day, have him back under her thumb. Kitana was, in a word, an incredibly stereotypical _bitch_.

Elsie wasn’t mean like Kitana, she reasoned to herself in the comfort of her head, but she also wasn’t pretty like her either, or blonde like her, or slim like her. She was fat and ugly and all the dyed hair, black clothes and pierced lips in the world couldn’t hide that. She swallowed and glanced at the floor before watching Doran’s display.

A beam of light shot from Doran’s hand, crackling and sizzling, and blasted a hole through the chimney.

Kitana whooped with joy and Seán stared, mouth open. Doran dropped his hands and grinned.

“It was easier that time,” he said with a smirking grin. “Gets easier the more you do it.”

Kitana ran to his side. “Teach me! Oh my God, teach me now!”

Doran laughed, stood behind her, using one hand to guide her while the other was on her hip. He spoke softly into her ear, and she nodded as she listened. Elsie looked at Seán. He wasn’t looking impressed anymore. Now he just looked jealous. Elsie couldn’t help it – she was disappointed. Doran was just a thug and an idiot who followed Kitana around like almost every other seventeen year old boy in their school. But Elsie had thought Seán was different.

She walked over from Kitana’s side to Seán’s.

Light flared in Kitana’s hand and the rest of the chimney blew apart. She screamed in delight and hugged Doran.

“That was cool,” Elsie said to Seán. He murmured. She smiled. “Maybe we could try it?”

“Knock yourself out,” he muttered and walked away from her.

Her heart sunk. She tried not to think about it and followed Seán over to them, half-listened to the instructions they were given, and Doran got that look in his eye. She noticed it happened more depending on the clothes he was wearing. When he had his school uniform on, he was more of a bully, probably to make up for looking like everyone else, to feel like he had some attention. When he was wearing clothes his father had forced him to wear, which was usually jeans with a belt and a t-shirt, he was nicer, more mellow. But when he was dressed like he currently was, in an oversized shirt and grey – it was always grey – jogging bottoms, he was a different person. Not like when he was at school and a typical bullying guy, he was what Elsie was only willing to describe as a chav.

With that look in his eye, Doran began calling her names and Kitana laughed and egged him on. Seán was too preoccupied with figuring out how to do the new trick. She doubted he even noticed they were picking on her again. If he had noticed and did nothing about it, she’d have likely felt worse.

Finally, after many curses and insults Elsie let roll over her head, she began to feel the power in her hand, feeling how hot it was getting. Besides her, Seán’s arm was trembling.

“Feel that heat?” Doran asked rhetorically, grinning predatorily. “Make it even hotter. Make it so that it almost hurts.”

They stood in a circle on the flat cinema rooftop, all four of them, with their arms up towards the sky. Kitana had blasted white light into the air twice already.

“Feel it?” Doran asked.

“Yeah,” said Seán impatiently. There was a pained strain in his voice. Her arm felt painful too but she tried not to show it. “What now?”

“Now you just push it out of you,” Doran said. “All the energy, just push it straight out. Like this.”

A beam of crackling energy shot out of his hand. A moment later, Kitana’s beam joined it, a slightly deeper colour mingled with his.

“This is so cool,” Elsie whispered.

Seán gritted his teeth. Seat rolled off his forehead and into his hoodie, a burgundy colour that matched his tracksuit bottoms. Then the light in his hand flashed even brighter and his own beam of energy raced towards the clouds and he laughed shakily.

Elsie became aware of Kitana’s eyes on her and felt her stomach get sick.

“Last one, Elsie. You can do it.” She said it was a hardness in her voice she never had when she spoke to the boys, or even other girls.

She wet her lips. “I’m trying.”

“Try harder,” she said bitchily. “You can’t be the only one of us not able to do this stuff. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, have you ever heard that?”

Elsie had absolutely heard that phrase before but didn’t answer her because she knew it was just how Kitana was. It was her way of making Elsie feel stupid so Kitana could feel smarter. She could feel her arm burning now, so hot it felt as if it would explode.

“Hurry up,” Doran strained out. “I can’t keep this up forever.”

Elsie felt that heat and pushed it, tensing every muscle in her body, pushing it up, out of her skin, away from her, and then it burst through, a beam of orange energy, flashing to the sky and joining the others. Elsie couldn’t help it, she laughed. It was beautiful, their four burning lights mingling in the sky above.

Almost immediately Doran’s light shut out and he lowered his arm with a gasp. The other three followed quickly. Elsie felt exhausted but her body was tingling pleasantly. She couldn’t wait to do it again!

Kitana almost said something but they all heard the car up below them with a screech. They went over to the edge of the building and looked down.

“What the hell do you kids think you’re doing?!” The man shouted.

“None of your business, dude,” Kitana called down with a roll of her eyes. “Fuck off or I’ll kill you.”

“Let’s use him for target practice,” Doran grinned.

Before Elsie could object, the man swung his arms. A strong gust of wind suddenly blew and he rose upwards like he was flying. Seán swore and they all backed away from him and the edge quickly. The man landed in front of them.

“Do you have any idea how risky that is?” The man immediately ranted. “You’re out in the open, for Christ’s sake! How stupid are you kids?”

“You’re… you’re like us,” Kitana stated with a frown.

“I could see your damn lightshow from miles away. What were you trying to do? Were you _trying_ to get noticed?”

“We didn’t think there was anyone else,” Kitana said.

The man stared. “Anyone else? What? What do you mean?”

“I mean other people with super-powers.”

“What on earth – look, you’re not superheroes, you don’t have superpowers, and you cannot use magic where mortals can see. You’re sorcerers and your number one priority is to stay hidden from everyone else. Got it? It’s the literal law, you have no idea what you’re doing!”

“We’re very sorry mister,” Kitana said in the same voice she used with Doran’s dad whenever they had to meet him.

He sighed. “My name is Patrick Xebec.”

“That’s a stupid name,” Doran immediately scoffed.

“Dorian,” her voice full of scolding. “Don’t be racist, it’s obvious foreign.”

Xebec shook his head. “We don’t have time to get into this now. I’m on my lunch break and I’m not really qualified to go over this with you. But know that you need to come up with a new name or else other sorcerers can control you.”

“Like, do what?” Kitana asked.

“Anything you want. I felt Xebec was right for me, so I took that name. Choose whatever fits you.”

“Cool. I could be, like, Kitana Killherway, and no one can stop me?” She asked with a laugh in her voice.

“Sure, whatever you like,” Xebec said with some annoyance.

“I’ll be Doran Kickass.”

“That’s the stupidest name ever,” Kitana giggled teasingly. “Seán, what about you?”

“I don’t know,” he said with a considering smile. “How about Seán Chill? Or Seán Destiny or something? Seán the King.” He laughed. “Yeah, I’ll be Seán the King.”

The three laughed and Elsie awkwardly watched in play out with wide, anxious eyes. No one asked what her name would be.

“Look,” Xebec said hurriedly, “pick whatever names you like, I don’t care. I’m not qualified to take you through this at all. I don’t like getting caught up in Sanctuary stuff. I just live my life and get on with it.”

“What’s the Sanctuary?”

“It’s like our own private government, it had departments and soldiers and police and stuff. Normal government things. If you want my advice, don’t get caught up in it. Anyone dealing with the Sanctuary is in the firing line and a whole lotta people end of dead working for the Sanctuary every year. These last five years have been hell in particular, let me tell you.”

“Magic cops,” Kitana mused. “I don’t like the sound of that. Can they do what we do?”

“They’re all different disciplines,” he said. “I’m an Elemental. What can you do?”

“We don’t know yet,” said Kitana. “We keep finding new powers. Like, at first we were just strong, but then we could move stuff with our minds. And now we can fire beams of energy from our hands.”

“I found out that one,” Doran grinned at Xebec.

“I actually don’t know what discipline that is,” he said slowly. “Usually you can only do one thing, two at most. And even then you’d have to train for years.”

“Maybe we’re naturals,” Kitana grinned. “So the cops can’t do what we can?”

“No, not that I know of. I don’t think anyone can,” he said. “Look, I’ll call the Sanctuary. You need training and resources, things I don’t care to deal with. And then I need to get back to work, so just stay out of trouble while you wait for them, okay?”

He turned and walked to the edge of the roof. Seán went to follow but Kitana put a hand in front of him and he stopped.

“I don’t think you should make that phone call,” she called out.

Xebec turned back with a frown and put his hands in the air. “I don’t know what else you want kid. Pretty sure I’d be breaking some law to not tell anyone about what you did.”

“We understand. But we can’t let you tell the magic cops on us,” she said.

Doran raised his arm and held his breath. Barely a moment later, his hand glowed, far faster than it had last time, and it blasted into Xebec who didn’t even have a long enough chance to beg before his leg was evaporated.

He fell screaming and Kitana took a step and glared at him. For a moment Elsie thought she was going to help him, but then Xebec’s body went slack and he was dead.

“What did you do?” Seán asked breathlessly.

“I burst his brain with my mind,” Kitana said, and she started to laugh.


	210. A new mission

**Chapter 210**

**_Tanith’s POV_ **

Toeing her kickstand down, Tanith shut off her bike. Valkyrie had racked up a lot of miles in the last year and a bit she’d been borrowing it and she was tempted when she noticed the tuning it needed to let Valkyrie continue believing it was her own and instead get a new one for herself. She loved her current bike, but it was no less disposable as the previous twenty-three she’d owned. Not that she could particularly afford a new bike considering her bank balance. Being a freelancer that didn’t work made her no money, and being a tutor for a girl that didn’t need much tutoring hardly helped her situation. She’d spent everything she had saved on Laila and her medical expenses, as well as her bikes insurance and M.O.T, and not long before that her Visa, and without her normal income she just didn’t have much left.

Of course, she considered as she removed her helmet, she could ask Valkyrie to pay for some of the expenses on the bike to help out, but she already gave her a home, and as her little, underaged sister, it felt entirely wrong to ask for cash from her. She couldn’t ask Ghastly either, because she knew perfectly well he had as little money as her. Being a tailor barely made even most months, and what profit he did make went into the tiny financial pillow he had to stay afloat in bad economic times. His stipend as a Dead Man helped him a lot getting by so he could do his passion, but he would never have enough to support her when she wasn’t even dating him. She wouldn’t feel right asking anyone else, so she had very few options.

She shook the thoughts away, pulling her hair from its tie and getting herself ready for her so-called “ _important_ ” meeting.

A horn blared in the street beyond and Tanith glanced back before taking her keys, activating the signal on her bike and getting out of the street.

She walked into the short, box-like building, giving a group of Cleavers marching out a wide berth. Tipstaff wasn’t in the front entryway, but one of his cute assistants was so she went to her.

“Hey Clara,” she greeted quietly, tilting her hip and giving her a sweet smile.

Clara blushed before she even turned her head and then gave her a dazzling and slightly embarrassed smile. “Good afternoon Miss Low. Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Could you tell me where I’m meant to be? I have some meeting, I’m not sure what’s up with it,” Tanith told her.

“Sure, just let me take this to my workstation,” she agreed quickly.

“I can carry it,” Tanith offered.

Clara ducked her head and smiled at the ground as Tanith took the stack of freshly printed papers and binders and followed Clara to her desk. She noticed the taller woman made sure to sway her hips just a little more than usual, that she took off her cardigan when they got to her desk, that she discreetly undid her top button when Tanith looked away to put the things down, that she pressed her elbows together on the desk to press her breasts together. She took it all in with a smile and enjoyed the small attentions Clara gave her.

They parted far too quickly and Tanith felt Clara’s eyes on her as she left to go meet Meritorious and some official or other in the Grand Mages office.

At another time Tanith would have been just as tempted to try and flirt with him as she did with Clara. The exhaustion in his eyes and tension in his body gave her the feeling if she so much as continued that thought in his presence, he’d stand up and leave.

“Grand Mage,” she instead said neutrally. The door had been left open so she walked in, assuming it was for her. Another man was there, one she’d seen bossing others around with his pompous clipboard and pointing finger, and she didn’t so much as look at him. “I was told you wanted to talk with me.”

“Yes, please sit down,” he said with just as much strength in his voice as the first time she’d met him. She couldn’t help but admire him. “You might have met Bernard Sult, he’s here as a representative from the American Sanctuary on the behalf of the Supreme Council.”

Tanith understood perfectly that he was telling her to _not mess up this meeting_. She sat slowly in her chair. “Okay.”

Meritorious swept his hand to Sult. Sult coughed once and then began. “Good morning Miss Low. I asked for this meeting as I’ve been receiving concerns from the general public that they’re worried about someone of your… past and education working for a governing body.”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” she stated, keeping her face blank despite the almost immediate rage the man had filled her with.

He gave her a ‘ _ha ha_ ’ type of fake laugh. “We’re receiving allegations of you having been trained as an assassin, Miss Low.” It took rather a lot of willpower to not change the expression on her face to one of annoyance. “Considering how closely you work with the Irish Sanctuary, an allegation like that doesn’t bode well for you.”

“Well, Administrator Sult,” his face dropped slightly at her wording, “I appreciate that that is a rather serious complaint, but it sounds as if you have no evidence or else you would have reported me to the authorities and I’d already be in handcuffs, so I don’t know what I can tell you.”

He clucked his tongue as if sympathetic. “I understand, Miss Low, and as a newly single working mother, I appreciate that an allegation like this must be very shocking, so the Supreme Council thought it would be best for us to inform you of the public complaint and make you aware that we are investigating and that it won’t take too long. The Irish Sanctuary won’t be able to work with you for the duration of the investigation, as I’m sure you’ll understand, but I’m afraid our hands are tied.” He laughed. “Imagine, if the Irish Sanctuary were working so closely with an assassin, letting them into the building around innocent people and valuable information! It would be a scandal and a half, and I dread to think how it could affect your child. I’m sure it’ll all be sorted in a matter of weeks and we can all get back to business.”

He smiled smugly at her and Tanith smiled back at him. “Thank you, Mr Sult, I really appreciate you’re willing to help me get this sorted.”

He seemed surprised by her happy response and nodded. “Well, I appreciate your understanding. You’re welcome to leave.”

“I actually do have a small problem with what you’ve said,” she said, seeing him not so subtly roll his eyes. “I don’t actually take any orders from any Sanctuary. I’m not even Irish.”

“But you have an Irish Visa, you’ve lived in Ireland for several years now, you have a child with an Irishman, your child’s nationality is Irish. When you take work, it’s nine times out of ten from the Irish Sanctuary over the last five years, and you receive your reward money for arresting wanted criminals from the Irish. Do you see how that all works?”

“I understand how it looks on paper, however I am not Irish and the only reason I have been in Ireland for the last few years is because my actual job is to be a tutor for Valkyrie Cain. I only do a handful of jobs on the side, or on occasion I’m given work through the Dead Men to help them when they have a surplus, but that’s few and far between. I do not get paid a salary by any means, and I’d be fully able to move back home once Valkyrie graduates.” _Not that I would_ , she added in her head.

Meritorious nodded at her words. “What she says is correct. However, I would like to say that considering the severity of the accusations, the Irish Sanctuary will have to apply our normal policy of not working with you, Miss Low, meaning no reward moneys, no information handouts, no nothing. You are still welcome to get work through the Dead Men, as they are an outside service not controlled by the Irish Sanctuary, however you will not be privy to any Sanctuary resources. Does that make sense to you?”

“I understand,” she said blankly, refusing to look at Sult’s stupid face so she would punch it from his neck.

“That’s excellent,” Sult smiled, writing something on his clipboard. Tanith was fairly sure it was some random scribbles and not actual notes. “Unless you have any more queries, you’re welcome to go.”

Shifting her sword as she stood, she walked out with her back straight and head held high. She’d warned the Dead Men and Valkyrie of her past, stating that she had changed her mindset and actions but that she worried it may catch up with her. They had been understanding, entirely too happy to offer her anything she needed to stay safe and out of trouble, but she doubted they’d be able to do anything when they were all so distracted with war preparations. She doubted they’d even find out she needed help until she was halfway towards Coldheart Prison. The Supreme Council would no doubt make a big example out of her.

Her heart sunk for Laila. Perhaps leaving before the investigation commenced was the safest option? Perhaps pretend she and Laila were mysteriously killed? She’d simply go into hiding, posing as a mortal. She’d have to get a sizeable chunk of money to do it, and she had no idea what country she could even go to, but she couldn’t see many ways out of the path Sult was laying down for her.

She made sure to look for Clara on her way out to not make anyone think anything was amiss, but her eyes fell on Dexter instead.

She waited for him to hand the two criminals with him, a naked man except his tiny underwear halfway down his arse crying about being a butterfly that wanted to fly, and a woman that was hissing at the man to stop or else she’d set his knees on fire, and then she went over to check on him.

“Hey, Dex,” she said lowly.

He looked at her with almost dead eyes, still managing to flick the edge of his lip up for her. “Tanith. Why are you here?”

“I had a meeting. There’s apparently been some public complaints about me. Meritorious basically said the Sanctuary couldn’t be seen paying me or working with me so you’ll have to give me tip offs from now on.”

“Sure, we can make that work,” he nodded.

“Are you okay? When’s the last time you slept?”

He shrugged. “Few days ago. Got a few hours. Do you think you could see Corrival with me? I don’t think I’ll be safe on the road.”

She nodded, happy to help considering he looked worse than some zombies she’d seen. “What’s the meeting about?”

“Not sure babe.” There was a short silence from them both as they made their way to Corrival’s office. “Shit, sorry. I know you don’t like being called that.”

“I’ll let it pass.”

“Thanks. I didn’t mean to.”

“I get it. You’re tired. I won’t hold it against you.”

“Thanks.”

“I will be randomly telling you to back me up in the future and you’ll have to blindly agree with me though,” she smirked.

He managed a smile back. “Seems fair.”

Tanith knocked on Corrival’s office door and they waited for him to answer. Tanith spotted Clara’s caramel hair at the end of the hall and gave her a smirk of a smile and the assistant ducked her head to hide her blush. Tanith continued to watch her as she went through her papers and handed some off to someone before glancing at Tanith and turning away quickly. The person she was talking to looked down at Tanith and gave Clara a look that she seemed to wave away. A few moments later, he finished speaking with her and Clara started making her way towards Tanith and Dexter.

“That your new girlfriend?” Dexter teased quietly.

“Not yet,” she grinned at him.

He chuckled under his breath. “She’s cute.”

“Yeah, that’s the whole point,” Tanith said. Clara stopped by them and gave Tanith a sweet look though she didn’t say anything with Dexter there. Tanith chose to speak anyway. “Hey, you waiting for Corrival too?”

“I have a memo for Elder Deuce, yes,” Clara said softly. Tanith didn’t usually go for soft, cute girls but the tease in Clara’s eye was definitely keeping Tanith interested. “Do you have a meeting?”

“Dexter does, I’m just keeping him company. I love your hair by the way. It’s beautiful.”

Clara blushed even more than Tanith expected, making her grin widen. She was sure Dexter was going to mock her for the basic flirting lines, but Tanith knew Clara was already into her, so she was hardly going to use her good material. “You’re very kind, Miss Low. Um, this might be unprofessional, but I have some friends going to a gig next Friday. I know you must be really busy with work, but if you have a few hours, would you like to be my date?”

Tanith bit her lip and swayed on her feet. “I’m not too sure I will. I’m on call all the time. I wouldn’t want to agree and bail on you. And I have a kid at home.”

“I totally understand,” Clara said, not deflating at all. “Maybe we could exchange numbers and if you happen to have time you could join us? You don’t have to stay for the whole thing. And we can leave early if the music’s bad.”

Tanith leaned a little closer and gave Clara a roughish smile. “I think I can do that.”

Corrival chose to open his door then and Tanith let her give the memo to him before she quietly got Clara’s number and sent her a text. She had to leave for her job quickly but Tanith watched her walk for a moment before joining Dexter in the office.

Both men gave her a knowing look.

“Oh shush, she’s cute!” Tanith grinned at them as she took her seat.

“Ghastly’s going to sulk,” Dexter said gravelly, giving her a sly smile.

“He can go ahead, it’s not like we’re together. I don’t even know if I’ll have the time to meet her until after all this, but that doesn’t mean I can’t try.”

“You gave up on the not dating thing then?” Corrival asked tiredly. He had a hint of mirth in his eyes.

“I never said anything about dating,” she said coyly.

Both of them chuckled at her blatant shamelessness. “Tanith’s love life aside,” Corrival began, “the mortals developing magical powers are getting out of hand. We think we have a lead from Skulduggery to begin the investigation, but I suspect it’s a Dead Man mission. Considering the circumstances, I hoped to send just a few of you boys in, perhaps some of the ladies as well,” he added for Tanith’s sake, “to get it finished. It’s going to need to be quick and mess free.”

“I understand,” Dexter said seriously.

“Good. A werewolf, Ed Stynes, was brought in by Anton not long ago. Doctors have him sedated now and we’re running tests with the help of Doctor Grouse, but we made sure to interview him first. He is the first mortal we’ve found with this sudden surge of magic that hasn’t been driven insane by it. He claims to have been plagued by dreams for the last few weeks prior to transforming about a man in white named Argeddion.”

“Strange,” Dexter frowned.

“It is. He claims Argeddion said he had a gift for him, and to prepare for the Summer of Light, and a few days ago was his last dream in which he received the gift, a glowing light that Argeddion put in his chest. Considering we’ve had every test done on them and not a single result has been made, this was our first big clue. I had Skulduggery on the case before this information, as I suspected it might have something to do with the Magicae Furem Device, but neither of us believe this to be true any longer.”

“How so?” Dexter dutifully asked.

“A woman came here earlier. She just left. She’s an elderly lady, named Greta Dapple. She once dated a man named Walden D’Essai. He found out his true name, which was Argeddion. According to the woman, D’Essai was a pacifist and she believed, when she heard through her friends that Skulduggery was looking for Argeddion, he was looking to finally solve his murder.”

“What?” Tanith said, sitting forwards.

“That’s what I thought,” he said, sitting back in his chair and crossing his arms. “To keep it short, he wanted to find the source of magic and find out why some countries have Cradles. A Sensitive saw a future in which Argeddion turned evil. Four sorcerers, three men, one woman. Leader named Tyren Lament. The woman was the Sensitive. He found out they were looking for him and he disappeared.”

“Didn’t Lament die, like, thirty years ago?” Dexter asked.

“He did. I am not meant to tell you this, and I’m most definitely breaking some Oaths in revealing it, but Lament was an undercover detective for Meritorious when he supposedly died. Lament and his group were essentially the Dead Men but far quieter and meant to be invisible. I have read enough of Eachan’s Journal’s and questioned him enough to know that they are, however, alive.”

Tanith took a deep breath as she took in the change in the story and sat back in her chair.

“What happened?” Dexter asked.

“I’m not entirely sure as Meritorious was ever so slightly vague in his answers. I get the impression either he knows the bare minimum as a protective measure or it was something underhanded. I did have a small look into Lament and found out his last arrest before his disappearance was Nadir, a Shunter yourself, Dexter, with Valkyrie and Skulduggery went to interview at Hammer Land. He died almost as soon as he was unhooked from the Shunting device Delafonte Mien had him set up in. The details don’t matter because he’s dead, but Skulduggery was able to find out between catching these magic mortals his friends were Vernon Plight, Lenka Bazaar and Kalvin Accord.”

“I know the men but not the woman.”

“Same here,” Corrival shrugged. “I have a theory. Or, Skulduggery had a theory, which he shared with me. I told him to be here but he isn’t so it’s my theory now. We don’t think any of them are dead. We think Lament and his group were able to sedate or somehow stop Argeddion and now they’re guarding him. Since he hadn’t done anything wrong, I doubt Meritorious gave Lament the order to kill, and Lament was never known for being violent. I think they’re hiding somewhere with him as a prisoner, unable to kill him, unable to leave. They’re stuck, keeping the world safe from Argeddion’s potential danger.”

“Oh, wow,” Tanith expressed.

“Where?” Dexter asked.

“That’s where it gets complicated. Skulduggery is doing other work at the moment so I had a look into Lament. He was a scientist and we have some of his work on our database. He was working on a containment unit for a person. Makes sense to me that’s for Argeddion. The only lead I would even _begin_ to call a lead is the freight company Lament mentions in the files is Dagan’s Logistics, the Invisible Train, or whatever the crap he called it. He was using it for materials.”

“So you need us to start there,” Dexter sagged.

Corrival nodded. “And quietly. I don’t want anyone knowing we’re looking into this or the American’s and the English might try swooping in and scaring Dagan into not helping us. They’re an international company, they make more money out of Ireland than in. You need to get there quick.”

“Great,” Dexter said miserably.

“I don’t know that Dagan Logistics is,” Tanith said.

“They’re an invisible train that moves anything for anyone for the right price. They’re known for being difficult and Arthur Dagan, the owner, has always particularly hated the Dead Men. He was a big supporter of Mevolent,” Dexter said, rubbing his face. “I assume you already checked when the trains passing in Ireland.”

“I’m an Elder, Mr Vex. You can do the running around.”

Dexter rolled his eyes and stood. “Sure thing, boss. When will Skul be ready to help?”

“No idea. He hasn’t been answering his phone but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. And Dexter,” he said, putting his hands on the table and closing his eyes to get across his point, “please keep Skulduggery occupied. The Supreme Council are up my ass about him and if he so much as insults someone the hammer might come down on us all. And you know how he is.”

“I’m not sure it’s possible to stop him insulting people,” Dexter pointed out.

“And yet I’ve made it your responsibility.”

“Corrival, be real,” Dexter said, giving him a look. Tanith stood and looked between the two. “I can’t control him, you know that.”

“I am aware. So find out where Lament and Argeddion are and send Skulduggery to whatever far away, remote, out-of-service place they’re at! I don’t want him here. We both know he’s _barely_ stable,” he said, voice lowering to an angry whisper. “I trust him not to turn on us, but I do not trust him to not mess this up. Keep him busy. Keep him out of the way. Now please leave me alone. I have too much shit to deal with to argue with you too.”

Tanith followed Dexter at he swept quickly from the room. They were silent all the way out of the Sanctuary, though she did spot Strom in a room berating some almost crying ladies, and they made their getaway before he saw them.

As soon as they were out, she nudged him with her shoulder. “Ready to be detectives again, partner?”

“Sure,” he said, and then yawned loudly. “Fuck. My cars over there.”

“Will you bring me back to my bike later?”

“Tell someone to grab it when they come here next.”

“With what keys?”

He paused and then shrugged. “I love you Tanith, you’re like a sister and all, but I really can’t think of this right now. I need to sleep and then we can figure it out, okay?”

“It’s fine, Dex, I’ll take you home,” she said, trying not to sigh as she took his keys from him.


	211. Skulduggery runs away

**Chapter 211**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

Valkyrie was shoved forward and onto her knees. The air was frighteningly cold and she tensed as the bag was pulled from her head, shocking her with the temperature against her skin. She stayed frozen when the tip of a gun pressed into the back of her head. She knew they wouldn’t kill her unless she was in the act of escaping – they wouldn’t have kept her alive for The Torment otherwise – but she didn’t want to test her captures trigger-happiness.

The shackles on her wrists were removed but there were bindings in the room that kept her magic at bay anyway. There was shuffling on either side of her as Skulduggery and Militsa were untied also, and then the captures backed out of the room and an iron gate slammed shut.

Valkyrie opened her eyes and looked around quickly. Dark, underground, old. They were in a dungeon sort of cell. There were people all around, mostly against the wall. Skulduggery on her left, Militsa on her right. Militsa looked afraid and had turned to look behind her, and Skulduggery was assessing the situation also.

Valkyrie looked behind her and saw five men, all in dusty but seemingly protective gear, all holding semi-automatic rifles that seemed military grade to Valkyrie, with other weapons strapped to their bodies.

They gave them nasty grins from behind their facemasks and swaggered out of view.

“Fuck’s sake,” Valkyrie muttered, standing herself up. She turned to the other people sitting against the back wall. “You wouldn’t happen to be the Necromancer’s kidnapped from Australia, would you?”

An elderly man with a hunchback and permanently bowed knees sneered. He looked as if he was likely in some pain from his position on the floor. “Unfortunately,” he said. He looked at Skulduggery. “You wouldn’t happen to be the Detective Skeleton, or are there more of you morons now?”

“I am still a unique being,” Skulduggery said drily. “What can you tell me about the Children of the Spiders?”

“As general information? Next to nothing,” the elderly man said in a shortly. “As for these particular Children of the Spider, not much. I believe they have a scientist with them that’s performing experiments on us.”

“What experiments?” He asked quickly.

“I wasn’t there, was I?” He snapped, turning his weight painfully. “Ooh, ah, good _Lord_ my hip. I swear on the gods, the Temple will have revenge on these bastards!”

“Some of them came back,” a younger girl said. She looked to be around fifteen or sixteen, her cheeks still chubby from lingering baby fat. “They said the tortures covered their eyes and tied them to chairs, and they did some magic to them they’ve never felt. They said it felt as if they had no magic after, but then they came back here and no one can feel magic in here. A few days later, someone took them out of here again and they haven’t come back.”

“Sounds like the Magicae Furem Device,” Skulduggery muttered quietly, turning to the gate.

“That’s not unexpected,” Valkyrie groused. “We could have guessed they’d be doing experiments. So we know no more than before and we’re trapped in the Children of the Spider’s lair. How is this helpful?”

“It isn’t.”

“I told you this would happen. I told you we should lay low, and if we had done that we probably wouldn’t be here right now.”

“If we weren’t here right now, we wouldn’t know where the kidnapped victims were,” Skulduggery said, drawing out each word as he got frustrated with Valkyrie’s tone.

“Now see here,” the old man said. “I am _not_ a victim.”

Valkyrie ignored him. “I don’t understand why my plan wouldn’t have worked. We’ve done hundreds of stakeouts; we’ve done hundreds of tailings. We could have done it just fine, even with Militsa with us. We could have had backup and gotten the Sanctuary to use their new drones to follow the Spiders! Instead we’re here because your plans are utter shit.”

“We couldn’t have known this would happen Valkyrie. The plan was the best idea I had given the circumstances, I apologise for the situation we’re in, but I truly don’t know what you would have liked me to do.”

“Listen to me, maybe? Perhaps considered that I’m not a complete idiot and my ideas have been consistently good and produced good results. It’s _very_ rare my plans fail!”

“I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you the way you feel I should have, but I did what I thought was best. Yes, my plan failed, but you have no proof yours would work any better than mine other than your own opinion. I’m happy to discuss this later if you feel strongly about it, but right now is not the time nor the place.”

Valkyrie turned away from him, clenching her fists tightly. There was no point fighting him on his attitude without coming off as the one with the bigger issues, so she had no choice but to give in and let it go until they had escaped, finished the mission and they were all safe. Then she could get however annoyed she wanted and it wouldn’t matter.

“Are you okay, Mil?” She asked, trying to keep the resentment and fury out of her tone.

Militsa looked at her guiltily, as if Skulduggery’s words were hers, and answered quietly. “Yeah I’m fine, don’t worry.”

Valkyrie nodded and took a discrete deep breath. “Can anyone name any of the captures? We need to know who we’re dealing with.”

There was a short silence until the fifteen year old spoke up again. “Um, most people came down with masks on, but there were a few that didn’t. One man was a Necromancer, Vandameer Craven. He claimed to be a Cleric, but I don’t know who he is.”

“He _was_ a Cleric,” the same old man spat. “He aided the Children in the Spider in killing many of the Irish Temple Necromancers. I didn’t believe one of our own would betray us, but now I know the truth… he may be considered a Cleric to some still, but I assure you when I get out of here I will guarantee his name is considered an enemy.”

“Okay, other than Craven, was there anyone else? Can you describe people who you don’t know the names of?” Valkyrie asked.

The old man continued. “Craven told us a man named Stolen is in charge of the experiments. Some muscular, military type men came down to get information out of us occasionally but they were no one remarkable.”

“Describe them,” Valkyrie demanded.

He sneered at her. “Don’t you give orders to me, child. I am far too old and far too wise–”

“You’re not in a position–”

“ _DO NOT INTERUPT ME_!” He screamed furiously. Valkyrie bared her teeth angrily. “You have no right to ever talk down to me like I am some lowlife citizen, as if I am some common rat on the streets. I am a powerful man and you are _nothing_ but a child!”

“You are an old man stuck in a _cage_ ,” Valkyrie growled back. “And you are entirely at the mercy of serial killers, tortures and scientists hellbent on taking your magic away and killing you. We already know about their little projects. They’re going to take your magic for themselves, systematically going through all of you for information on the locations of more powerful Necromancers until you’re no longer useful and then they’ll kill you. But go ahead. Tell me I’m a stupid little bitch and I’ll make sure to go out of my way to let you remain in your cage so you can make your own escape without me and my help.”

“You have no idea–”

“I know exactly what I’m doing. What, you think if I actually bother to help you get out of here you can go to your little shadow buddy meeting and tell them what a horrible little girl I am and they’ll come kill me? Me and Skulduggery are the only assholes stupid enough to help you so shut the fuck up before I _break your_ _fucking_ _face_. You couldn’t get out of here if you tried, even if I opened every door and took out every Spider and mercenary, you’d die of old age before you find the energy to stand. You are a weak old man past your prime with too much book knowledge and not enough weapons to be of any use to us. So unless you’re going to cooperate with the people that are literally here to help you escape with your life, keep it to yourself. I am not above breaking your jaw to shut you up.”

The man when purple, or perhaps red, it was difficult for Valkyrie to tell in the incredibly low lighting, and stood up using the shoulders of the people sitting next to him. No one had been looking, embarrassed at Valkyrie’s crude words and the old man’s outburst, but now they were looking more closely between the two. Skulduggery was still studying the metal gate and didn’t bother turning. She was capable of looking after herself.

The old man shakily hobbled on his rattily knees and stopped a foot from Valkyrie who crossed her arms and tilted her hip. He raised his arm and she raised an eyebrow.

He swung slowly and her fist shot into his face and he fell like a sack of bricks.

Unfortunately, it didn’t knock him out.

“You nasty bitch! You dirty little _whore_ , you stupid little _cunt_! I’ll have you killed for this!”

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. “Oh my god, please just stop, this is pathetic.” Militsa put a hand on her arm and Valkyrie sagged. “Yeah, I know.”

She helped drag the man to the wall where he glared and tried to act like painful tears weren’t leaking from his eyes – some mutters includeed claims that “real men don’t feel pain, you selfish _bint_!” – before taking a deep breath and turning to the teenage girl. “Can you please describe those men?”

She did quietly, describing, to Valkyrie’s knowledge, Juandré Opperman and Lemae Van Wyk, two of the main Wild Brothers. Both Spingheeled Jack and Scapegrace seemed to be culprits also, though she had been sure Scapegrace had been arrested after the Doomsday Machine business in Las Vagas.

“This is sort of hopeless,” she murmured quietly to Skulduggery. Militsa was sitting with the fifteen year old, Erembour Kage, who seemed scared in general but was far sweeter and reasonable than most of the adult Necromancers who were much more interested in appeasing their Cleric and trusted scholar whose name Valkyrie purposefully refused to listen to. “How the hell are we meant to get out of this? With them?”

“I have a plan, that’s how,” he said lowly. “Everyone, silence. Valkyrie, can you hear that?”

Everyone, even the old man, went silence for them to listen. In the distance, echoing, footsteps approached.

“What’s the plan?” She whispered silently.

He stepped back behind the stone wall – the front of the cell was designed to have a stone wall about three feet in, then about six feet of metal rods, then the door, and the same on the other side. This meant Skulduggery was hidden from view where he now stood. “You do something to make them come in and I’ll slip out. Nothing to get punished, just enough to cause attention.”

Valkyrie sighed, already knowing how awfully this plan was going to go, but was at least more on board than she had been with the previous plan he’d had. She moved the hostages around so she’d have more room in the middle of the back wall, giving her space should she need it. Militsa remained the nearest to her, Erembour sticking close to her.

A young appearing woman came into view, wearing dark clothes with spider webs and dust clinging on. She glared into the cell, obviously trying to account for Skulduggery. Her eyes landed on Valkyrie.

“Where’s the Skeleton?”

“He left,” she said simply.

“He – what did you say?” She said slowly, confusing immediately taking over her previously fairly cold and indifferent tone.

Valkyrie shrugged. “He left. He just, you know, stepped through the bars.”

The woman assessed the bars. Valkyrie assessed her face, trying to place her but not really able to. “What does that mean?”

Valkyrie feigned confusion. “I mean he fits through the gaps of the bars? Because he’s a skeleton? Like, he has to take off some body parts and stuff them through after the rest of him’s on the other side and work out the angles, but when he gets them through he just pops them back on and off he goes. Did… did you not know he could do that?”

The woman glared at her and puffed her chest up indignantly. “How am I suppose to know he can do that?”

“I don’t know, because he’s your sworn enemy and that’s a pretty big thing you should know before you put a thin-ass skeleton in a cell with gaps? It’s just common sense to be honest. You can look around if you want, but he’s gone though. He went left.”

The woman turned to her left and then narrowed her eyes back on Valkyrie. “If he’d gone that way I’d have run unto him. You’re lying.”

Valkyrie rolled her eyes. “Your _other_ left.”

The woman tutted, obviously not believing her, and pulled a gun out from the back of her trousers. She aimed it at Valkyrie hazardously. “If anyone moves, I will kill you. And I’m only using this gun because it’s new. I still have all my magic, unlike you.”

Valkyrie put her hands up mockingly and the woman glared at them all before opening the door. Her black as pitch eyes scanned the room as best as she could, looking right over Skulduggery and not spotting him in the shadows. She stepped further in and Valkyrie knew this was the chance she needed to begin.

“What type of gun is that?” She asked.

The woman hesitated and then spoke while she continued to look around. “It’s a pistol.”

“Yeah but what type?”

She rolled her eyes. “I don’t know, kid, is that what you want me to say? I don’t know what type it is, but I know how to use it and I’ll shoot you in the knee to prove a point if I have to.”

“No you won’t.”

She scoffed. “Yes, I will, it’s a gun and I’m less than eight feet away from you.”

“Well, yeah, I know you can pull the trigger in my direction, but I mean you won’t shoot me. My clothes are protective, I won’t get hurt. Well, no, it will really hurt, but it won’t go through me.”

“You are as annoying as they say you are.”

Valkyrie gave the woman her cutest grin. “Do you like it?”

She almost replied, then went red and decided to cover with anger instead. “Don’t be obtuse. My bullets might not pierce you, but they sure would break your kneecap! Don’t push me.”

“Yeah, but what’s the point if there’s no blood?”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah, of course I am!” Valkyrie said with some passion despite her wildly beating heart. This was the stupidest act she’d ever done. “There’s no point in hurting someone if you can’t even see good results! That’s just, like, low level stuff.”

“Just, just shut up,” she said after a moment to think about how dumb Valkyrie sounded. Valkyrie didn’t blame her. “I have to report the skeleton missing now.”

“Honestly? There isn’t much point. I know where he’s going and how he’s doing it, and me and him are the only two people in the world that knows the plan. There’s legitimately no reason to even report him missing unless you know the plan and I’m hardly about to tell you. And I bet The Torment won’t be happy if you don’t have all the information. And if you go to a supervisor, and they say you said he was missing but told him nothing else, both The Torment and your supervisor will be mad.”

“Well then,” the lady said slowly, pacing towards her slowly. “You better tell me what you know.”

“Why would I do that?”

The lady got to only a foot in front of her and Valkyrie had to stay still as the gun rested on her forehead. “Because I have the gun.”

“And I have the information. You can’t kill me, gorgeous. I’m too valuable.”

Out of the corner of her eyes, Valkyrie saw Skulduggery dart out and silently run through the open door and down the way the woman had come from. Now she needed to give him time.

“You have to be the most annoying little shit I’ve ever had to deal with,” the woman said with disgust. A moment later a man came up on the cell from way Skulduggery had just gone. He made no alarms so Valkyrie assumed he must have gotten by him despite Valkyrie’s heart still jumping fearfully.

“Who’s that?” Valkyrie asked.

“I’m not going to fall for–”

“Portia,” the man said deeply.

She jumped slightly and turned her head, keeping the gun on Valkyrie. Valkyrie had every chance to remove the gun from her and turn the tables but that wasn’t the point of her task. “Syn! Sorry, I was just, um, disciplining Cain.”

“What did Cain do?”

“She’s making up stories,” Portia said with a roll of her eyes. “She claims Skulduggery Pleasant fit through the gaps of the cell and is making his getaway. I say he was never here to begin with because this is a low-level cell and he’d obviously be in a higher graded cell.”

Syn shrugged and nodded. “Makes sense. How are you going to punish her?”

Valkyrie was now stuck between being glad she had managed her task and being horrified by her actions. “Um, maybe can we just forget about it?”

“Shut up,” Portia snapped quietly. “I’m going to hurt her of course.”

“I overhead something about protective clothing,” Syn smiled.

“Yeah,” Portia said, nodding. She wet her lips and gestured with her head. “Stand up. Take the protective clothes off.”

“What!? You can’t be serious, I’ll freeze and then I’ll be dead and then someone will definitely be angry!” Valkyrie said quickly. “It’ll still hurt if you punch me, you just can’t stab me!”

Portia was silent for a moment, trying to work out how to make it work in her favour, and Syn opened his mouth to comment when Portia finally made up her mind and put the gun on Militsa. She stepped over to hold the barrel against Militsa’s temple easier. “Take the protective clothes off.”

Valkyrie swallowed and stood slowly. Syn leaned against the open doorframe with a smirk and watched as she took off her shoes and trousers. “I’m a minor by the way,” she said snootily. “So maybe don’t watch me or I’ll make sure to report it to HR.”

“There’s no HR here,” Syn said, continuing to watch.

Portia grimaced at him. “Syn, please don’t be so… disrespectful.”

“Disrespectful,” he repeated with a laugh in his voice. “You’re about to torture her.”

“No, I’m going to beat her up a bit for what she tried to tell me, I’m not going to get in the way of the experiments. The Master would be angry with us for doing that.”

He rolled his eyes and stepped forwards. “Fine. Keep the gun on the ginger and I’ll punish Cain.”

Valkyrie pulled a face and didn’t even see Syn as he punched her so fast she couldn’t follow him. She folded immediately, and he was already giving her an uppercut, grabbing her hair and slamming his elbow into the back of her neck with his other arm. She fell to her knees and her ankle was stomped, followed quickly by him kicking her shoulder to get her on her back.

She struggled to breathe, impressed with how fast he was and how much pain he inflicted so rapidly. He kneeled after a moment thinking, grabbed her left shoulder with his iron grip, and began beating her.

Fist after fist came down on her face until she could barely breathe, and then they moved to her chest and down to her stomach. When she curled in on herself, he let it happen and stood to pant for a moment before kicking and stamping her legs and back. He hit her with incredible speed and restrained strength. Every touch left her blooming in new agony, but he continued so brutally fast that nothing he did made it worse, simply prolonged the punishment.

Valkyrie didn’t even notice when he stepped away from her, tensing for his next attack, until Militsa was thrown on top of her. Valkyrie’s eyes widened and she gasped out, pushing Militsa next to her and throwing her body over her before Syn could strike her.

“Yeah, I thought you’d care more if I threatened your friend,” he chuckled, acting like it was an enjoyable game. “Come on, move. Let me hit her and we can leave.”

“Just leave her alone. She’s not meant to be involved in this,” Valkyrie gurgled out. Blood from her broken teeth and bitten tongue got in the way of her voice. “She’s just a normal person.”

Syn paused for a moment. “I don’t really care.”

The kicking began again but he put less work into it and seemed to give up after not that long. Many of the kicks got through to Militsa, but Valkyrie took many of them in the side of her torso and along her arms until they felt numb. Portia was the one to awkwardly suggest Syn leave with her, citing wanting to check the other cells still. He agreed and they left.

“Valkyrie?” Militsa’s small voice came from below her. Valkyrie tried not to groan, not wanting to hurt her throat any more than it already was. She pulled herself up with her right arm and dropped next to her, hissing painfully as her muscles spasmed. “Oh, no. I don’t think you should have done that.”

“Which bit?” Valkyrie couldn’t help but ask as the cold stone began steeping into her bare legs. She tried to take a deep breath only to feel intense pain in her ribs and ended up being thrown into an excruciating coughing fit, leading her to inhale more of her blood and coughing even more.

Militsa waited for her to calm down and stroked her hair gently. “Listening to Skulduggery.”


	212. Hansard Kray

**Chapter 212**

**_Tanith’s POV_ **

Very early morning came and found Tanith breastfeeding Laila in their bedroom with Dexter, Nadia and Erskine. Nadia sat next to her sleepily, getting ready to take Laila and likely sleep in with her in Tanith’s bed until morning.

“It’s been almost forty hours,” Erskine said slowly. “We might just have to leave without them.”

“What if they need help?” Asked Dexter quietly.

“It’s Skul and Val,” he shrugged. “I expect they’ll be fine. And we need to do this, you know how dangerous True Name’s are. As long as Lament and his friends are reasonable people, we’ll only be there briefly anyway, so we might we well do it quick and come back with four more people to help us.”

Dexter yawned and shrugged. “Sounds alright to me. Tanith?”

“I’m happy to come with you,” she nodded. “If I’m allowed.”

“Aww, the Sanctuary doesn’t have to know,” he smirked. “They can’t control the Dead Men anyway. Although I wouldn’t be surprised if they stopped their contract with us to keep the peace longer.”

Tanith nodded. “I was wondering that.”

“Have you made plans with Ghastly for Laila?” Erskine asked softly.

She looked at the baby and Laila looked up at her sleepily. Her blonde hair was growing in properly now and no longer falling out like many young babies did after birth. It was perfectly straight on her head rather than curled like her own had been. Ghastly said his father had had straight hair, and his mother fairly straight with some kinks in it. Their baby had obviously taken from her paternal grandparents, unless it all altered as she aged. Her eyes were still infant blue and hair perfect blonde, she had lots of changes to go through.

How many of those changes, the important milestones, did she want to miss?

How many were worth missing to ensure her child would have a world worth living in?

“I’m not sure,” she said quietly. “I haven’t made a decision.”

The men didn’t argue with her, thankfully, and instead made excuses to get themselves ready for the job. Tanith sighed and stroked Laila’s head soothingly as she drank and sat in the dim light of the room after she’d finished and nodded off. Despite the challenges, Tanith had been looking forward to being a mother. She had taken a blow when Ghastly’s behaviour had changes but since birthing and seeing how well he had, eventually, stepped up to being a father, she was happy with her choices. But as the war got closer and more serious decisions came up, the more she doubted if she’d done the right thing. Her child wasn’t planned, and she came at a bad time, in a relationship that she hadn’t even realised yet was going to end in disaster. Laila did at least have Dual Citizenship, but Tanith wasn’t certain what countries were safe to move to if she did leave with her – both Ireland and England, alongside Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, were all too close to be considered safe, as well as being countries about to be at war with Ireland. Perhaps she could move them to Africa in hopes of a union between the countries to stand with Ireland as a fellow Cradle country, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to risk her baby’s life over a possibility.

But if not Africa, where?

“What do you think?” Tanith whispered quietly. “What would you do?”

Nadia moaned sleepily. “About what? Leaving? If Laila was mine?”

“Yeah.”

“I would leave,” Nadia said instantly before yawning. “I’m happy to take her with me if you want to stay to fight, but if she were my baby, I’d want to stay with her. I don’t know how you’d function knowing she wasn’t with someone capable of fighting. You know I’d do my best, but I’m not all that capable of fighting. I don’t want something to happen to her. I think me and Laila would be better off with you.”

“Where would you go?”

“My parents, if I had to,” she said slowly. “India will probably follow the rest of Asia in going to war. They were not that involved in the war against Mevolent but that’s mostly because technology wasn’t good enough to put in the same about of resources. But even then, cargo ship’s full of soldiers came here over and over to fight. Mostly against Ireland, and a bit against Australia though they were never as involved as Ireland obviously… I don’t think my family would want you there. They would accept me and Laila, but you’re too recognisable and they wouldn’t want that risk. We could go to my cousins in America, they’d help us, one of them has a baby not that much older than Laila so they’d understand. But no country is safe at the moment.”

“That’s my worry.”

Nadia put a hand on her arm sympathetically. “We’ll work something out. We’ll make sure nothing happens to Laila especially. I’m glad I’m not you in that way. This has to be a really hard decision to make.”

Tanith couldn’t help but agree with that assessment.

**.*****.**

The train, Dexter claimed after talking to his underground contacts, would be going through a field in Ireland within a minute. Tanith stood next to Erskine, Dexter on his other side, and wondered aloud: “How far do you know to take us into the invisibility bubble? Before we get hit by the train when it comes through?”

Erskine hesitated and then looked her in the eye. “I don’t know.”

She stared out into the field. “Wonderful.”

They walked exactly twelve steps once they found a large oak tree, as Dexter had been instructed by his friend, and then they waited. It hit oh-six-one-seven and the train didn’t come. Erskine put an arm around Tanith and Dexter’s waists, and she put her arm around his waist back while Dexter’s went over his shoulders. Tanith almost opened her mouth to ask if their timings were correct, but then she heard faint whistling sound in the distances that reminded her strongly of when she was a younger woman taking trains around the world visiting people and places, saving all her money for travel, weapons and concerts.

Erskine lifted them high up until they suddenly couldn’t hear the incoming train and floated slightly lower and waited. Without any true build up, tracks appeared on the ground several feet ahead of them and the black steam train came into being some few hundred yards away.

“ _I’ll drop us off op top_!” Erskine shouted. “ _We’ll break in and find Dagan or Kray_!”

Tanith nodded as Dexter shouted his agreement. She couldn’t help but feel fearful as the train blasted past them at high speeds and Erskine began manipulating the air to keep them almost in line with it, angling them down towards the top of the train to land. Teeth gritted her teeth, preparing herself for the power of the train.

It wasn’t enough, even with Erskine’s help at keeping the wind at bay. As soon as Erskine let her go on the train top, her strength was no match for the sheer speed of the vessel and she flew back, rolling wildly with no control.

She gasped as she went, too panicked to waste time screaming. She flew over a gap between two compartments and tried to grab on but only jarred her shoulder before flying back off and sliding, this time without so much chaotic rolling, down the next carriage. She glanced behind herself and prepared, and when the next gap between carriages came, she forced her legs down and drove in the gap.

Using her magic, she kneeled on the door on the forward most cart. She waited only to catch her breath and then sidestepped, opened the unlocked door, and jumped into the carriage.

Air pressure changed and she almost fell. It was full of crates and Tanith decided she might as well have a look inside – using her sword, she thrust the blade between a side and the top of a crate and forced the lid up until she could see inside with the camera on her phone. Inside, hundreds, if not a full thousand, of grenades were thrown together in the box like stuffed toys for children.

Feeling quite uncomfortable with her find, Tanith removed her sword and pressed down on the top to force the screws back in. Some stuck on at angles but she didn’t concern herself with it. She went through the carriage and moved through to the next one against the current of the wind. Once she’d forced the door closed, the air settled and she narrowed her eyes. She prepared herself and turned her light on.

Rows of Hollow Men, staring straight at her, packed in so tightly their paper skins were melding into one another and only kept back by a thin rope cordoning them off. A string they could easily break through now they’d seen her.

She turned off her light and heard the rustle of them jumping for her as she flipped to the ceiling. Hollow Men never had good eyesight but it was fairly obvious they were the more expensive, hardier type when they started reaching upwards for her. She threw herself and slid across the roof quickly, dropped behind the string on the other side and broke the lock of the door.

She was out and into the next room as quickly as she could manage.

“Oh,” a man’s voice said. Tanith turned and found herself looking at Hansard Kray, Arthur Dagan’s young son. She flicked her hair out of her eyes. “I was watching you on the cameras. Thank you for not damaging the merchandise.”

“No problem,” she said simply, sheathing her sword. “Did two men come through here? They’re meant to be with me.”

“Dexter Vex and Erskine Ravel? Yes, I saw them too. They’re on the roof. I assume they’ll join us eventually,” he shrugged. “What are you here for?”

“We need information,” she said immediately.

“No can do,” he shook his head, darting around the long desk on one side of the room and sitting in the high-backed chair. He had a laptop plugged in and he closed the screen. “My father’s business is built on customer trust. If I told someone working with the Dead Men, who work with the Sanctuary, with all that political problems going on, and it got out? We’d be in trouble. And someone would find out I told you.”

Tanith took a breath, glanced at the floor, and looked up at him through her eyelashes, giving him a head tilt for good measure. He didn’t seem immediately interested so she licked her bottom lip. “You’re Hansard Kray, right? Mr Kray, I appreciate your dedication,” she started, sauntering to his desk and sitting in one of the wide chairs opposite him. She sat with her legs open, “and I understand your concerns. But you have to understand my side. I’m not trying to participate in a war, or any politics at all for that matter. In fact, I think the information you have might well help _stop_ a war.”

To his credit, he did consider her words. Dexter had told her on the way he was supposedly more neutral than his father, but Tanith was betting on him wanting to rebel against his father’s likely harsh and overpowering beliefs. Young people loved doing that, just as Nadia did in leaving her parents at such a young age. “I suppose I’d be willing to talk about it. It depends on what information you want. I’ve been working on digitalising some of the company records, but it’s slow going and we don’t have all of them computerised yet.”

She nodded sympathetically, wishing Dexter would hurry up to help her. She was only good at this stuff for so long and if Hansard didn’t hurry, she was just going to dropkick him and take his laptop. “Of course. We just need to know about deliveries to a man called Tyren Lament. We don’t need to know the supplies necessarily, just where he had them brought to. The deliveries might also have been under the name Vernon Plight, Lenka Bazaar or Kalvin Accord.”

He sighed and opened his laptop, clicking away at the keyboard far faster than she could. Not a moment later, Dexter slammed the door at the other end of the carriage open and sent her a grin before moving to let Erskine in. They closed the door back up and silently came to sit with her.

Hansard continued to type away, scrolled, stared intently at the screen, clicked a bunch and started typing again. They waited patiently until he finally looked up, looked right at Dexter, flicked his eyes down to Dexter’s splayed legs, and back to his face seriously. Tanith saw Dexter smirk out the corner of her eye and Hansard reddened.

He cleared his throat. “I’ve found Lament in our database. There aren’t many files to him, but we do have a delivery location for him. I don’t know if I can tell you much else. Is there anything in particular you want to know?”

Tanith looked to Dexter and he took over with a handsome grin. “I don’t suppose you can tell me where those deliveries are being taken to, Mr Kray?”

Hansard looked down at his computer as soon as Dexter started talking. He’d spoken in a deeper, gruffer tone. Tanith held in a laugh. “It would massively break protocol to do that. I’d need a good reason to justify it.”

Dexter shrugged and leaned back more into his seat, spreading his legs more and putting an arm over his head, revealing some of his toned abdomen and the hair there. Hansard didn’t look, though it seemed to pain him. “We believe the people you’re delivering too are illegally keeping a man captive there. We don’t know the details but considering the leader of those people are Irish and the current state of the world, they could use this man’s nationality to start a way. It only takes something small when countries already want it. We’re trying to deal with it before it gets out. We also believe this is connected to the mortals gaining magical abilities, so you can imagine it’s rather important to us. I’d be… indebted to you if you could help us.”

Hansard swallowed and thought about it for a moment before scrolling on his computer. “He used the company three times in total over fifty years. Twice from New York to Dublin, and once from Africa to Switzerland. The Switzerland job was the last time he used us.”

“We’ll be interested in that address.”

He grabbed his notebook, wrote it down, ripped out the page and stood to hand it to Dexter.

“Thank you so much Mr Kray,” Dexter grinned. “We really appreciate it.”

Hansard shrugged. “I don’t want a war as much as the next person.”

“Of course,” Dexter smiled, and waved his hand at Tanith and Erskine to get moving. Tanith got to the door the fastest and waited for the men. When they were both there, Erskine held onto them and flew them up and out of the invisibility bubble. “Thank Christ.”

Tanith laughed. “I really thought we were fucked when I was left with him.”

“Ah, nah, you had it in the bag!” Dexter encouraged. “Unless you were flirting, because from what I’ve seen, you’re an awful flirt.”

“I flirt fine! Why would I try hard on someone who already wants me? There’s no point!”

Erskine started laughing as Tanith and Dexter continued to bicker playfully and took them into the treeline by their car.

“I’m just saying,” Dexter continued with a grin, “you could try harder. And you could do better than that Sanctuary girl. She’d be so, you know, boring over time.”

Tanith shrugged. “I’m not really looking for commitment right now so it doesn’t matter. Just a distraction on my off-time parenting.”

Erskine shrugged. “That’s a good reason.”

“I know,” Tanith said, bumping her shoulder with his. “I’m sure Ghastly has someone too.”

Both men snorted and she held back a smile. “Yeah, sure,” Erskine quipped. “Like he’ll move on from you in the next six years.”

She sent him a confused look. “You’re not telling me he still has feelings for me, are you?”

“Obviously!” Erskine laughed, unlocking the car. “You have to be delusional to think he’s moved on from you. You’re one of the best people he’s probably ever dated.”

She grimaced and got into the back seat. “Are you being serious? Stop playing.”

“We are,” Dexter said, turning back in the driver’s seat. He had an incredulous look on his face that made her think he thought she was being stupid. “He still loves you.”

She sighed deeply and closed her eyes. “That’s ridiculous.”

“It isn’t!”

“It is, because why would he treat me with contempt and as an object if he _loves_ me?”

“You know why,” Erskine said, entirely flummoxed by her less-than-happy reaction.

“I don’t, actually, so please explain.”

“Because he’s an idiot.”

She cracked a smile. “Okay, I might have known that.”


	213. A Great Escape

**Chapter 213**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

Valkyrie didn’t know how long it had been, but her body was sore, her bones ached, and she could barely lift her head. Her throat was dry and her head pounded painfully. Militsa was stroking her hair softly. She was laying on her lap.

Valkyrie reached up, feeling the pain all through her ribs, and put a hand over Militsa’s to stop her. She was rubbing over a sore lump on the side of her head.

“Val?” Militsa whispered. Her voice was sharp in the cold, silent cell. “Are you awake?”

Valkyrie grunted softly, unwilling to move.

“I need you to wake up,” Militsa whispered.

Valkyrie moaned painfully but forced her body to comply, hissing when Militsa tried to be nice and help her sit but only pushed on her aching ribs. She sat herself up and shuffled back to ease against the wall. Her already sore skin didn’t like being pressed against something hard, nor the freezing cold of the stone, but it was better than supporting her own weight.

Militsa stood and peed in the corner and Valkyrie waited for her to get back, trying to control her breathing. “We need a plan,” she whispered huskily to whoever was listening.

The old man from the day before – she assumed she’d slept long enough for it to be a new day – grunted and spoke softly. “Agreed.”

“Don’t you think Skulduggery would have one?” Militsa asked as she came back over on silent feet.

“To be honest, Mil,” she said somewhat harshly, “I wouldn’t put it past him to entirely leave us. I like to think he hasn’t but… I really don’t know. I don’t know if I trust him yet. But it’s been hours, we need our own plan that doesn’t revolve around him. He’s a magnet for trouble, he most likely got captured.”

“There were voices,” the old man said. “Sounded like a scuffle.”

“When?” She asked as quickly as she could. Militsa pressed into Valkyrie’s side and opened her arm up to young Erembour, who snuggled into her warmth. The poor girl seemed frozen cold, her lips blue. Since she was from Australia, and considering her age, she may have only recently been allowed out of the Temple, so she likely wasn’t used to being so cold without warm cloaks and blankets for so long. Valkyrie’s heart went out to the poor girl. She seemed an age younger than Valkyrie ever had been.

“Not long before you woke up,” he said. “They usually visit us in the mornings, bringing us our water and food rations. I expect they’ll be by soon.”

Valkyrie perked up. “Do they open the door for that?”

“Not usually. But they might be tempted, if you convince them.”

Valkyrie restrained from rolling her eyes if only to not agitate her headache. “I’ll think of something. If they open the door, do you guys think you could take them down? If it’s just one person?”

“I am sure of it,” he said, a menacingly cruel tone to his voice. Valkyrie doubted he was still capable of whatever horrible thing he used to be able to do ‘back in the day’.

“Okay. Just, everyone get ready, and I’ll think of something.”

There was some sitting up, shuffling, taking turns using their bathroom corner, and then they settled back in to wait. It wasn’t that long, though it felt longer considering there was nothing to do, say, or hear, but eventually they all perked up at the sound of footsteps coming towards them.

The woman from the day before, Portia, came into view with a scowl. She had an armful of plastic water bottles, no labels, and a tote bag of food. She looked over them all sceptically.

“You’re alive,” she said finally, looking at Valkyrie.

Valkyrie croaked her voice, barely letting more than a whisper out. “Just about.”

Portia looked at her critically. “Anything bleeding? Broken?”

“Ribs. Think I’m bleeding internally,” she said, not letting her voice rise. She stared in Portia’s direction and let her eyes drift before settling back on her. “Water.”

“Hmm,” Portia said, and unlocked the door with her key, trusting them entirely too much. “You’re not meant to die. You’re not allowed.”

Valkyrie grunted but didn’t say anything. No one did anything, letting Portia come close. Militsa did take the bag of food when Portia dropped it and began shuffling in it and passing food down the line. Staying natural. Portia opened a bottle of water and held it to Valkyrie’s lips. She drank gratefully, taking a bit over half the bottle before holding up a hand. Portia took it away and put the lid back on. “Thanks.”

“Yeah, well,” she said darkly. “Don’t tell anyone. Let me see your ribs.”

Valkyrie pulled her shirt up with her more painful arm. The grimace she made wasn’t fake. Portia gently pressed around her ribs, checking for breaks around the black, blue, yellow and green marks. Some of them might have been purple but it was too dark to tell the difference in colour. “Doesn’t seem broken,” she commented slowly. “Can you breathe properly? Is it your lungs?”

“Don’t know,” she said, breathing in tensely to make her breath tattle. The old man began standing up.

“Hey, sit down or I’ll put you down,” Portia glared.

“I’m just going to relieve myself,” he said primly. “And I’ll need help to stand. Jackleg! Help me up! And you, Tooth, don’t think I forgot about you.”

Portia looked as the two men tried to help the old man stand, and the old man struggling, and then turned back to Valkyrie. The three pretended to struggle until they were almost past Portia, and then turned on her. The men had taken her out before she had a chance to realise her mistake. She dropped on Valkyrie, who cried out loudly.

“Quiet, you fool!” The old man hissed. Jackleg and Tooth rolled Portia off of her. She took a deep breath and accepted their help to her feet. It felt like hundreds of needles were piercing her right through the bones, but once she was standing, she didn’t think she’d just topple over. Militsa handed her some food from the bag, a banana, and Valkyrie ate it quickly while everyone else consumed their rations. They may need the energy so Valkyrie didn’t feel inclined to stop them.

Jackleg searched Portia while they finished up and pulled out the gun. She didn’t suggest giving it to her, Jackleg just found spare bullets for the handgun in Portia’s jacket pocket and made sure it was loaded. He seemed much stronger, much more capable than her when she was so weak. After she thought everyone was ready enough, she whispered for them to go, and they filed out of the cell.

She noticed immediately that she couldn’t use her magic, which was a big pity because she knew full well her magic would have been powerful enough to incapacitate low level enemies or outright kill any particularly nasty criminals the rest of them might not be able to deal with. Plus, she seemed to be the only one whose magic didn’t rely on an object. And no one had their objects.

Within two minutes of leaving the cell and slowly racing with their best guesses towards some type of exit, Valkyrie and the old man began to lag. His joints slowed him down, quite obviously as he grabbed onto the nearest individual for support, and Valkyrie’s injuries made speed difficult. Their breaths echoed in the dark, barely lit dungeon, their footsteps more so, but it wasn’t as horrible as Valkyrie feared. The Spiders didn’t suspect any wrongdoing, just as they hadn’t noticed Skulduggery was gone – although she was still very aware that the old man claimed he heard some sort of fight before she woke up. She was pretending it was some Spiders getting into an argument and had nothing to do with Skulduggery being captured and if she got away she’d have to come back for him. She wasn’t sure if she’d bother.

They came across their first two guards at the bottom of the stairs. A woman and a man, leaning against the wall and talking with smiled on their faces, possibly flirting. Valkyrie made everyone hide behind the corner and got Jackleg and Tooth to take them out. The men sidled up to the two easily, sticking to the shadows and lucky the pair were so deep in conversation. They took them out quickly and Valkyrie rushed forward and opened a nearby cell for them to be dumped in. She almost told them not to kill the pair, but Jackleg and Tooth let them go at a good time and laid them down carefully, with more care than she had thought. She guiltily held the door open for them and closed it softly behind them. Jackleg locked it and flashed her a grin.

Indicating for the others to follow, she swallowed her pain and followed the men up the stairs. They saw as two people left a room and another made a joke before going in. She mouthed the word “ _Staffroom_ ” at the men and they nodded once. They jogged off and opened the door like they owned the place.

It shut softly behind them and Valkyrie watched, heart pounding, to see if their ballsy approach worked. There was silence for a long moment and she felt herself begin to sweat from the stress and then – a gunshot, and another, and another. Silence.

She stayed utterly still, crouched on the top step with the others hovering behind her. It was lighter up there, at least, and seemed cleaner also. She didn’t see any spiders, though there were a few small webs in the corners of the stairwell. And a camera.

She stared at it in horror before looking away resolutely. It was like they had already seen them if they were checking. She just had to keep moving.

Knowing that, she got up and pushed forward, hearing the group more follow. She got to the door as Tooth opened it. He ushered her in.

She grinned painfully when she saw the control panel, five people lying prone on the floor and cabinets of security paraphernalia. “Close the door, quickly,” she whispered. “Where are the lights?”

“Do we want to do that?” Tooth asked cautiously.

“The camera screens are in here,” she reasoned quietly, indicating her head to the screens, “but there could be more. I’m don’t know The Torment well, but people like him like to personally be able to watch their cameras at all times. So he might already know we’re here. I’ve been told some Children of the Spider can see in the dark, so we may as well have a level playing field and get out fast rather than try to be slow and walk right into a trap.”

“What about Pleasant?” Jackleg asked, already looking over the control panel.

Valkyrie didn’t answer for a moment, instead looking over the monitors. “I’m not sure. But there’s a fifteen year old with us. We have a duty to get her out safe. She comes before Skulduggery. That’s it.”

He shrugged. “Sure. What do we do if we see The Torment?”

“Run. Fight if we have to,” she said simply. “We need to find your Necromancy objects. Not that they’re much use if we don’t turn off those magic dampening signals anyway.”

“Um, Miss?” Someone asked. She looked into the anxious crowd grouped up on one wall, trying to stay out of the way of them and the bodies on the ground. “There’s some signals here?”

She waved them aside and got to the signals at the same time as the old man. They were similar to the ones on standard magic dampening shackles. “That’s it,” she nodded, trying to be hopeful even though she wasn’t certain. “But I’m pretty sure we need someone to break it. Is anyone any good at signals here?”

“I can do it,” the old man groused. “Get me something sharp.”

Militsa found a fountain pen after a short search and gave it to the old man. He opened it. Checked the sharpness of the tip. Held it up the to signal delicately. And scraped a line through the whole thing.

Valkyrie felt her magic come back to her more and more powerfully as the signal was destroyed and its bonds in the building ruined. “I wonder how long it’ll take for them to notice.”

“With the Skeleton skulking around? Not long,” the old man grunted as he continued to ruin the signal. “I can feel my object close by.”

The Necromancer’s began searching and some of them found their objects in a bag in a cupboard. Not all of them, including Militsa, but some of them. Valkyrie was glad Erembour had hers, a choker necklace.

“Give me that broom,” the old man said. Valkyrie did. “It may be beneath me. But I will not be without a weapon.”

He held the broom in his hands and had a look of concentration on his face as he transferred his magic over. Valkyrie hadn’t known Necromancer’s could do that, but considering his age, Cleric station and his supposed abilities, it made sense he could do things others couldn’t. When they were as ready as they could be, Valkyrie took a breath and activated her Aura Vision. She saw people down the hall coming towards the room, people below, probably in cages, and other moving and stationary blobs. Smaller Auras, assumable children, somewhere above them. Children sitting in rows, probably for a class. A group of adults moving quickly… perhaps training, working or cooking. She tried to search for Skulduggery but didn’t find him before filtering through the layers gave her an awful headache and she had to stop.

“Someone’s coming,” she whispered and took her place with the other Necromancers who were now armed. Tooth had his object and Jackleg had the gun.

They jumped out and Tooth immediately wrapped shadows around a young man’s head, knocking him out with efficiency. They darted from the room and got everyone out, dragged the man in and started down the hall. Valkyrie kept Militsa close behind her, and Erembour followed Militsa. There was no way of knowing how deep down they were or where the stairs were, so they just kept going, taking out any person they found and leaving them unconscious. They came upon the first set of stairs without much trouble, brutally taking out two more people with shadows and leaving them in cupboards and empty rooms. Occasionally she flicked her magic into view and still didn’t see Skulduggery’s red aura.

Five minutes into searching the new level, Valkyrie noticed a spider on the wall uneasily. Then they opened a door to find a fully transformed Child of the Spider, and Valkyrie blasted them to dust at the same time as several waves of shadows came to slash the person. She turned on her Aura Vision to see dozens of orange orbs moving and directly ahead, and one floor up – Skulduggery.

“We need to get upstairs again,” she said, adrenaline overtaking her pain quickly. “Skulduggery’s up there, he might know a way out.”

They ran as quickly as they could with the old man, an overweight woman and a man with asthma allowed them to. She felt as if they went in a big circle and the layout made no sense. Spiders were creeping up the walls, above their heads on the ceiling, and although they encountered fewer people, the ones they did were ready for them. She heard when someone in their group yelled out about the stairs and they all went for them, jogging up as fast as possible. More spiders came, getting larger and stronger, crunching under all their feet. Valkyrie had to slap one off her hand.

She was worried she wouldn’t find Skulduggery before they escaped, but they barely took two steps before Skulduggery was thrown through a wall straight into their path. “Skul!” She shouted. “We need to leave!”

“Working on it,” he groaned, standing up. “Get out, I’ll meet you.”

She almost argued to stay together before she heard the hard nubs of a gigantic Spider running full pelt towards them. She barely stayed long enough to see the start of the Spider before she took off in the other direction. No one needed telling to follow her.

There were footsteps now, running for them, and shouts rallying people into place further away. She used her Aura Vision to help know where to go at a cross section in the corridors and pushed them to go left, where there was only one person rather than the massive mass of light waiting on the right. The left way led to a big hall with lots of tables for eating or meeting.

Craven stood on one of the tables on the other end, grinning madly. He lifted his arm and shadows came to life above him, a black mass that would crush them all. Valkyrie shouted and pushed Militsa and Erembour out of the way as Craven threw his arm down.

She really thought they were going to die, so when she felt no more pain than before, she got confused. Looking up, she saw the old man straining with his broom held high, keeping Craven’s shadows off of them.

“Get up,” the old man rasped, stepping away from the man he was holding onto to keep balanced. “Go!”

Valkyrie grabbed the girls and pulled them with her. Craven tried to send his shadows at Valkyrie with an angry snarl but the old man intercepted again and pulled up an immediate whirlwind of shadows he began throwing at Craven. They commenced battle, throwing attacks violently and with more power than Valkyrie had ever seen before. She got caught in the crossfire trying to get everyone out on the other side of the room, a table slamming into them all and throwing them to the floor, little sharp flicks of shadows cutting into their sides. She used her larger body to protect Militsa and Erembour but she had no idea how well it works, especially when a larger shadow slammed into her, knocking her into them and making her scream.

They stumbled out the doors on the other side and she pulled them quickly upright. Not waiting for anyone else, she immediately began down the corridor with a single-minded focus. The area they were in now had pictures on the walls, the floors were polished clean and doors lined the corridor. She flicked on her Aura Vision and felt instantly sick seeing all the little orange Aura’s crouching down, probably under their little desks. Feeling incredibly guilty, she urged the small group that had followed from the hall to hurry.

They found another double door, which Valkyrie blasted with her magic, leaving it gaping open. The new area seemed much as the work area they’d been in before the school area, perhaps for sleeping or another sort of workforce. A flick of her Aura Vision only showed they were surrounded. She turned it off.

Pressing on, she demanded they found more stairs. Almost instantly, they came upon a large, double wide set of stairs with a sign leading up stating ‘Offices/Lounges’ and a woman gliding down the stairs.

The woman and Valkyrie looked at each other at the same moment. Valkyrie couldn’t see the woman’s face but she recognised her. Madam Mist. Mist instantly bent over, vomiting thousands of spiders over herself and down the stairwell. Holding onto a burst of speed, Valkyrie ran close enough, held out an arm and blasted white energy at the woman. Mist threw herself down the last stairs, somehow still gliding as she did it, but Valkyrie didn’t let up. She sent another beam, then another and another, turning spiders and parts of the stairs to dust.

Mist began to transform and Valkyrie’s eyes widened in barely restrained panic. She skidded to a stop, jarring herself painfully, took aim and fired a consistent beam of energy towards the woman, turning to ash the wall, floor and furniture. She scrunched her eyes up, feeling the strain too quickly, and let it suddenly go when she heard a scream. Militsa grabbed her arm, though she remained hiding behind Valkyrie, and pushed her on from the horrifying scene. Madam Mist, on her knees, screaming, quickly reverting back to her human body, surrounded by spiders that were writhing painfully. Blood. A missing arm and parts of her torso.

It was disgusting and Valkyrie was disgusted at her own magic. There was a ringing in her ears and she could feel the sick trying to rise up her throat, and her adrenaline was quickly transforming into panic. She was better off throwing up on herself running than stopping to do it and getting mauled by savage Spider terrorists hellbent on using her to kill her family, then her country, and then the wider world.

She staggered up the stairs to the sounds of Madam Mists screaming which seemed to be devolving into a panic attack Valkyrie tried very carefully not to listen to. She ran quite literally into the front of a man, followed by a few more, and she didn’t even have time to gasp in horror before reacting with another beam, turning Pippin Black, leader of the Wild Brothers, to ash.

The Wild Brother’s look of horror was almost the same as her own. She toned down her power as much as her fear stricken mind could manage and she got two of the Brothers before the others rushed her. She screamed and panicked, falling to her knees, but Erembour and some of the others from their slowly shrinking group were able to throw shadows at the mercenaries and threw them into walls and right down the hall.

Valkyrie scrambled to her feet. “Run! The other way! Go, quick!”

Everyone pushed to go to the right or left, splitting their ground down the middle. There was no way for Valkyrie to know which way was going to keep them alive, she just had to trust if they kept moving they might manage it. She kept Militsa’s hand in her own out of fear of being separated from her friend, and Erembour stuck right beside them.

They all skidded to a halt when the building, even though it was underground, shook violently and the floor ahead of them cracked and then suddenly smashed open. Shadows protected them from the debris, and then a ball of fire, shooting back down into the hole, let them know Skulduggery’s fight had brought him to them.

“Skulduggery!” Valkyrie screamed. “What do we do?!”

The shadows disappeared and Skulduggery, floating in mid-air, flicked his head to her and back into the hole. He clicked his fingers as millions of black little spiders came spilling out over the hole. “Go up on level, that’s the way out! I’ll keep The Torment busy!”

“Oh my god,” she muttered painfully and then turned around and shouted for everyone to follow her again. She’d just have to fight the mercenaries, that was better than The Torment. And getting in the way of Skulduggery in a fight in a small hallway was not a good idea for her group.

Large spiders followed them now, ones as big as dinner plates, and littler ones on the ceiling but hanging down. Valkyrie almost turned the corner to where the mercenaries would surely be on them in an instant before she heard Erembour screaming her name. She came to a dead stop and turned quickly, worried something had happened, but Erembour was right there.

“The ceiling!” She was saying.

“We need to leave!” Valkyrie reiterated.

“The ceiling! Blast a way up!”

Valkyrie didn’t question the girl, just put both her hands above her head, felt the power, and obliterated the ceiling and whatever else was above that.

It wasn’t a big hole, but it was enough for a person to fit through.

“Right, Erembour up, take Militsa,” Valkyrie commanded. The young women grabbed each other and Erembour flew them up and into the hole above. There was a shriek from The Torment in his Spider form, and then Skulduggery screaming like he was being tortured. She turned his way. “Get up, find a window and run!” She shouted, pushing through the group. “ _Go_!”

She had no idea what possessed her to think helping Skulduggery was more important but the idea of losing him after everything was suddenly her greatest fear and she ran full pelt back towards them. She grasped at her power and found enough to throw it at the Spider, who was on Skulduggery with a leg going through his sternum and out the other side, rearing on his back legs and keeping Skulduggery pinned against the wall. It jumped from the pain of her magic but it wasn’t enough to penetrate the thick skin. He turned, dragging Skulduggery’s impaled skeletal body with him. The terror she felt at being opposite The Torment in spider form though… it was like nothing she’d ever felt. She’d been calmer going to save Laila. But this monster? It was otherworldly.

She took a step back in fear and The Torment clicked his pincers. She took another and he reared suddenly, Skulduggery’s body coming loose and falling to the ground. She stopped breathing entirely. One wrong move and he’d be on her and there was nothing she could do. She didn’t know what she was thinking but one moment she was standing, waiting for him to strike, and the next she was sprinting in the other direction, The Torment pursuing her with a hissing, incredibly fast pace, and Skulduggery following behind The Torment in agony.

She flew up into the hole above and began to run, knowing the group would be looking into the nearest doors, some of which were blacked out with spiders, for windows. She was shaking from the fear, her mind fuzzy and pleasantly blank with no thoughts at all, only command after command distantly telling her what to do. She didn’t process any of it, just running, feeling something hit her leg, blasting it with a scream and seeing eight legs and no spider body when she looked down after the damage.

They were so close to freedom. “Mil! Militsa! Erembour!” She screamed, running out of the room she’d flown into and out into yet another hallway. There had to be more hallways than rooms in the building, Valkyrie vaguely mused as she stumbled down the hallway. She thought she heard someone screaming, but when she kicked open a door in hopes of finding some of her group, hopefully halfway out the wall and running away, she was instead greeted with a massive back Spider, and behind them, a woman and four young children screaming in fear of _her_.

The Spider reared up and she, stupidly, closed the door before continuing to run. The Torment and Skulduggery seemed to have resumed their fight, from the sound of things and the lack of Spider killing her, which gave her some hope even in the millions of spiders all around her, crunching underfoot, falling on top of her head, in her clothes. When she heard screaming again, she turned on her Aura Vision to see three orange auras floating away from a larger aura – three people backing away from a Spider. Knowing in her gut it was some of her group, she put on as much speed as she could and burst into another dining hall, this one smaller than the last, and on the other side, one of the male prisoners along with Militsa and Erembour. Erembour seemed to have given her choker to Militsa, who gripped it in her hand and slashed at the Spider with more skill than she expected from the redheaded bookworm, and the man was on the floor backing up, throwing shadows wildly at the Spider. She ran to them, watching at Militsa threw a perfect rod straight into the side of the Spider, who screeched and stepped back.

She could only watch in horror as the male prisoner stood and, fearing the Spider would come for him, grabbed Erembour’s shoulders and pushed her.

The Spider was on her small body before Militsa had any chance of defending her, and they all felt the vibrations of Erembour’s screams when she was impaled through the stomach.

Militsa screamed with her and didn’t do anything, having no training or real knowledge on how to deal with a situation like this. Valkyrie barely did also, and it wasn’t anything she was taught when she ran up behind the man and rugby tackled him, throwing them both under the Spider with Erembour.

A giant Spiders foot went straight through the man’s head, crushing and killing him instantly. Valkyrie used her white magic to blast the Spider, hearing it scream to begin and then adding more power, more power, more power, _more power, MORE POWER_ –

She let out a short, dry sob and looked down at Erembour. She was breathing fast, gasping as her body went into shock. Militsa threw herself down by her head and waved her hands around, panicking. The leg was still inside of Erembour but only a bit of it. Valkyrie didn’t touch it, just pushed an arm under her legs and under her back so her hand was hooked around the young girls’ armpit and forced herself to her feet.

The girl was unfortunately somewhat heavyset, making her much harder for Valkyrie to carry when she was so injured. Erembour sobbed and begged Valkyrie and Militsa to help and Militsa’s voice made a lot of promises Valkyrie was sure were entirely empty and void of hope. She marched herself, barely, through the throngs of spiders and Militsa used Erembour’s choker to sweep the larger spiders away from them. Valkyrie didn’t know what to think, didn’t have enough sense of mind to tell Militsa a type of plan, just kept. On. _Moving_.

She was saved, quite literally, when Skulduggery appeared, like a dead saint in ruined armour, skull etched with cracks and his expression full of pain. She gasped at seeing him, choking up as she thought at least our last moments would be together.

This was broken abruptly by Skulduggery turning and running.

Like a panicked child, Valkyrie burst into sobs and ran after him, feeling Militsa running next to her and holding onto Erembour’s head to keep her stable. Skulduggery didn’t stop, his dark suit blending with the ever-growing spiders that were all at least as large as a paperback and some getting as large as six foot in length. Only the dirty white of his bones kept him in vision, little black spiders obscuring parts. She could feel them on her neck and face, one on her lip she couldn’t remove. She felt pinchers snapping at her skin.

She didn’t know how he did it, but Skulduggery went out of view, giving her what felt like a heart attack, and when she ran hazardously after him, she next saw him at a window, smashing it and making all the spiders keeping it hidden fall away with the glass. Skulduggery waited for her and she didn’t know what to do with herself other than pass Erembour over and wipe her eyes with her arm as Militsa got herself out of the window. She followed and Skulduggery appeared by her side on the wet, muddy and spider covered ground below.

Her heart lurched and she knew they still had a way to go.

“Militsa!” She screamed. “Fly!”

Skulduggery didn’t need telling twice, the air picked him up and he flew quickly into the sky and disappeared into the clouds. Militsa didn’t hear her shouting and kept up her adrenaline filled pace. Valkyrie felt herself getting weaker as she pursued her friend, at the very end of her nerves and energy. Only her superior strength and leg length let her get to her. She didn’t stop them, didn’t say anything, just wrapped her arms around the girl from behind and threw them into the air.

She hadn’t noticed the Spider following her. Any of the three that had been right behind her.

The Spiders began turning back to people, she noticed as she shot them into the air as fast as she could manage. Militsa screamed until she was out of breath and didn’t seem to take in any air. They were lucky it was a cloudy day, and more so that there were clear skies above the clouds for her and Skulduggery to immediately find each other in.

They flew together, Skulduggery with the air and Valkyrie with her white energy at her feet.

“Are you okay?” Skulduggery rasped. His arms were shaking from holding Erembour’s body.

Valkyrie tried to breathe a few times as Militsa turned in her arms, so she was hugging Valkyrie painfully tight. “You left me,” she gasped out. “You _left_ me.”


	214. The Fight of her Life

**Chapter 214**

**_Tanith’s POV_ **

“Where’s Fletcher?” Tanith asked quietly. The hallway was dim despite it being midday – it was a cloudy day and Corrival’s manor, while grand and beautiful in its own way, was also furnished darkly and let in little natural light. She was packed and ready, as was Erskine. Dexter was just finishing eating and needed to clean his teeth.

Erskine shrugged. “Sleeping, I think. He’s overworked and overusing his magic.”

“Someone needs to convince Peregrine to join us,” she muttered, looking at the ground. If she had realised Dexter was going to take so long, she’d have stayed in bed with Laila and Nadia. There was no cot at Corrival’s house, and Tanith didn’t much mind co-sleeping with her daughter, plus it made her life easier. She suspected Laila would be able to start picking herself up enough to nurse from Tanith while she was asleep soon. If Tanith’s milk didn’t dry up before that happened. She wasn’t sure it was the best parenting move, but considering everything, she didn’t care if she made some mistakes making her daughter happy. She immediately stopped thinking about that. She didn’t have the luxury of pitying herself.

Erskine snorted a laugh, unaware of her sudden drop in mood. “Yeah, like that’ll ever happen. We should be glad Peregrine is such an anti-violence person. He won’t join anyone if he can help it, and the Spider’s would kill him because he’s more likely of morally siding with the Sanctuary. You know what you should do? Wake Fletcher up. What I wouldn’t give to see his face. He’ll think he’s in a dream.”

Tanith rolled her eyes. “Don’t be disgusting.”

“I bet he won’t even question it, he’ll just invite you into bed with him.”

“I will throw you out the window,” Tanith threatened with a smirk.

Erskine was saved, or perhaps Tanith was saved from Erskine, when Dexter appeared at the top of the stairs. “Let’s go fuckers!” Dexter shouted down at them. “We’ve got a plane to catch!”

They left, Erskine driving them to a private airport in a tiny little patch of grass with a slim little strip of tarmac, a picturesque small plane, and fields of sheep and their lambs beyond. Tanith vaguely recognised the pilot from some old memory, while Dexter and Erskine seemed to know her better. They were in the air before she knew it and speeding off towards Europe.

Although it was small, rickety and likely older than herself, the plane was steady enough for Tanith to close her eyes and attempt to get some sleep. She was woken several hours later by Dexter who put a hand on her arm. She instantly shuddered from the cold. Even her Bespoke coat wasn’t enough to keep it out. She nodded to Dexter and sat up, taking her coat off so she could strap her sword to her back, awkwardly put her padded coat back on, zipped and poppered it up, and put on her gloves. She really needed a balaclava or goggles, or maybe both, but she figured she’d be alright with just what she had. Dexter had a harness in his hands.

“What’s that for?” She shouted over the racket.

“So we don’t get separated. Do you want to hold hands or be strapped in?”

“Hands!” She shouted with a grin. Why would she want to be trapped when she could fly free? “Where’s my parachute?”

Dexter looked at her blankly for a moment and then his face split into a giant grin. “There are none, Tan. Erskine’s going to guide us!”

Tanith laughed excitedly and bounced in her seat. She looked out of the window at the incredible view, the snowy mountains that glistened in the sun, the horizon never ending. Devastatingly beautiful.

She helped strap Dexter and Erskine together, Erskine standing in the front. Dexter was in control of the coordinate’s device. Erskine would manipulate the air to keep them safe. She just needed to grab only Dexter when they got closer to the ground to make Erskine’s job easier.

A trap door in the floor was opened and Tanith experienced some tantalising vertigo at the sight of the ground thousands of miles below. The hole was barely big enough for Erskine and Dexter to get through, and they had to wiggle a little before their bodies suddenly slipped down and they disappeared from her sight as if they’d never been there at all. She grinned excitedly, sat on the edge, held the door, and swung it in as she jumped down to close it after her.

The wind caught her and she fell, her body twisting and turning insanely fast through the air. It was gorgeous, what little she saw around the spinning, the sun just starting to set over the high peaks, the curves and angles of the landscape – it was a once in a lifetime view. She struggled but managed to level herself off and controlled her angle to shoot towards Dexter and Erskine who were angling towards a mountain peak. The experience was almost too much to let go of, and she almost thought it would be worth it to see if Erskine could guide her to a safe stop without her hanging onto Dexter, but then she grabbed him. She couldn’t take that risk anymore. She’d never take those risks now she had someone to look after.

Feeling almost shamed at her moment of freedom, she looked out over the peaks but it was too late. The sun was hidden and with it, its golden glow. She tried to look behind her but her movement threw Erskine off and she didn’t dare ruin it any further.

Erskine got them down to the edge of the cliff with incredible skill, and they all fell to the snowy floor. Snow went into Tanith’s mouth and her sword prevented her moving naturally, but at least they hadn’t been separated. She wouldn’t have been able to help with the mission if she was off trying to find them from miles away. She opened her eyes and looked left and right, unsure of which way was up and down for a moment, before realising she was on a cliff edge staring out over a thousand mile drop into a snowy hell. Swallowing, she shuffled back away from death.

“Tanith!” She heard. She turned and saw Erskine and Dexter already standing, separated from each other, and grinning madly. She grinned in response and picked herself up. She jogged over to them and they didn’t say anything due to the high winds that wouldn’t have let anyone hear them anyway. She pulled her coat off, hating the frozen winds, and switched her coat and sword so she could actually get to it if she needed. The men helped her, and then Dexter pointed and they started walking.

“Look!” Erskine shouted against the current of the air. He pointed a bloodless, cold finger at a mountain beyond. Tanith looked. She saw nothing but snow and mountain. “See the black thing? Moving?”

She squinted. The air was so cold it was giving her a headache and her eyeballs desperately wanted her to close them entirely. She concentrated and after a moment, saw movement. She thought, for a second, it was a person, and then realised it was no such thing. “Is that a Yeti?!”

“Looks like it!” Erskine shouted with a laugh.

“I thought they were only in the Himalayas?” She asked.

“So did I!” He laughed.

“I’ve always wanted to fight one!” Tanith shouted madly. “Do you think we’ll run into one? I want to take its body home and keep it! I want a Yeti rug! I could get Ghastly to make a Yeti scarf for me!”

Erskine seemed to laugh but his voice was taken by a loud wail of wind. Dexter spoke when it passed. “It’s a sign!” He shouted at them seriously. “Tyren Lament could have brought them here to keep people away!”

Tanith nodded as that sounded reasonable, smart and like something Valkyrie or Skulduggery would say. “Do you think I could kill one?”

“What?”

“I said,” she shouted louder, “do you think I could _kill_ one?”

“They’re endangered!” Dexter replied.

“But they’re an invasive species so it’s okay!”

He didn’t seem to hear her and after a moment looking between her, the somewhat thin trail they were on, and his coordinates device, he gave her a smile and nod. She knew he hadn’t heard what she said, but that was agreeance to her. She desperately wanted to kill a Yeti and take it home. She could only imagine how cool it would look as a fur coat or a rug. It wasn’t like a bear or a fox anyway, they were cute and intelligent creatures that deserved not to be hunted. Not that a Yeti wasn’t massively smart. It was actually very intelligent from what she knew. Not quite as smart as Bigfoot, but still close. She wanted a Bigfoot rug too. She’d gone hunting for one once, but hadn’t been successful, and then hunting season for them ended. But Yeti were notoriously smelly, slobbery and all around unappealing to look at. But their fur was thicker than anything imaginable, and soft after being washed and brushed out. She’d felt a pair of Yeti fur lined gloves before. It was like nothing else, not even the softest rabbit fur could compare. And because they were impossible to breed and keep in captivity, they were prized possessions. She could gift it to Valkyrie as thanks for all she’d done for her. Or they could co-keep it, if Valkyrie was willing to pay for the skinning and general handling of turning the Yeti into a rug. And she’d never had Yeti meat before!

Tanith’s fantasies of meeting a Yeti overtook her mind for a full thirty minutes of travel. They were going down an incline when Dexter suddenly stopped and broke her from her thoughts. He pointed and they all crouched.

“Markings!” He shouted. After a moment, she noticed the indents of almost circle like markings in the snow, since brushed over from the wind and snow being pushed by them. Dexter stood and nudged a snowy rock with his foot, and it broke apart to reveal it was actually droppings. “There must be more Yeti!”

Tanith whooped excitedly and stood, bouncing on her feet. They continued and she gasped with happiness when she saw ahead of them, on a straight, flat path, a Yeti ahead. It was facing them.

She drew her sword and blocked Erskine and Dexter from getting closer. “Come and have a go, rug!”

The beast roared over the winds and ran at her with incredible speed, its fur barely swaying from the speed of its run and the force of the wind. Tanith laughed loudly and prepared for the fight of her life.


	215. Argeddion's guardians

**Chapter 215**

The fight of her life had… not gone to plan. But at her feet, fur swaying softly in a sudden lull of wind, lay the creature. It was a male, seemed to be in good shape, and was now satisfactorily dead.

She panted, her excitement and adrenaline warming her somewhat. Erskine and Dexter crunched up behind her. “That was dramatic.”

“That was amazing,” she panted.

“Your head was in its mouth,” Erskine commented.

She pointed her sword at his throat. “And you won’t tell a soul, Ravel, or I’ll have you turned into a rug too. I killed it perfectly. One stab through the neck. It won’t get in the way of the skinning at all and I can keep the head. Do you know how much a Yeti with the head is worth? This is hundreds of thousands in any currency. Maybe millions.”

“Probably millions,” Dexter nodded. “So what’s your plan?”

“Hmm?”

“Your plan? To get it home?” He said sweetly.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “I’m going to carry it.”

“Uh hu. You realise we may have miles to walk and that this is the same weight as a large meat bull? Can you bench, what, two thousand pounds of muscle? For however many miles it takes us to get to Lament? What if we need to take a helicopter home?”

“I will carry it even if it kills me,” she sniffed, wiping the already frozen blood from her sword as best she could. “Lament will probably have a food cooler. The Yeti can stay in there. And I’ll work out the rest as we go.”

Dexter shrugged and Erskine took off his glove to stroke the fur of the Yeti only to grimace. Tanith had noticed, when her head was in the Yeti’s mouth, that the fur before being processed was incredibly greasy. Probably to help with keeping the warmth in. That wouldn’t matter once it was a rug though.

She sniffed, sheathed her sword and grabbed one of its arms and pulled. She rolled it and ducked under his body in a crouch and lifted like she was at the gym trying to impress someone. She impressed _herself_. She didn’t think the Yeti was two thousand pounds like a large bull might be, but it was over a thousand for sure. When she pulled it up the men began laughing and her look of concentration turned to amusement when she realised the animals’ body had done as many bodies did after death and… expelled its bowels. Thankfully not on her shoes, from what she could see. She knew Erskine was helping keep the weight up when she began walking, listening to them snicker at the trail the animal left. There was no way she could lift, let alone carry, the weight of the Yeti alone. When they stopped giggling and caught up, she at least knew it was over.

The weight of the animal kicked in quickly and barely as soon as she started, she knew she was exerting herself too much even with the help. She was thankful when Erskine flicked a hand and the weight lifted above her. She was still holding her prize but the weight was barely on her. She flashed him a grin as the winds came back.

Dexter didn’t seem worried at all, putting his coordinates device away and leading them with a purpose towards a lump of rocks. She stood back and lowered the Yeti to the ground with Erskine so it was flat on its back in the snow. They waited for him, and he grinned and said the words “Found it,” though his voice was carried away from them.

Tanith and Erskine jumped onto the rocks and went to him, trying not to slip into some crack and break a leg. Dexter was by the side of the mountain where a small cluster of rocks were. He crouched next to it and they copied.

Once, it may have been a tunnel, but now it was caved in. No way in. But where Dexter was pointing, there was a dark hole. Erskine clicked his fingers and sent a fireball through the holes and it lit up some dark place below.

“This is the coordinates, and this is a way into a place,” Dexter reasoned over the wind. “Seems to me like I’m a successful detective.”

“You’re alright at this,” Tanith complimented as Erskine moved a larger bolder from the hole entrance. It gave them twice the room and seemed like it would give them just enough space to get in.

“Do you think we’ll fit?” Erskine asked.

“Tanith will. Probably you. I might struggle,” Dexter shrugged. “We’ll make it work. I’ll go first and if it collapses, make sure Saracen never stops mourning me. Take my body to him. I want to be taxidermized and prayed to.”

“Where should he keep you?” Erskine asked seriously.

“Either a public place for public viewing, or directly in bed, please,” he said before shoving his head into the hole. His arms went next, then his shoulders, he wriggled to get his chest in, and then his waist slipped in. His hips struggled for a moment and then he got caught on his butt. There was a wiggle, a pull as he attempted to get in, but he didn’t go anywhere.

“He’s too juicy,” Erskine said and then tried to maintain a straight face for the joke, only to break into laughter. Tanith laughed as Dexter kicked his feet and tried again to pull himself in, but he didn’t manage it. His body seemed to be laughing too as he struggled. Finally, Erskine put his shoe on Dexter’s back end, kicked him, and he slid in the final amount. Erskine went next and slid in much easier as he was slightly smaller than Dexter and not quite as muscular nor as large in the same places as Dexter. Tanith went next after glancing back at her prize out of view.

She worried she’d get stuck like Dexter did but was lucky that he was there to grab her hands and help her down. She fell in and flipped her body down at the last moment so she landed on her feet. Erskine already had a flame in hand, lighting up the pit. Behind him was a tunnel. “Awesome,” she whispered, and they all heard her because there were no more winds. It was cold still, but much less so. “This has to be their base.”

They were all cautious as they started, worrying over signals and secret traps. Some way in, perhaps a two minute walk, the tunnel began to get lighter, and Erskine let the flames die out. The ground turned into a metal grille. Thick support struts criss-crossed overhead and glowing orbs hung from them, as if someone had caught handfuls of daylight and brought them underground. They passed through corridors of rock walls. The air was a warm summer’s day down in the mountain.

A bird flew past, disappearing around the corner.

“Well,” Erskine said with a small smile, “that was unexpected. How can I prepare to think the worse of Lament when he has little birdies?”

They walked on until the corridor widened, and in this widening a man wandered by. Tanith recognised him from the file Dexter had shown her on his phone. Kalvin Accord. Adept, specialising in science-magic. He was in a bathrobe and sandals.

“Kalvin,” Dexter said gently.

Kalvin whipped around to see them, eyes wide. He stared.

Dexter took a step forward, painting a smile on his mouth. “Sorry. We didn’t mean to startle you. How are you?”

“Oh this isn’t good,” Kalvin muttered, wetting his lips. “This isn’t good at all.”

He turned and ran.

Tanith glanced at Erskine, and they both then looked at Dexter who looked back at them. They shared a shrug, took a moment to undo their coats and take their gloves off, and then started after him.

“Kalvin,” Dexter called calmly. “Please stop, we’re here to talk. We don’t want to hurt anyone.”

But Kalvin didn’t stop running. It wasn’t an impressive run, as he was in sandals and very obviously out of shape, but he didn’t stop. They caught up to him immediately. He lost one of his sandals but didn’t stop. Erskine picked it up for him.

Dexter was on one of Kalvin’s sides, Tanith next to him. Erskine appeared on Kalvin’s other side.

“I picked this up for you,” Erskine said, offering him the sandal.

“Thank you,” Kalvin said, taking it.

“Why are you running from us?” Erskine asked.

“I’m not sure,” Kalvin panted. “But now that I’m doing it, I may as well keep going.”

“I’m not sure that makes sense,” Erskine said with a small laugh. He sounded sweet and kind and cute. Tanith was consistently astounded with how the Dead Men just did not care what people thought about them. Not in a bad way – in a perfectly good way. If Erskine wanted to flirt his way into Kalvin’s good books, he just did it. No questions. It was fun. It was the type of person Tanith had always aspired to be. “You can stop if you like.”

“I don’t think I can,” Kalvin said. “I want to stop. I should do it. But I haven’t had to run, or stop running, in so long, I think I forgot how.”

Erskine laughed, though this time it was a little more at poor Kalvin. Tanith grinned herself. “Just slow down. There you are.”

Erskine talking him into slowing his pace until they were at a jog, where Kalvin collapsed onto his knees. He complained of a stitch and they politely waited for him to get over it. “Why… are you here?” He panted.

“We’re here about Argeddion,” Dexter said simply.

“You’re going to need to talk to Tyren about that,” Kalvin said, shaking his head. “He is _not_ going to be happy you’re here.”

**.*****.**

Kalvin was right. Tyren was not happy to see them in the least. Tanith had been separated from her coat and sword and was now sitting between Erskine and Dexter as if she was some sort of ringleader than knew information of use. Tyren stood over them, his arms crossed, wearing sandals and white robe also. His belt was blue and white striped though. There was a lady, though Tanith had only glimpsed her on the way, in a baby pink robe. And a man. Though she hadn’t seen his face.

“How did you find us?” Where his first words to them.

“It wasn’t easy,” Dexter said simply, his voice carefully calm.

“It was meant to be impossible. We were meant to disappear.”

“I promise, we are only here because of Aregeddion. This isn’t for fun,” Dexter said, some annoyance creeping into his voice. “There’s been problems in the real world. And Argeddion is supposedly the cause it. So here we are.”

Tyren grunted noncommittedly. “And where’s the detective? Don’t tell me Skulduggery retired, because I won’t believe you.”

“Oh, of course not. He’s on another mission,” Dexter said more neutrally. “Tyren, Areggedion is giving regular mortals magic powers. He’s giving them gifts of magic. And they’re wreaking havoc.”

He shook his head. “Impossible. Aregeddion isn’t in a position to do anything. And no magic can be transferred, that’s not how it works.”

“It can be done,” Dexter rebutted. “For one, the mortals in question may have dormant magic inside them that was simply activated, granted, but they weren’t aware of it at all and suddenly they are able to do some incredible things. And as well, we have a literal device being used against us by a different enemy, which steals magic from one person and gives it to another. Your theory is outdated, my friend.”

Tyren soured, obviously not too thrilled with Dexter lecturing him. “And what do you think Argeddion has done to them? Because I’m quite sure it wasn’t him. He’s been in a coma-state for over thirty years.”

“Are you certain?” Dexter asked.

“Of course, there’s always eyes on him, and cameras. He’s fast asleep. We even have neuro-sensors to know if there’s any brain activity. Whoever’s doing this to mortals, it isn’t him.”

“If it’s not,” Dexter said, “it’s someone connected to him. We would like to see him nonetheless.”

“I’m sorry, but we can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t want you to,” he said simply. “You’ve already breached our outer perimeter, I don’t want you breaching the inner perimeter. I knew you thirty years ago, Dexter, but a man can change.”

Dexter tilted his head disbelievingly. “You don’t trust me.”

“I don’t. And I don’t even know your lady friend.”

“That’s just Erskine.”

“And your partner?” Tyren rolled his eyes.

“Tanith Low,” she introduced. “I’m a friend.”

“A family friend,” Dexter reiterated. “She’s not a Dead Man but she’s our sister.”

“Well that’s just lovely but I’m not letting you in the facility.”

Dexter sighed and looked at the table for a moment before continuing. “Can we at least talk about the facility?”

Tyren sat opposite them. “Of course.”

“How did you catch Aregeddion?”

“That’s not about the facility,” Tyren said slowly, “but I’ll answer it. When Walden was a child, as was his name before he became Aregeddion, his mother was murdered. This happened in front of him. After, the killer turned to him and said three words and ran. We found out those words, and when we felt he was starting to lose his humanity, starting to value magic above people, we said them to him. He froze and we caught him in a trap and sent him to sleep. We didn’t use violence or hurt him. He hadn’t used violence on anyone. It was only fair.”

“How did you send him to sleep?” Dexter asked.

“We targeted his brainwaves. Took them over, regulated them… he was asleep within moments.”

“And if he needs that to be constantly monitored, you can never leave,” Tanith continued.

“Exactly. We cannot allow him to wake up, ever. He would never allow us to put him back under. This is the safest thing for us all.”

“Makes sense,” she muttered, leaning back in her chair.

A girl rushed in. Petit frame, ashy blonde hair that was straight up until a slight kink at the tips, looking like someone in her twenties and her eyes were incredible. Large, huge even, and bright blue. She had light freckles all her nose, her skin was pale and smooth. She was wearing the baby pink robe Tanith had caught a glimpse of earlier. “People,” she gasped. “But…”

Lament smiled. “It’s okay. They’re not our enemies. Lenka Bazaar, this is Dexter Vex, Erskine Ravel and Tanith Low.”

Tanith stood quickly to shake her hand and Lenka jumped on her, wrapping her in the biggest bear hug despite not being able to wrap her tiny arms all the way around Tanith. She was short, barely five two if Tanith had to guess. “People!” She screamed. “There are people here! New people!”

Tanith laughed, and finally Lenka released her.

“Hi. I’m Lenka. Will you be my friend?”

Tanith grinned and noticed the little tooth gap in Lenka’s large teeth. She’d always had a soft spot for girls shorter than her, less muscular than her, cute features. Lenka was a type in a way other girls, even someone like Clara, just didn’t fit. “Of course!”

“Tyren,” Lenka said immediately, “I only have room for a certain number of friends in my life, so you’re not my friend anymore. I’m really sorry.”

“I’m sure I’ll survive.”

Lenka turned back to Tanith giddily. “I don’t want to alarm you,” she said, “but there’s someone looking over your shoulder.”

“Very pleased to meet you,” Dexter said, shaking her hand. He had his prettiest smile on.

“And myself, it’s a pleasure,” Erskine cut in, shaking her hand just as vigorously as Lenka shook his. She laughed.

“Lenka is the youngest of us,” said Lament, “a Sensitive and a gifted engineer in her own right.”

“I never thought I’d meet someone new,” she said, her eyes still wide. “I thought that the three people I’m down here with were the only people I’d ever know for the rest of my life. And new people. Three new people! And one of them’s the coolest person I’ve ever seen!”

“Thank you,” Dexter smirked.

“I was talking about her,” Lenka said, sliding close to Tanith and putting her hands on her shoulders. Tanith smirked at him, but then looked down at Lenka when she looked up at her and felt herself get incredibly aroused at the massive blue eyes looking up at her. Neither woman looked away from the other. “Have you seen the Arboretum?” She said, her voice lower but still as excited. “Tyren, have you shown them the Arboretum?”

“They’ve only just arrived–”

“Then it’s high time they saw the Arboretum!” She grinned, grabbing for Tanith’s hand and already dragging her from the room. “Come! The tour!”

On their way, they met the last person down there other than Argeddion, Vernon Plight. He was narrow, dark skinned and had a warm smile. She’d heard of him, as he was known as a fierce soldier. Dexter, Erskine and Lemant stopped so they could talk but Lenka had no interest in waiting. She was dragged quite happily to the Arboretum, Lenka looking back to flash Tanith flirty smiles every so often.

They stepped in without introduction, leaving the men far behind, into a vast cavern, and in this cavern sat a rainforest. The heat, the humidity, the sounds of the streams and waterfalls and birds and insects met them and enveloped them.

“Oh my God,” Tanith whispered.

“This is our very own biosphere,” Lenka grinned. “I help look after it with Kalvin. It took a lot of work, but don’t you love it?”

“I do! It’s amazing! I mean, I can’t imagine how it must feel to be cut off from the world, but having your very own rainforest, that’s just incredible!” Tanith said and laughed as a butterfly approached. She held out a hand and after a moment of thought, the insect landed on her hand. Lenka hopped back over to Tanith’s side and pressed herself against Tanith to look at the butterfly. “Beautiful.”

Lenka looked at her. “I agree.”


	216. Tanith and Lenka

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: NSFW chapter

**Chapter 216**

Although Lenka made some very obvious suggestions towards Tanith staying in her bed, Tanith fetching her Yeti from outside and putting it in the cooler seemed to give her enough hesitance to get Tanith a lonely sleep that night. The Yeti was fine, thankfully. Leaving it unattended had been worrying her.

She woke up to a beautiful light in a warm, soft bed, smiled to herself and got dressed in her leather trousers and tunic, going straight to the Yeti.

Vernon came to help, the only one seemingly amused at her enthusiasm over the creature. He assisted her with the cuts, made sure she didn’t damage any skin, and told her how to de-bowel the animal effectively. She’d done it before, but only on rabbits and chickens. A Yeti was new territory. She didn’t ask how Vernon knew what he did, just accepted his help. After, they spent an hour cutting the meat into manageable packets and put them in the freezers, only grinding a small amount for that day’s meals.

When Tanith left the Yeti to dry out in the cooler, she went back to her room and ran into Lenka on the way.

“Oh!” She said, eyes widening impossibly so at the sight of Tanith. “You’re covered in blood.”

“Yeah, I was dealing with the Yeti. I thought we could have burgers for lunch?”

Lenka’s mouth hung open. “Burgers? I haven’t had meat in thirty years. I want burgers.”

Tanith grinned at her. “Well, I’m happy to share. I was thinking of hunting another, if you guys don’t mind sharing freezer space. Depending on what happens with everything. Maybe you could have the meat and I could take the fur?”

“That could work!” Lenka said. “I miss meat so bad. What’s the last meat you ate? How did it taste?”

“I’m not sure,” Tanith said, thinking back. “Perhaps sausages? I had bacon a few days ago. I’ve been craving stake though.”

“Oh god, I’d kill for a stake,” Lenka groaned with her eyes closed. “Could you make Yeti stake?”

“I can do that. It’s my favourite,” she smirked. “I should probably get showered first.”

“Oh sure!” She grinned. “You can use my shower.”

Tanith smirked at Lenka’s back as she bounced away to her room, shamelessly happy. She was led into a room that was just like her own, but Lenka’s was animal themed, somewhat girlish, with electronics, gadgets and books in every corner.

“I brought a lot of it with me,” Lenka admitted as Tanith looked around curiously in her bloodstained clothes. “We couldn’t bring things from our houses, but I got new copies of all my favourite books, and all the best-sellers at the time. I can still get digital versions of new books but it’s not the same.”

“Have you read any of Gordon Edgley’s books?” Tanith asked.

“Oh yeah, of course! I’m a giant horror and gore fan, he’s the absolute greatest at it! I sometimes get a bit upset at the endings, because it’s kind of predictable that he’ll kill everyone off, I sort of wish he’d write so the main character changes as people die so you have unpredictability without it the same structure, you know? It takes away from the experience if I know he’s following a format.”

Tanith grinned excitedly. “One of the books was written after me!”

“Oh my God which one?!” Lenka squealed excitedly.

“’ _Bloodbath in the Thames_ ’,” Tanith grinned. “I die at the end!”

“Oh my _God_ that’s one of my favourite’s! That’s so amazing! Did you get to meet the author? What was it like? Did he interview you? Is it all exactly what happened?!”

“No, it was just inspired by me, but it’s so cool! I met him later though. I’m best friends with his niece, whose basically my sister now, I’ve known her for a few years since she was a kid, and she found he’d make an Echo Stone of himself to talk with so he could use it for book ideas, but it has a power source. So now we have Gordon Edgley, and he’s making books, but not the original one.”

“Oh wow that’s so cool! It’s so futuristic and _fun_ , imagine living in a stone like that. It would be such a new experience! And he’s writing more books! Do you think he’d make one of me?”

“I mean, it depends if you’ve done something to put in a horror. I can tell him about you.”

“Can you make me be a side character, or a passionate lover, and have him kill me off brutally? I want my guts to be on a ceiling fan and it to turn on and get my insides all over the walls and the main character, I think that would be so, _so_ funny!”

“I’ll pass on the message,” Tanith grinning. “It would be so cool if he did that, I bet he’ll think it’s good.”

“Awesome! I really hope he does it. Come, I’ll show you the shower quickly. We don’t have things like conditioner or anything fancy, but it’s enough.”

Tanith nodded unnecessarily as she was led to the attached bathroom. Lenka sat herself on a little ledge between the toilet and the bath and looked at her excitedly. Tanith smirked and raised an eyebrow back. “It’s okay,” Lenka giggled sweetly, putting her chin in her hands. “I’m only watching for personal pleasure. You can go ahead.”

Tanith snorted a laugh. “I will be. I just wanted to tell you, before anything went any further, that I had a baby a few months ago and–”

“ _YOU HAD A BABY AND YOU DIDN’T SHOW ME PICTURES_?!” Lenka shouted, jumping up and bouncing around on the spot. “Show me pictures! Is it a girl or boy? Do they have a name? Well, like, I know you can’t tell me but I can’t leave or talk to anyone outside of here so would you tell me anyway? Is it a cute name at least? Are they blonde like you? That would be so cute! Do they still have baby eyes or are they brown like yours already? Do they have chubby cheeks? How cute are their toes? _Please_ tell me you have a photo of specifically the baby’s toes!”

Tanith couldn’t help it – she had thought for a moment when Lenka’s voice raised that she was going to accuse Tanith of something awful, but when she showed only enthusiasm and no judgement, she burst into roaring laughter.

“Don’t laugh at me,” Lenka laughed, bouncing over to Tanith and hanging off of one of her arms. “ _Please_ show me pictures! I’ll do _anything_!”

“I’ll show you pictures,” Tanith wheezed, pulling out her phone. She had washed her hands already at least so she could use it. She quickly pulled up her photo album, which was mainly pictures of Laila, but also a few of people with Laila such as Erskine, Nadia, Valkyrie and one or two of Ghastly. “Here, have a look.”

Lenka gently began using the touch screen and scrolled through all the photos, cooing and awing at them all, not losing her excitement for a single moment.

“She’s so beautiful Tanith,” Lenka grinned, looking up at her with her big eyes. “She looks so much like you too. You’re very lucky to have such a cute baby.”

“I am. I’m glad that it, you know, happened. It wasn’t the plan but…” she trailed off, realising she was going towards an area she didn’t want to get into, but Lenka continued for her.

“Just because it wasn’t your plan doesn’t mean you can’t be happy,” she smiled. “I was an unplanned baby, and I think a lot of kids are. My parents were really, really young. My Mummy was only seventeen and she got kicked out of her home. It broke my heart to leave her behind and not tell her anything. I couldn’t even leave a note. But she was a great mother. And she was great at finding a balance in looking after me, working and having friends.”

“I’m not sure I’m quite there yet,” Tanith admitted a little quietly.

“Don’t be silly. Every dynamic is different, right? Like, I was a kid that needed constant attention or I’d destroy the place. My Mummy once afforded to get us a television, and it was sort of broken, and she had to leave me at home alone when I was ten once for work. While she was gone, the television broke and I ripped it apart and laid it all out and tried to fix it. I’d never done it before! She got back and was so angry, but after she punished me, she sat down with me and we learnt how the television worked and I put it back together with her. And now I’m an engineer. But if my Mummy hadn’t made the mistake of leaving me alone, I’d never have found my passion. It was fixing stuff with her that gave me the love for it. But leaving a ten year old alone with no one to go to if trouble happened, a child that was known for pulling the furniture all over the house to make forts if I got bored… that probably wasn’t the best parenting move, right?”

Tanith shrugged. “My parents sent me away as a kid so I suppose it’s hard for me to relate what the right thing to do is.”

“Well, I can see you love her. You’re working so you have money to look after her. As long as you show her love and give her food, what else could a growing girl need?”

Tanith smiled at Lenka. “You might be right.”

“Probably,” she grinned. “Just don’t put yourself down before you’ve even done anything wrong. She’s a baby, and she’s chubby and she’s healthy. You can’t have possibly done anything wrong! That’s all a baby needs. And when she’s a toddler, she won’t even need clothes, she’ll only take them off, so you can save on the expense.”

Tanith snorted a laugh. “I’m tempted. But her fathers a tailor, so I may as well.”

“Oh cool. Are you and him like… I mean, I assumed not because you seemed to be flirting with me, but if you’re together–”

“We’re not together. We haven’t been for a few months. We’re not going to get back together either, it’s totally over. We’re sort of friends now, for the baby. It’s getting better though.”

“That’s great! I’ve always wondered who my father is,” Lenka said casually. “Is he a good one?”

“Yeah, it took a few weeks for him to realise how much work goes into it and to stop taking his stress out on other people, but now we’re more separated and there’s time between us, he’s almost like when we met. Which is good. And he’s a very attentive father. He’d of had her more as a baby if I hadn’t been breastfeeding her full time up until a few weeks ago.”

Lenka bit her lip and glanced down at Tanith’s chest. “Are you still, like, you know?”

Tanith smirked. “Yes. I am lactating still. Not as much as before.”

She was quiet for a moment. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but that is super hot.”

Tanith grinned. “You think?”

“I’ve always wanted to try human milk.”

Tanith snorted this time. “What? Sorry, but the phrase ‘ _human milk’_ was not what I expected you to say.”

Lenka giggled back at her. “It’s true though. I’ve always been curious, and I thought I’d never get to try it. Actually, I’ve only ever had sex with one woman at all, so I’m curious about a lot of things. She only wanted to top me and wouldn’t let me return it, and _hated_ her boobs being touched. I’m way into nipple play by the way.”

“I like that,” Tanith grinned. “I might be able to let you try my milk. But, if it feels too much like when my daughter drinks, we’ll have to stop.”

“Oh totally, I don’t want to make it weird. Is there anything else I should know?”

“Not really. I’m good with anything,” Tanith grinned. “Why, how crazy are you thinking?”

“I don’t know if it’s crazy, per se,” Lenka smiled innocently, turning to the open style shower and turning it on. The water sprayed between them. “Maybe we could start with washing and go from there? Like I said, I’ve never done much with a woman, so you’ll have to teach me.”

“I can do that,” Tanith grinned, pulling her shirt off. Lenka stepped around the water and stared hungrily. “Have you had tests done since you last slept with someone?”

“Absolutely,” Lenka said, eyes roaming over her body. “I had to get a last second appointment, I was so scared it wouldn’t be done in time. I was having nightmares I caught something and would have to tell everyone here and live with it. That would have been so bad. Thank _god_ that didn’t happen. I assume you have to?”

“Yeah, a few weeks ago. Everything’s fine.” Tanith smirked at her bold watching and took her bra off. Her nipples were healing nicely now she was doing half, or perhaps barely a third, of the nursing she had been before. They were thicker and slightly longer than before her pregnancy, but otherwise she was in good health. She wasn’t bleeding or getting scabs anymore which was a massive improvement. Her breasts had stretch marks, along the bottom and sides, from expanding for her milk production. Her stomach also, although she had returned almost entirely to her prior strength, had a few lingering stretch marks and some loose skin under her bellybutton over to her hipbones. It wasn’t anything extreme, and didn’t take away from her obvious muscle mass, but it was noticeably from being pregnant. She took her trousers and under things off next before looking up at Lenka.

She was staring at her with a small smile, her hands clasped in front of her like this was some wonderful wish coming true. Which Tanith supposed it was. She hadn’t seen anyone new for thirty years, she hasn’t had _sex_ in at least thirty years. Tanith couldn’t imagine going that long without sex.

She stepped into the water and let it wash over her, the blood and sweat washing away. She needed this as much as Lenka, though perhaps not as desperately. She needed change. She needed fun. She wanted to feel like her old self. Not like a mother, not like a fighter or a sister. Just a normal woman spending time with another woman.

She listened as Lenka stripped off and washed her face and hair in the water as she did, giving the girl time to take her in. As soon as she was ready, Lenka pressed their bodied together and wrapped her hands around Tanith’s thick biceps. She grinned up at Tanith and gasped when Tanith pulled her under the water and picked her up so her legs were wrapped around Tanith’s waist.

“You’re so strong!” Lenka laughed. “Can I kiss you now?”

Tanith answered by leaning in. Lenka’s lips were soft, like the rest of her was, and she hadn’t forgotten how to kiss at all. They deepened it quickly, their tongues fighting for dominance which Tanith won, sucking on Lenka’s tongue and biting it lightly. Lenka groaned and fisted at Tanith’s hair to pull her head back, moving to Tanith’s neck and sucking on her skin. She knew she was going to have red and purple marks but didn’t mind at all. In response, she took a step and put Lenka’s bare back against the cold tiles.

She gasped before grinning and cupping Tanith’s face to kiss her more softly. “I can’t decide,” she said humorously, leaning in to kiss her again, “if I want this to be quick and dirty or if I want to draw it out as long as possible.”

“We have a few hours,” Tanith grinned. “I’m not good at talking to people like Tyren. Dexter and Erskine will deal with that. We can just have some fun.”

Lenka giggled and bit Tanith’s lip roughly. “I have a request.” Tanith hummed. “Can we do it really rough? This might be the only sex I have for the rest of my life, I want to feel it for a few days, you know? If not for all the hours we have, at least at the end.”

Tanith nodded and sucked on Lenka’s neck. “I can do that.”

“My safeword’s bubble-gum.”

Tanith snorted a laugh. “Of course it is.”

“Can I wash your hair? It’s so pretty,” she gasped out as Tanith licked and nibbled on the delicate nerves behind her ear. “That’s really nice.”

Without waiting for an answer, Lenka began washing Tanith’s hair as Tanith methodically sucked and bit on Lenka’s neck, ear and jaw, leaving little marks forming behind her. Lenka’s pale skin contrasted against the marks beautifully, and she continued to moan softly as she massaged the soap into Tanith’s hair. She pushed to see how much Lenka would let her do, but even when she bit harshly on the muscle between her neck and shoulder, Lenka just let out a squeaky moan of enjoyment and rubbed her pelvis against Tanith’s abdomen.

She did as Lenka instructed when she was told to stand under the water, and Lenka helped rinse her hair out while Tanith slipped an arm under her butt and pulled her higher, leaving Lenka’s nipples at her mouth. Without any pre-empt, she took a pointed nipple between her teeth and bit down on it, making Lanka tense and let out a long moan, pushing her body firmly against Tanith’s face. They continued their game, Lenka washing Tanith and Tanith biting and pulling on Lenka’s nipples, pretending she didn’t notice her trying to get some friction between her legs on Tanith’s stomach. When Lenka was done rinsing out her hair, Tanith pushed her back against the cold wall and sucked harder on Lenka’s nipple so she cried out. She sucked as she pulled away and the nipple left her mouth with a wet _pop_.

Lenka looked down at her and they maintained eye contact as Tanith slowly reached forward and licked her nipple, gently and softly. Lenka’s sweet smile dropped when Tanith picked up the pace and flicked her tongue against the nipple quickly, shuffling her arms so she had one free and could brace herself against the cold tiles. She waited for the cold to seep into her skin, Lenka suspecting nothing as her eyes closed and she began to enjoy the stimulations, and when she felt like it, she squeezed one nipple tightly with her now cold fingers and sucked the other into her mouth.

Lenka cried out and put a hand over Tanith’s. “Fuck!” She cried, before abandoning Tanith’s hand and slamming her hand over the wall to turn off the shower.

She succeeded, but Tanith just grinned, dropping Lenka to her feet, turning her quickly and pressing her against the wall bodily. “You’re perfect,” she whispered in her ear. The otherwise silent bathroom echoed her voice. Lenka’s fast, excited breathing joined her voice. “You are stunning, by the way. Exactly my type.”

“Hmm, you like intelligent girls?”

“Exactly,” Tanith grinned, slipping a hand between Lenka and the wall. Slowly, she pushed it down until she was reaching around Lenka’s freshly shaven pubic bone, splitting her fingers just to deny her pleasure. “Have you ever begged someone to fuck you?”

Lenka snorted a laugh. “All the time. Though I don’t think it was always worth it.”

“How wet are you right now?” Tanith whispered in her ear seriously.

Lenka shivered and ground her hips against Tanith’s hand. “Very. I was thinking about you all night. I really wanted to come find you but I was touching myself instead.”

“Yeah?” Tanith whispered, dragging a cold finger over Lenka’s pussy and over her clit.

She gasped a breath. “Oh God. I did. I fingered myself and thought about you going down on me,” she whispered back, resting her cheek against the wall. “I orgasmed three times but I was still so horny for you.”

“You should have come found me. I’d have loved to have watched,” Tanith smirked. She flicked the same finger back along her clit, lingering on the sensitive nub at the end before expertly splitting her labia and dragging down to her hole. She was slick with arousal, her clit swollen and ready. Her finger lingered right outside teasingly. “What thought made you cum to me?”

Lenka bit her lip and ground her hips but Tanith moved with her, not giving her any satisfaction, even making sure her palm didn’t touch her clit. “I was thinking about you with a strap. You were really good at it in my head.”

“I am in real life too.”

“Will you do that to me now?”

Tanith paused right before she gave in to Lenka’s warm body. “You had to move thousands of miles and could only take a handful of personal items, and you brought a strap? For what?”

“Well. It’s a dildo,” she grinned. “But I want one so badly right now I’m happy to pretend.”

Tanith laughed but shifted to use her left hand to smack Lenka’s arse soundly. She squeaked before laughing and Tanith did it again, and again, and again, grabbed her cheek roughly and gave her one last hard smack before suddenly inserting her finger.

Lenka went from giggling about the smacks to crying out in pleasure at Tanith’s simple ministrations. “Fuck Tanith, please don’t go slow,” she begged, putting her arms up by her head and balling her hands. “I want this so _bad_.”

Grinning, she obliged and easily slipped in her other middle finger and palmed Lenka’s clit. She gave her a moment to worry Tanith was going to go slow before curling her fingers and giving her what she wanted.

Lenka immediately cried out and went weak at the knees, dropping to the floor, trying to balance on her knees and feet to give Tanith access to her sensitive core. Tanith continued, reaching around from her place on the floor to pinch and flick Lenka’s nipple while she fingered her, smearing her arousal all over her hand and dripping onto the floor from how desperate she was. Lenka’s moans and begs jumped around the room loudly and Tanith loved it, feeling her own arousal growing rapidly. “Please make me cum, please make me cum,” Lenka began to repeat as she got closer to her first orgasm. “ _Fuck_ that feels so _good_ Tanith!”

Tanith didn’t think she’d ever made a woman orgasm so fast in her life and grinning madly, she pulled Lenka’s hips back and pushed her head to the floor. From behind, she continued to finger her, pressing her knuckles to the inside of her clit, or thereabouts, and used her other hand to flick the very tip of her clit. She was a gorgeous colour, beautiful dusty pink skin that was reddening quickly from Tanith’s touch, stretched around her fingers wonderfully. She bent over when Lenka began to gasp in high pitches and flicked her tongue over her clit around her hand.

“ _Oh fuck_! _Tanith_!” Lenka shouted, repeating herself until she suddenly went silent and Tanith didn’t dare stop, speeding up as much as she could. Lenka screamed out a moan and her insides clenched tightly around her fingers and clit began to spasm.

She continued for a few moments, and a part of her wanted to force her to orgasm again, but Lenka moved and she had to stop. Sitting up, Tanith looked at her hand and saw she was covered in glossy and creamy arousal, and licked her fingers clean to Lenka’s joy.

“That was so good,” Lenka grinned, jumping to her feet. “I don’t think I’ve ever cum that hard before. I felt my whole body get hot. I want to try going down on you now.”

“Awesome,” Tanith grinned, following her out to the bedroom. They were both still wet from the shower but neither cared as Tanith sat on the edge.

“Can I play with your boobies first?”

Tanith laughed, getting the covers wet as she shuffled back. Getting comfortable against the pillows at the headboard, she smirked at Lenka and encouraged her over. From her almost laid down position, Lenka was able to drape herself over Tanith’s body and immediately sucked her left nipple into hot her mouth.

At first it felt entirely like when she had sex with anyone and they sucked on her nipples, but then she felt as Lenka pulled on her milk and she began to lactate. It wasn’t quite as sexual as Lenka probably felt on her end, but it wasn’t necessarily a bad feeling. Mentally it did still feel like a sexual interaction, certainly a new one, but it wasn’t what she worried she’d feel which was good. It wasn’t something she was incredibly into but she didn’t necessarily feel the need to stop since Lenka very obviously liked it from the sound of satisfaction she made when she tasted the milk on her tongue.

She ran her fingers through Lenka’s hair while she gently rolled her nipple between her teeth, easily working out the tangles from how soft and straight her hair was. Eventually Lenka worked out that if she flicked her finger over the other nipple, it would begin to lactate too and she let out a laugh when she saw before licking the milk from Tanith’s chest and ribs. When she pulled away, her nipples continued to leave a few drops.

“It tastes good,” she grinned. “I wasn’t sure I’d like it but I do. And it’s so fun how it comes out.”

“I’m glad you like it.”

“Not nice?”

Tanith shrugged. “I’m happy for you to have your fun, it’s just not particularly pleasurable. It’s not bad, just not making me wet.”

“Can I try licking you now?” She asked excitedly, sitting on Tanith’s hips.

“Do you want to kneel on the floor or lie down to do it?” Tanith asked.

Lenka thought about it for a moment and then got on the floor. Tanith shuffled over so she was almost off the edge of the bed and opened her legs for Lenka to settle between. They were the perfect height for Lenka to dip her head down when Tanith was flat on her back. “I know mostly how to do it,” she grinned.

Tanith laid back and put her arms behind her head comfortably. “I’m waiting,” she teased.

She lacked some skill, Tanith noticed, but if nothing else Lenka was incredibly enthusiastic. She pushed Tanith’s legs further apart, used one hand to split her lips and took a long taste of Tanith’s pussy. She sucked on her clit, rolled it playfully between her teeth, which made Tanith gasp, and tried her best to flick her tongue over her clit. It required practise, and Lenka lacked that to get Tanith towards an orgasm, but the experience wasn’t about her, rather about Lenka getting to do something she might never get to try again. Plus it was her first time, and she didn’t think she did that badly considering.

Lenka fingering her was a lot better, as it generally was with other women even on their first time. She copied what Tanith had done for a time, sending bolts of pleasure through her spine, before adding a third finger. Her body stretched around it and Lanka giggled to herself as Tanith groaned and enjoyed her slowly thrusting her fingers as she tried to lick her clit at the same time. It was all off but it was fun and she felt little jolts of pleasure every time Lenka brushed her tongue or fingers over almost the perfect spot.

“Lenka,” Tanith moaned after a good twenty minutes of enjoyment, “where’s your dildo?”

Lenka gasped and jumped up, leant over and placed a soft kiss on Tanith’s clit, and grabbed her dildo out from under her bed. It was a translucent pink, a softer plastic that flopped about. Tanith easily pushed her on the bed and took the toy from her. Lenka immediately put her legs back and held them with her hands against her chest. Tanith gladly played with her clit first, dipping in her fingers and using the wetness to prepare the fairly thick dildo before sitting back and gently pressing it into Lenka’s pussy.

She moaned with Lenka, enjoying the way her body opened for the toy. When it was in, she grinned at her and began to fuck her with it, eliciting a happy scream from Lenka’s lips. She began to work on her agreement with Lenka to make her feel it for days after they were done, roughly pounding her with the toy as Lenka moaned nonsense, screamed Tanith’s name and begged for more even around her grimaces and digging her nails into her legs. Creamy arousal dripped from her pussy, over her arsehole and onto the bed, and Tanith used a finger to gather it up.

She leant over Lenka, pressing her pubic bone to the base of the dildo sharply to keep it in and offered her finger to Lenka. She stuck her tongue out and Tanith watched her lick her finger as she began to barely pull away and snap her hips back forward. Lenka gasped every time, and Tanith knew it was hitting the back of her cervix in that painfully good way. When she was done with watching Lenka, she took her legs and pushed them back, forcing her to stretch out her muscles, and leaned their bodies over so Lenka was folded on herself and her pussy was in a good position for Tanith to continue thrusting her hips against. She put all her weight onto the back of Lenka’s knees, hoping she’d leave some sore marks or bruises to remember her by. That would be something Tanith could think of in the days to come too.

“ _Tanith_!” Lenka gasped, her eyes screwed up. “It’s so deep it _hurts_ , don’t stop. It’s so good.”

Feeling a sweat forming on her brow, Tanith grinning and obliged, smacking their bodies together and putting more weight onto her legs to stretch the muscles – and in doing so, stretching the muscles in her abdomen and the muscle that was her vagina. It stretched smaller and she was able to add more pain to the pleasure that Lenka enjoyed, loving hearing her shout her name.

There was no way for Tanith to make her orgasm in this position, as it wasn’t a strap so she didn’t have as much freedom to move and touch Lenka’s clit as she needed. Instead, she persisted until Lenka had shouted herself into a quiet, happy stupor and then pulled back and used her hand to roughly slam the toy into Lenka, who cried out again before laughing.

Tanith didn’t stop, throwing a leg over Lenka’s to push them back down and sitting on her legs, which were on her chest, to get the best access. Lenka laughed as Tanith make her cry out painfully, reaching her arms up Tanith’s muscled back and dragging her nails down.

As much as she would happily continue doing that until Lenka literally couldn’t use her legs, she didn’t think that was what she had meant by what she said. She stopped abruptly and released her legs so she could shuffle back over Lenka’s face and they could easily satisfy each other.

It was over an hour and a half later, after Lenka enjoyed another two orgasms she shouted up to and then silently choked on with her eyes rolled back into her head, that they came down. Tanith was sedately kissing her large breasts when she finally spoke. “Did I do okay?”

“You did amazing,” Tanith whispered. “When you’re rested we can go again. Are you feeling sore enough?”

Lenka breathed a laugh. “Probably. I can feel the ache inside me. It’s good though. Thank you for letting me practice on you. I know I didn’t make you orgasm.”

“It’s your first time, I didn’t expect you to. We can go slower and I can talk you through it if you like.”

“I’d like that. I’d regret not managing to do it once,” Lenka admitted, her body relaxing into the messed-up bed. “Do you think anyone heard us?”

“I think they might have heard _you_ ,” Tanith smirked. “You were so hot though. I loved hearing you scream my name so loudly.”

Lenka grinned. “That’s funny. They’re never going to let me live that down.”

“They can’t blame you for having fun.”

“Are you okay?”

“Of course. I’m just enjoying your breasts,” she smiled, holding one in her hand. It was heavy, large and beautiful. “In an hour or so it’ll be lunch so we can make burgers and see if the guys have figured anything out.”

Lenka stroked her hair. “Sounds good to me.”

**.*****.**

**_Dexter’s POV_ **

“Do you think they’re finished?” Erskine whispered as they watched Lament furiously pace the hallway outside of Argeddion’s supervision room.

Dexter gave Erskine a look. “You know Tanith. She won’t be done until she’d hungry.”

“I have no idea how her and Ghastly hid so much of their relationship from Valkyrie.”

“She was in her own naive world,” Dexter smirked. “Poor kid. I walked in on them three times by accident as it was. Valkyrie would have died if she walked in on what _I_ saw.”

Another scream from Lenka rattled down the structure, made worse that Lament was torturing himself by keeping the audio of the security on so it echoed again a second later out of the speakers. Dexter was tempted to turn it off but didn’t want to anger him any further. He also wanted to get on with making a decision about Argeddion, but that wouldn’t happen as long as Lament was in this state.

“At least we can taunt her about this later,” Erskine smirked.

Dexter grinned evilly. “I can’t wait to rub it in Ghastly’s face.”


	217. Don't look and it isn't there

**Chapter 217**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

She was back in the same office as the last time she was at the Sanctuary. Militsa had just left after giving her version of events to Bernard Sult, the American Administrator, and Quintin Strom, one of the English Elders. Both of them there on the behalf of the Supreme Council. Meritorious and Elder Feie were also there, along with Skulduggery and herself.

“About how many Necromancers,” Sult said slowly, “do you believe died?”

“There were twenty-eight present when we were brought in, and only left with us alongside our companion,” Skulduggery said in deep monotone. “We were told by the other prisoners that there were more before we arrived but they had been recently removed from the cell and hadn’t been brought back. They believed they’d been killed and I agree.”

“And what evidence do you have of that?” Sult asked, looking down his nose at Skulduggery.

Skulduggery tilted his head. “I was there. As was Valkyrie and Miss Gnosis. You just heard her account. We brought Miss Kage back with us also and she had a spider’s claw in her stomach, one from a Child of the Spider.”

“The doctors have not confirmed–”

“It’s barely been ten hours, they haven’t had _time_ to confirm its authenticity. Where else in Ireland would we encounter a spiders’ claw of that size, a spider with that strength?” Skulduggery asked rhetorically.

“Perhaps not here, but there are in Australia.”

“We weren’t in Australia when it happened. It was in Ireland. We brought her straight to the nearest doctor I knew of,” Skulduggery said tensely.

“Mr Renn,” Strom said casually, “could have helped you though, hmm? He’s a friend of yours.”

“I wouldn’t say friend,” Skulduggery said darkly. “Acquaintance, maybe. Someone I wish to know less, definitely.”

“He took us to Australia,” Valkyrie said before Skulduggery could blow it, “after we called him and asked for his help so we could meet Militsa. He left immediately after taking us to Australia. I have the call logged on my phone. Neither of us called him again until we got to Doctor Synecdoche. That was after we handed off Erembour for surgery. Doctor Synecdoche can confirm that and it’s probably on her security footage.”

The Supreme Council men sat up slightly, thinking of their next absurd rebuttal to try and find some reason to bring their armies to Ireland and _kill_ them.

“If,” Strom said slowly, “we believe you, and you truly did end up in Ireland with a Child of the Spider as an enemy – how is it you allowed so many of these people to die? Your job is to stop that happening, Pleasant, and by your own admission you failed.”

“We did the best we could at the time,” Skulduggery stated. “There was a long way to go and a lot of people to protect. At each turn people were split from the main group, and both of us had to fight and people had to run. There wasn’t a lot we could do.”

Valkyrie clenched her jaw, carefully keeping her face from sneering at him.

“That’s not acceptable,” Sult said promptly. “Twenty-nine people needed bringing out alive and you barely managed two, and one of those is in critical condition! How do you plan on telling the public?”

Skulduggery shrugged. “That’s not my job. In fact, saving hostages is rarely my job. We were never meant to be put in that situation, but considering we were, we did the best we could. What else would you have had us do?”

“Save more people,” Sult said as if it were obvious.

“How?” Valkyrie questioned.

He paused, expecting her to say more, and then soured when he couldn’t think of a way. “That’s not something I know about, I just know you haven’t done well enough here today. Considering Miss Kage is in hospital, we’ll make sure to tell the Supreme Council what happened here today, and we’ll see what the next step for her is. Until then–”

“This is an Irish matter now,” Meritorious said simply.

Both men scoffed. “It is an international problem,” Strom said, “when an Australian minor is critically injured on Irish soil.”

“And is it an international problem when international criminals are responsible for her being held prisoner?” Valkyrie asked. “We were captured in Australia, they’re a part of your Council. They refused to help the Necromancers even when they asked for help and they knew a minor was missing. Are they going to face any consequences?”

Strom looked at her levelly. “It will be investigated. Until we confirm if Children of the Spider are responsible for Miss Kage’s injuries, I don’t want to hear of this again. And to make this clear, if we hear anyone attempts to move on any sort of Child of the Spider home in any country without permission, it will be counted as an offence. You can’t attack possibly innocent people to prove a point. It won’t be done and it isn’t legal. Grand Mage Meritorious, am I heard?”

“I hear you,” he said, mouth pinched.

“I’d also suggest having Miss Cain and Mr Pleasant assessed psychiatrically,” he continued, standing up. “Regardless of whether their story is true, their results are unacceptable, and it shouldn’t be allowed. I’ve been saying this for years, and as have many Sanctuaries around the world, remove the Dead Men from your service. It’s not an acceptable use of Sanctuary power and shouldn’t be done. You’re on thin ice, Meritorious. I want to see changes.”

He took his leave, Sult standing up quickly, tripping over his chair leg in his hurry to follow Strom. Valkyrie tried not to glare at the table too hard.

When they were gone, Meritorious sighed and stood. “I think it’s best you make yourselves scarce from the Sanctuary for a few days. We’ve had a suspect missing person’s report, take that and run with it. Okay?”

He didn’t wait for any type of reply and Valkyrie had to hold in an apology. He was tired, had lost weight, wasn’t himself. He was getting war ready and Valkyrie hated it. Feie followed behind.

They left the Sanctuary in silence. At the doors, Militsa waited for them. Valkyrie jogged ahead and pulled her aside from the door to talk.

“I’m sorry,” Valkyrie said instantly.

“Don’t be,” she replied. Her voice was soft and quiet but strong. “You tried very hard, Valkyrie, and I appreciate it. I’m sorry I was in the way of you fighting. All of us hostages were. We held you back.”

“It’s just how it went,” Valkyrie said simply. “Um, I was wondering what you wanted to do next? You can go back to Australia and I can take you back to your Temple, or I can arrange a safe place for you to stay or get you legal documents to pose as a mortal. Or you’re welcome to stay with my family. Solomon can help you with breaking your ties to your bracelet so you can have a new object and you can stay with the baby and Nadia when they go into hiding. Don’t tell her I said this, but she’s a shit fighter and I know you’re a lot better, so it would be good if anything happened.”

Militsa hesitated. “I’m not sure, Valkyrie. It’s hard to know so quickly.”

“That’s okay. How about I take you to see Solomon and you can go from there?” Valkyrie suggested kindly.

She smiled. “That’ll be nice. Maybe I’ll meet the famous Nadia Robin as well.”

Valkyrie smirked. “Why do I get the impression you two are going to gang up on me?”

“I’d never do that,” she said, stepping away. “Are we going with Skulduggery?”

“Yeah,” she sighed, following her slowly. “I saw Tanith’s bike but she might be using it. I’ll introduce you and I think I’ll have to leave for a crime scene after. I’m not looking forward to that.”

“Is it a bad one?” Militsa asked.

“No, it’s a boring one. Missing person. Not to be uppity and all that but we do big jobs, not one missing person jobs. That’s a small thing. That’s someone running off with their side piece and telling no one. Not nearly the same.”

Militsa sighed and tried a smile. “Try to stay positive.”

Valkyrie wasn’t sure how to reply so she didn’t. They didn’t have a car so they waited for Fletcher, who seemed slightly more rested this time, but he popped to them, took them to Corrival’s, and disappeared again.

“Someone needs to make sure he’s getting days off,” Valkyrie muttered, going straight through to the living room without looking at Skulduggery. “Nadia? Where are you?”

“Baby?” Her voice called in the distance of the large house. “I’m in the kitchen.” Valkyrie thought she might have heard “If that’s you,” but it was too quiet for her to be sure.

Valkyrie went through to the kitchen and smiled at what she saw – Nadia in a loose top and shorts, Laila on the table covered in red goo and the counter she was sitting on equally messy.

“Hi sweet baby,” Valkyrie grinned. Laila out her arms out for Valkyrie to take her but Valkyrie did not. “I can’t pick you up, you’re a messy girl. What were you eating?”

“She had tomato soup and then strawberries and raspberries,” Nadia smirked. “Ghastly’ll be taking her when he’s out of the shower. He just got back from work. I think he was out for thirty hours.”

“Fun.”

“Who is this?” Nadia asked, glancing at the doorway where Militsa was standing.

“This is Militsa,” Valkyrie smiled, waving her in. She took a few steps into the overwhelmingly large and outdated kitchen. Other than the fridge-freezer, she didn’t think Corrival had updated anything in sixty or more years. Not even the microwave. She wasn’t even sure microwaves were around sixty years ago but it was still at least that old. “We had a big mess up with our case and ended up in Ireland. I thought it would be fun for you two to meet since Mil’s here.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Militsa said immediately, sticking out a hand.

“And yourself,” Nadia smiled, shaking it. “Are you both okay? What happened on the case?”

Valkyrie sighed and began, but let Militsa take over when she got more comfortable and started adding things in. They ended up passing off the baby to Ghastly silently and not stopping in their story telling at all. When it finished, Nadia was horrified and she and Militsa were sitting closely on the sofa and Valkyrie on an armchair on the other side of the room.

“That’s awful,” Nadia said. “I can’t believe that happened to you. And poor Erembour in the hospital, I hope she can recover.”

“I think it might be a good idea for me to stick around for her,” Militsa said quietly. The more she spoke, the more it felt like she was letting a great burden out by speaking it. It had probably exhausted her. “It’s awful waking up in hospital with your whole life changed. I want to be there for her.”

Nadia put a hand on her knee. “You’re welcome to stay with us. As long as you don’t mind crying babies, that is.”

Militsa smiled at her joke. “I can cope with that.”

Valkyrie smiled behind her hand. “Come on,” Nadia said, “let’s go upstairs and I’ll find you a room and set it up for you. You must be really tired.”

Militsa silently followed Nadia away, giving Valkyrie a small smile before disappearing. Valkyrie waited and some half an hour of silent musing later, her fiancée reappeared.

“Baby,” Nadia whispered and rushed over to her. She jumped and straddled her and they hugged tightly. “I’m so sorry all that happened. Are you okay?”

“No,” she whispered into Nadia’s shoulder. “Erembour might die. She’s so young and small. It’s not fair.”

“She might be fine yet,” Nadia tried to comfort her. “You never know. What did Militsa mean when she said you and Skulduggery had a fight?”

“He just kept disregarding everything I said even though I was right. And every time I was right, he just didn’t care and told me to focus on the work, which I get, but he didn’t even apologise past a ‘ _well I’m sorry this happened but it doesn’t matter now_ ’ type of thing. He left us there. He left me. I don’t know what happened but it was like I’ve been pretending for the last two and a half weeks that everything’s okay but it’s not. I’m still upset and all that forgiveness and progress we had is just ruined.”

Nadia tutted and stroked her hair sympathetically. “I’m sorry honey.”

“I know. It’s not your fault. I don’t even know if it’s my fault or his. I’m just upset. Because he does have more experience and he isn’t entirely wrong in some of his plans, but they never work Nadia, you don’t even know some of the crap he’s said as a plan before. They’re just ideas of how he wants things to end and then he expects that we just work it out. And when I suggest an actual plan, he veto’s it. But he doesn’t even have a worthwhile plan in the first place. And this time, he did have a plan, but my plan was better and when he just brushed me off and told me off in front of everyone, it was just humiliating. And then he left me with the Spiders and the prisoners and fucked off. And he didn’t come back for hours. He was just ‘scouting around’ he said. What does that even mean?”

“And then you had to get everyone out without him anyway,” Nadia finished for her.

“Exactly. It’s not okay,” she whispered. She closed her eyes and took a deep, calming breath. “How have you been? I’m sorry if I worried you.”

“Other than being utterly distraught you broke your promise, I’m just normal bored at home and tired of babysitting,” she smiled.

Valkyrie frowned and pulled back to look her in the eyes. “What do you mean?”

“You promised me on the phone you won’t get into trouble or get hurt when I said about my dream. And then you went and got into a lot of trouble,” she said softly before leaning in and kissing her lips.

She tried to think of a response at first, but when Nadia’s gently sucked her bottom lip between her teeth and pulled on it, she lost all her thoughts and kissed her soundly. Their moments together had been so short and rushed, peppered with steaming kisses between their time alone that it barely took anything to make Valkyrie desperately want to take Nadia away for a night. Even if they just hid in their bed under the sheets naked so she could feel Nadia’s body against her own. But they couldn’t do that, so their kisses were turning into make out sessions that no one wanted to walk in on quicker every time their lips met.

There was a cough at the door. Nadia tried to pull away but Valkyrie was sick of Skulduggery and didn’t care less what he thought anymore, so she followed Nadia back and kissed her, putting her hands up the back of her loose top and feeling her skin. Nadia couldn’t help but moan when Valkyrie kissed her with just the perfect amount of force and leant her back, and Valkyrie honestly forgot Skulduggery was standing there entirely for a whole moment.

“Christ,” she heard Ghastly whisper, and she did pull away this time.

“I swear to God,” she said, glaring as he walked passed Skulduggery and into the room to settle, “you people need to learn what boundaries are or I’ll find some way to punish you.”

“Seeing you two like that is a punishment to me,” Ghastly said melodramatically, getting on his knees so he and Laila could play with some of her toys now she was clean. “This is a living room, not your bedroom. And it’s Corrival’s house anyhow.” He was more insecure about calling Corrival Pa except with only a few of his brothers. “He doesn’t like that.”

“He’s not going to know,” Valkyrie said. She gave Nadia a pleading look as she got off of her. “Now look at what you’ve done.”

“You say that as if you think I’d care,” Ghastly quipped. Laila let out a shriek and he gave her the toy in his hands. She threw it.

“And what do you want?” She asked darkly, scowling at Skulduggery.

“We have a case to work on. I was wondering if you wanted to accompany me or if you needed to rest,” he said.

She sagged and closed her eyes. “Did you call about it?”

“I did. Patrick Xebec. Elemental. Last seen Friday afternoon. His wife spoke to him–”

“Guys, take the detective stuff elsewhere,” Ghastly interrupted disapprovingly. “Laila’s old enough to understand some of this stuff now and it’s not okay to talk about with her around.”

Valkyrie could see some reason in that so she got up and took Nadia’s hand, and took the conversation through to the next room. Skulduggery immediately continued. “His wife spoke to him on the phone while he was driving and said there were lights in the sky, someone using magic. He told her he was going to talk to the people, assuming it was kids, but no one’s heard from him since.”

“Do we need to talk to the wife?”

“She apparently knows the place he was in when he disappeared and she wants to only speak with a high level detective or us.”

“Even though we’re not detectives anymore and it has nothing to do with us.”

He shrugged. “We’re the best. And everyone else is busy at the Sanctuary whereas we are both in timeout and can pick our schedules better. So I needed to know, do you want to join me or do you want to sleep?”

“If it’s just going to be a job of talking to someone right now, I think I need to pass,” she said, squeezing the arm around Nadia. “It’s been a long few days, a long few weeks actually. I need to sleep. Call me if something happens.”

He nodded once and wished her a happy sleep before leaving. Nadia took her hand and they went up to their guest bedroom. It was all in dark red, even the walls and ceiling, and it was far too much dark. It made her feel as if Corrival’s house was on the extreme end of dark and old, her newly renovated house was going to be as good as the extreme opposite, and the old version of her house had been nicely in the middle.

She sighed and pulled her clothes off. She’d had a shower at the doctors after her check-up while no one had been watching. Once naked, she pulled back the covers and sprawled out. “What time is it?”

“Barely four in the afternoon,” Nadia said.

“Fuck,” she replied, putting an arm over her head. “Where’s everyone else?”

“I don’t know about Anton, Saracen’s currently asleep but he stayed at his Dublin apartment. He texted me and said he was literally on the same street after he handed off the magic mortal he found so he stayed there. Tanith, Dexter and Erskine had to take a big mission that came up because you and Skulduggery were gone. They’re not in the country right now, but I don’t know where they are, it’s a top-secret thing. I overheard someone mention it being to do with the mortals with magic powers and I heard Elder Deuce’s name.”

“What?”

“Yeah, we all tried reaching you,” she said, throwing her clothes on the floor, “but we couldn’t get through so they had to go. I’m sure they’re okay.”

“Yeah but if they wanted me and Skulduggery it’s because it’s a detective thing. And if they sent someone in the last two days it must have been important.”

Nadia shrugged and straddled Valkyrie’s hips. “This scratch is new.”

Valkyrie paused and looked down at her body. There was a mark on her ribs where she’d been kicked by Syn. “Yeah. Militsa sort of brushed over the bit where Syn came in and kicked me. He beat me really bad.”

Nadia looked at her worriedly. “Did you see a doctor?”

“Yeah, I was healed baby. I know it’s scary for you, but I’m really tired,” she said, opening her arms and inviting Nadia to lie comfortably on top of her. “I promise I’m okay. Just a few deep muscle bruises a bath and a healing stone will sort for me. I swear.”

“And he only hit you?”

“And kicked, but yeah. I swear, he didn’t even use a weapon on me,” she said. “The doctor fixed me up immediately, I’m just fine.”

“If you say so,” Nadia whispered into her neck. "Did anything else happen there?"

Valkyrie was quiet for a moment and then spoke. "I thought he was leaving me. At the end. I thought he saw me and was running away and abandoning me. But he led me to a window and helped me out. But I didn't think that was what was happening. And I know he was helping me escape. But I feel... I have the feeling he was abandoning me. Even though I know in my head he wasn't."

Nadia stroked her neck. "Do you want to talk about it? It sounds horrible."

"No," she said instantly, surprising herself. "I want to lie here."

Valkyrie let a few moments go by, slowly relaxing her body using Helena’s meditation tricks to untense her muscles and enjoy the feel of their skin pressed together.

Nadia broke the silence. “Are we going to get dressed?”

“No,” she whispered. “I want to feel you against me.”

“It’s not allowed.”

She smirked. “Since when has that stopped me doing anything?”

“You’re bad,” she said, a smile in her voice.

“I’m yours.”

“You’re so cheesy,” she chuckled.

“Are you okay with Militsa staying here?” Valkyrie asked.

“No, it’s fine. She was a lot nicer than I thought she’d be,” she admitted. “I was imagining someone more like Emily. But I think I can be friends with Militsa.”

“I’m glad. I sort of offered for her to stay through the war. I was hoping she’d keep you company in case it’s you and Laila end up alone,” Valkyrie said, running her fingers up and down the curve of Nadia’s spine. It was entirely fleshed out now, no longer pronounced and skinny. It suited her better and Valkyrie genuinely preferred her fiancée’s body now she wasn’t worried she was too thin. Not that she wouldn’t be attracted to her in any shape, but fear of a loved one being ill wasn’t a massive turn on for her. “She’s really nice.”

“She is. I can see why you dated her.”

Valkyrie hesitated. “That sounded off. Are you actually okay with this?”

“Of course. She’s lovely. It’s just, I guess, a bit confronting to suddenly meet her. But it’s okay, she’s nice. And I don’t mind the company I suppose,” Nadia said, shrugging. “It’s just not what I expected.”

“If you don’t like it then I’ll change it. My only real priority is you, Nadia. I don’t think Militsa would be anything but nice, but if she isn’t, you don’t have to worry what I’ll think if you send her away. I’ll always take your side.”

Nadia smiled and placed a kill on Valkyrie’s neck. “That makes me feel better.”

“Good. I want you happy.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too. So, so much,” she whispered, holding her tightly, grateful for the chance she had to do it again.


	218. Two crime scenes

**Chapter 218**

Valkyrie was woken far too early the next morning, just after five o’clock, after a short eleven hours sleep that left her no less tired than before. A short phone call from Skulduggery told her he needed her ready in a few minutes, and she did just that, leaving a small kiss on Nadia’s lips as she stretched and groaned awake on the bed.

He let her grab an iced coffee on the way, just a cold black with ice and nothing extra, and they continued in the Bentley to their scene in silence.

“Did the wife say anything useful yesterday?” Valkyrie asked, basking in the warmth of the late May morning sun. It was cold outside, only ten degrees, but the sun was nice and she expected it would get warmer by midday. She was looking forward to it. “Or just an address?”

“Only an address and confirmation that Xebec was in the same area as the lights seen in the sky. Whoever caused the lights made Xebec disappear by all accounts. But we’re not going to where Xebec may have followed the lights to.”

“No?”

“No. Only a town over from here, there’s another crime scene. I am curious over whether the two incidents are connected, seeing as those lights could be from a mortal with magic. Initial theories?”

“It’s hard to say. I suppose, some mortal got their random powers. Which is something to do with energy beams or lights. Xebec came to them and they did something to him. If it’s the same person, maybe they went home and killed someone there?”

“My thoughts also. The scene is already a day and a half old, and Sanctuary detectives have looked it over but they haven’t found anything yet.”

“Wonderful.”

When they arrived, the house was already cordoned off with official Gardaí tape, but the men and women standing around were Sanctuary employees or Cleaver’s in Gardaí uniform. Skulduggery walked in first and Valkyrie nodded to a man she recognised at the door. They stepped into the living room.

“Oh God,” he said.

Blood was everywhere. Little bits of flesh and bones, a shred of clothing. And blood.

Feeling an immediate panic, Valkyrie ran from the room on shaking legs, falling into the garden without meaning to and throwing up in the garden flowers. She sat there retching and shaking on her knees until someone ran over with a blanket and bottle of water. It was one of the Sanctuary detectives, and it took her a moment to realise it was Amanda – the woman she’d recommended to Corrival and Meritorious when she left the position of Head.

“Are you okay?” Amanda asked sympathetically.

Valkyrie tried to say something but her whole body was shaking and she couldn’t get a word out. She sat on her knees, taking breaths until Skulduggery came out and knelt on Valkyrie’s other side. It was probably only thirty seconds later, but it felt like days passed. She couldn’t stop seeing all that _red_.

“You don’t have to go back in there,” he said softly, putting a gentle hand on her back. She nodded in response. “Thank you, Miss Ó Hallmhuráin. I’ll message you with any progress we make on the case to keep you in the loop.”

Amanda murmured something about agreeing and gave Valkyrie’s shoulder a squeeze. When she walked away, Valkyrie sat back onto her heels and Skulduggery gave her a hand up and passed her the water bottle. She took a mouthful and spat it out before standing and leaving with him.

She sat back in the Bentley and breathed deeply. Skulduggery broke the voice of Helena in her head by speaking. “The house belongs to a Gary and Rosemary Delaney,” he said, not driving anywhere, “both of whom were confirmed to have been at work when the murder took place. The blood and tissue inside has been confirmed as their eighteen year old son’s, Michael.”

She wiped her eyes and looked at her hand in surprise. “That’s weird,” she said. “I’m crying. I don’t feel like I’m crying.”

“It was a very shocking scene,” he commented, turning on the car. “It’s perfectly reasonable to cry. A young man has long his life and we have a very dangerous killer to find.”

“Yeah.”

“I am working on the idea it’s the same mortal that shot lights in the air, and I’m assuming they killed Patrick Xebec. But this might not be a mortal, and it might not be the same person with the lights, and they may not have killed Xebec.”

“Yeah. Maybe more than one of them too.”

“If it were a mortal, that would be out of pattern.”

“Yeah but the amount of mortals infected is getting higher every day. It makes sense that at some point, they’ll meet each other.”

He thought about it a moment. “I agree.”

She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes as he set off from the curb. “You didn’t spend long in there.”

“I got what I needed. So did you.”

“I only glanced in.”

“And that was enough. You’re a good detective Valkyrie. How was he killed?”

She sighed softly and closed her eyes trying to envision the scene through a filter of green. “He was ripped apart.”

“But how? Claws? Was he ripped apart by the killer’s bare hands?”

She shook her head as he waited for a family car to pass and pulled out behind it. “No. There were no footprints in the blood. If there had been someone in there, physically attacking him, they’d be footprints. They’d probably leave blood drops leaving the house too, and I didn’t see that. So it wouldn’t be whoever did the lights.”

“Unless the lights explode people.”

She stayed quiet at that, not wanting to begin retching in the gorgeous Bentley. She didn’t deserve that. But then she frowned. “Well no, if it was a beam of energy like mine, it would have passed through him and left scorching.”

He nodded approvingly. “Good, I was testing you.”

“So it can’t be the same mage or, likely, mortal that Xebec found, so there’s two separate killers. And we can’t know if they’re working together or not.”

“I think that’s a good assessment of the situation.”

“So where to next?”

“I’m not sure. The magic testing came back fairly general, and if it’s a mortal… I think it’ll be smartest to remain in the area and wait for more information. Perhaps we’ll get another light show that’ll take us right to them. There’s a diner not far from here, we’ll get you some real breakfast.”

“And hopefully Tanith, Erskine and Dexter get back soon too,” she sighed and closed her eyes, letting the gentle movements of the Bentley lull her into some sense of normality. “Having them as backup might not be a bad idea of these people can explode us.”

**.*****.**

**_Elsie’s POV_ **

Doran laughed like a maniac as his brother Tommy shoved passed him to look out of the window next to the front door. Seeing his car engine, which he’d lovingly restored, with more care than she thought he’d ever shown another human, spread out across the driveway and front garden. He’d worked for months on it, Elsie remembered Doran mocking Tommy for it to his friends. It had taken Doran a matter of moments to dismantle it with his powers.

Tommy sagged so quickly he had to grip the windowsill to stay upright. His eyes were wide, his mouth open. He had gone a dangerous shade of pale.

Doran was doubled over laughing. Tommy spun, his face contorted with utter, utter rage. He ran at his younger brother, fist arcing downwards to catch Doran full in the face. Doran fell back, still laughing. Tommy started lashing kicks in, and with every kick Doran would just laugh harder.

Finally, after trying his best to beat Doran blue, Tommy fell backwards, panting hard and confused as Doran sat up like he didn’t have a care in the world.

“Oh,” Doran said, wiping the tears from his eyes, “oh man, that was funny. The look on your face. I’m going to remember that as long as I live.”

He got to his feet without any hurry. Tommy scrambled up.

Elsie felt bad for Tommy. He was horrible and a bully. He had bullied Doran every day they lived together and it was probably one of the reasons Doran wasn’t that nice. But he didn’t deserve to get what he was about to suffer. No one did.

Tommy shoved Doran again. “What did you do to my car?”

“Same thing as I’m going to do to you,” said Doran, grabbing him.

And just liked he had pulled apart the body of the car with his bare hands, he pulled apart poor Tommy’s body.

By the time Doran was done, Seán was so still and so pale he looked dead. Kitana laughed as Elsie hurried from the room. She burst out of the back door and threw up in the garden. Tears ran down her face but her mind was strangely calm. Despite the horror of what she had just witnessed, her thoughts were clear.

There was a low wall at the other end of the garden. Elsie climbed over it and walked away. She didn’t bother running. It would be another half an hour before they noticed she was gone.

**.*****.**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

Valkyrie went up for her order at the McDonald’s and got her tray with her three hashbrown’s, double bacon and egg muffin and a side of pancakes with burger patty’s and syrup. She’d gotten a little kid’s bag of fruit for the road too, to make sure she remained healthy. It felt almost like a pretty balanced diet when her orange juice was included.

She sat herself down with Skulduggery. She began eating, trying her hardest not to think or look around too much, though her eyes were drawn to some kids sitting on their tablets and eating chicken nuggets, mesmerised and happy while their mother scrolled on her phone in exhaustion. A whole other world to hers.

“How are you feeling?”

“Hmm? Grand, I’m grand,” she muttered. “You good?”

“Yes, thank you. You didn’t seem alright in the car so I wanted to ask.”

She grunted and opened her orange juice.

“You aren’t as talkative as usual.”

She shrugged.

He sighed. “I am sorry if my actions yesterday and the day before were harsh, Valkyrie, or if I did anything else to upset you. I was focusing on the mission, but I am aware I sometimes brush over your feelings when I’m focusing too hard. Is there anything you’d like to talk about?”

She shrugged again and took a bite of her English muffin sandwich.

He didn’t say anything for a time as she chewed. “I would be easier if you spoke to me, you know,” he said quietly. “I can understand if I have done something wrong that I need to apologise and work on not doing it again, but if you don’t tell me why you’re upset, it’s difficult for me–”

“Stop,” she snapped, putting down her food unhappily. “You’re a smart man, Skulduggery, I shouldn’t have to tell you that brushing off my feelings upsets me. I’m not saying you can’t make good plans or I can’t be wrong in the field, because I know that isn’t true, but when at every corner you disregard my thoughts, it does upset me. You know that Militsa lied about what Syn did, right? He did,” she stopped herself suddenly, wet her lips and leant in to hide her face behind her hand and whisper. “He didn’t punch me a bit, he beat me until I could barely breathe. He kicked me hard enough to break bones. And when I do that for you, I sort of expect you to do more than scout the area and think up plans. I expect action. So after I went through all that pain, I then had to stand up and get out as many people as possible without you. So what did you do? How did you really help me? My plan got us out, and barely. I get that you were also fighting The Torment, but if you were with us we might have never even had to fight him in the first place.”

He nodded slowly, taking it all. “So the issue is less about me not listening to you, and more about me not being there.”

“Yes – no – I –” she tried to say and then stopped entirely. “I don’t know.” She pronounced her words with forced calm. “I suppose that fits.”

He nodded and held his hand out on the table. “I’m sorry for not being there when you needed me, Valkyrie. You were hurt and afraid and I wasn’t by your side.”

She glanced at him and back to her breakfast before shrugging lightly. “Sure.”

He waited to see if she’d take his hand but she picked up her sandwich instead and took a dry, painful bite. She was happy for the apology but something about the situation still hurt. She wasn’t even sure what she wanted him to have done differently considering she didn’t think he was actively being slow or leaving her to suffer. She was just hurt anyway.

She was halfway through her pancakes when Skulduggery’s phone went and he stepped outside to answer it. Valkyrie watched him out of the window as he nodded and thanked the person with his facade in place, before he hung up and came back inside.

“Another scene, like the last.”


	219. The Accelerator

**Chapter 219**

**_Dexter’s POV_ **

“How much do you know about Roarhaven?”

Dexter and Erskine sat in the mountain facility’s living room around the large table with Lament, Accord and Plight. Tanith and Lenka were not there, something Dexter was sure Lament was acutely aware of. It had taken him hours to calm down enough to ignore them and call this meeting.

He sat back and put an arm over the back of his head. “I probably don’t know whatever you’re about to tell me.”

“You’re aware there was once a coup in Roarhaven to take over the Sanctuary and use their own building to make a new Sanctuary?”

“Yes, vaguely.”

“That was just the start of it,” Lament explained. “From what we’ve gathered, the Roarhaven mages had much bigger plans. Did you know that since the end of the war with Mevolent, hundreds of sorcerers from all over the world have gone missing?”

“Sorcerers go missing all the time,” Dexter shrugged. “ _You_ went missing.”

“Very true,” said Lament, “but we didn’t meet a representative from Roarhaven right before we disappeared.”

He frowned now. “You’re saying the Roarhaven mages have something to do with it?”

“I’m not sure, but it seems that way. They got their way in the end, after all. The Sanctuary’s in Roarhaven.”

“Yeah, but that was voted in. It means nothing. The Elders chose to move there.”

Plight shrugged. “We’ve been tucked away for thirty years, we don’t know the ins and outs of the situation. However it happened, it happened. The Sanctuary is now in Roarhaven and so is The Accelerator.”

Lament sat forward. “Scientists talk. We share ideas and discoveries and theories. I would never have been able to build something like the Tempest or the Cube Argeddion is in without talking through aspects of it with people more intelligent than I. Through this talk, I came to learn a man named Rote was asking questions to do with boosting the Accelerator to an incredible degree. We believe he perhaps got to a point where it would be able to give an insane amount of power to everyone worldwide – enough to turn bullets to dust and without limitations. If it ever went off, all of civilisation would cease to exist how it does today. And Sorcerers, who know how to use their magic, would be the dominant race. Unlimited powers and the ability to use them.”

“And you’re sure it exists? In Roarhaven?”

“We think it’s right under the Sanctuary itself,” Lament said positively. “We could bring it online.”

Dexter immediately sat up. “Why would we want to do that?”

“So we can harness its power. Not to give magic to all of mankind, but to use it to power Cubes like the one Argeddion’s for centuries without any input from other people. We could have the room and space and time to have a dozen people with True Names safely locked away before they hurt anyone, without needing to kill them. It’s perfect.”

Dexter thought about it for a moment and then sat back. “And how would you even go about that? If we can’t go near it for fear of it sending magic to everyone, or whatever else it could do? If you can’t leave?”

“I haven’t thought that part through yet,” he admitted.

He sighed and thought it over for a moment. “I think it would be a good idea for us to ask someone to look for the Accelerator in the Sanctuary and work from there.”

Erskine was happy to call Corrival with their findings to subtly mention the Accelerater to him, and he left.

“Do you mind,” Dexter asked suddenly, “if you show me how you hook up to the Cube? The one to monitor Argeddion?”

Lament’s eyebrows went right up. “That’s not a possibility.”

Dexter sagged. “Right. I was just curious to see how it happened, I don’t want to be hooked up.”

“Like I said, it’s–”

“Tyren,” Accord said with a shake of his head, “he’s not going to do anything.”

Lament frowned deeply at him. “That’s not the point.”

“It’s exactly the point! We won’t have guests for much longer, and Dexter knows exactly how important it is to keep Argeddion locked away. We might as well let him see the things he wants to. It can’t hurt anyone.”

Lament soured but Plight nodded in agreement. “I need to monitor him right now. I would be happy for Dexter to watch.”

Accord and Plight got up and welcomed Dexter to follow, which he did before Lament could say anything. They walked over to the monitoring room and Lament came in behind them a few moments later. Plight sat in the desk chair to observe while Accord encouraged Dexter through to room Argeddion was in.

Accord and Lament stayed on the first side of Argeddion and Dexter slowly walked around the small, clean room, looking over the machinery and stepping over a pipe to get on Argeddion’s other side.

“This is the gadget Lenka–” Lament tried to hide a grimace at Accord’s use of her name but failed “–made for us to observe Ageddion’s brainwaves. We have another on the outside, but it isn’t as detailed as this one. I simply put it over my eyes, sit back, and do my work.”

Dexter nodded interestedly and waited for Lament to help Accord get the wires attached to the large scuba sized goggles ready. When he was behind Accord and neither of them were looking, he shoved the long pocket knife through Argeddion’s eyeball and into the back of his skull.


	220. Kitana, Doran, Seán

**Chapter 220**

They arrived at the house in Ballinteer. There were a handful, only four, of Cleaver’s disguised as police, making sure no one got too close. Philomena Random, a Sensitive that could make people believe anything she said, was talking to a news crew. By the time Valkyrie had stepped out of the Bentley, the news was packing up and heading away without filming a single frame.

Valkyrie let Skulduggery go inside alone, her stomach queasy at the idea of re-seeing what she had before. She waited at the door until he came out.

“Same killer?”

“The method is different but the result’s the same,” he said. “This one was done by hand. The victim was thrown about the place like a rag doll. Plenty of footprints. Sloppy. Angry. Sadistic.”

“So we can be sure we have more than one killer.”

“If this murder is connected to the others, then I think we have at least two killers working here, maybe more. This has all the hallmarks of a gang urging each other on. Each murder is more savage than the one before. Each time it gets more personal.”

“Any idea why there’s a car dismantled and spread out of the driveway?”

“None whatsoever.”

“We need to find the link between the victims,” Valkyrie said. “What was his name?”

“Thomas Purcell. Tommy. Twenty years old. Apprentice electrician. Mother absent, father works nightshifts, isn’t home from work yet. Younger brother Doran, seventeen.”

“Maybe he could help us,” she suggested. “If Tommy had any enemies, anyone he was having trouble with, his brother likely knows.”

“Maybe. That is if his brother is in any state to talk.”

“Is he here?”

“Geoffrey’s talking to him in the garage. See if he can be of any help. I’ll take a look around outside.”

Valkyrie nodded before going to the garage and looking in. Geoffrey Scrutinous was sitting on a crate talking to a boy dressed in baggy jeans and a hoody. Geoffrey’s hair was its usual wild and frizzy self, but he looked exhausted. She knew he was just as overworked as everyone else, rushing all over the country to stop people from noticing magical activities. Geoffrey’s job was one of the most important of all.

“You can feel yourself calming down,” Geoffrey said. “You’re calm and you’re clear. Oh, hello, Valkyrie. Valkyrie Cain, this is Doran Purcell. Doran lost his brother today.”

“I’m very sorry,” she said.

Doran looked up at her. Geoffrey’s routine had worked wonders. Doran looked remarkably calm.

“It’s okay. Thank you.”

“Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”

Doran smiled. “You’re my age. What are you doing, acting the detective?”

“I just want to talk to you and see if you can help us find out who did this terrible thing.”

“Right,” said Doran. “Terrible. Yeah. Sure, ask away.”

“Thank you. Do you know who might have wanted to hurt your brother?”

Doran nodded. “Oh, yeah. Yeah, I got a good idea. Everyone who ever met him.”

Valkyrie blinked. “I’m sorry?”

“My brother was a cunt. He was a bully. He’d bully whoever he could get away with bullying. He had loads of enemies. Everyone wanted to hurt him. I’m telling you, they’ll be a load of happy people today once this gets out.”

“Are you happy Doran?”

“Me? No. He may have been a bully but he was still my brother.”

“Did he ever bully you?”

“Yeah.”

“That must have been tough.”

A shrug.

“Do you know who did this?”

“No. I got home from school, came in the back door and went straight up to bed.”

“Do you have any suspects?”

“Like I said, he had lots of enemies. Could have been anyone.” A sliver of a smile played across his mouth and disappeared. “You know who it could have been?” He asked, leaning forward. “Mark Boyle. He was Tommy’s best friend, ever since they were little. Mark was as bad as Tommy. They might have had an argument about something and it got out of hand.”

Valkyrie nodded. “Alright, well listen, I need to begin searching for Mark then. Would you be alright here for a moment?”

“Go get him,” Doran shrugged.

Valkyrie smiled and thanked him, and approached Skulduggery.

“I think we have our killer,” she whispered quietly, facing away from the street so no one would see and panic.

Skulduggery’s false eyes flicked over her shoulder to Doran.

“He might be in shock,” she said, “so I might be reading this completely wrong, but he’s practically dancing with joy that his brother’s dead. And he seemed really happy about suggesting it was his brothers’ friend that did this. Both his brother and the brothers’ friend bullied him so I think he wants to set him up. And he smells of fresh soap.”

“He’d need to have had a shower to wash off all that blood,” Skulduggery murmured. “Then it’s another of the strange mortals for sure. If there are others he’s working with, he can tell us.”

“Yeah, except this mortal seems like a sociopath.”

“It was going to happen eventually. We can’t try to arrest him here, his powers are too violent and he’s too unpredictable in a public space. We need to get him isolated.”

“So let him go and follow him?”

“Exactly.”

**.*****.**

Valkyrie sighed as Skulduggery pulled up outside of the coffee shop Doran had just gone into. She asked him to get a coffee while he was in there, which he said he’d do and sat back. The very second he closed the rental car door, her phone rang.

“S’up,” she greeted.

“Valkyrie, we have something,” Corrival said on the other end.

“To do with the mortals?”

“Something else,” he said. “I want you to come in for a meeting as soon as you can. We’re getting Kenspeckle in to help but know there’s been a disturbance at the Sanctuary. Also, the others will be home soon.”

It took a moment for her to understand his broken code but realised he must have meant Tanith, Erskine and Dexter. Why he was using code was beyond her but it made some sense considering the Supreme Council barely let him sleep let alone talk alone.

“Sure, thanks for telling me. I’ll come in soon I suppose. We’re on a lead for three murderers right now so–” Skulduggery suddenly got thrown into the street through the coffee shop window “–and Skulduggery just got sent through a window. See you soon Pa.”

She hung up immediately and jumped into the driver’s seat. She turned on the car and swerved out into the road. Skulduggery staggered to his feet. Doran and two others, a boy and a girl, stepped out through the broken window behind him, grinning.

She reached over and pushed the car door open and Skulduggery jumped through, and she immediately hit the gas. A stream of sizzling energy took out the wing mirror. She swore and looked into the rear-view mirror right as a ball of energy hit the back of the car and sent it spinning.

Her head rang and she heard Skulduggery saying her name, telling her to move, as blood dripped up her face. They were upside down. She had bitten her tongue.

Some sense slowly came back to her and she forced herself to get out of the car, digging glass further into her cut hands as she struggled.

Doran Purcell and his friends were approaching, walking up the middle of the road, laughing to each other. Skulduggery appeared besides her, gun in hand. He fired and the boys went to run but the girl stopped them. The air in front of her had turned a hazy shade of blue – a protective bubble to keep the bullets out. The girl giggled.

Both of them jumped behind the totalled, upside down car as the boys threw energy beams at them, and Skulduggery shot at them again.

“We need to leave,” Skulduggery said to her lowly. “If we’re gone they’ll stop attacking. There are too many people here to fight.”

Valkyrie nodded. “Should we fly?”

“We’re too easy of a target in the air. We need to run.”

“I’m ready.”

Skulduggery nodded once, holstered his gun and snapped his palm out to the window of a bookshop parallel to them. The air rippled and the glass smashed. He clicked his fingers, summoning flames.

She gave him a nod and Skulduggery stepped out, sending twin flames towards Purcell and his friends. The fire swarmed over their force field, unable to get through, and Valkyrie used their lack of sight to dash across the road and jump through the window. She tripped on something and almost went headfirst into a bookcase but kept herself up and running. She glanced back. Skulduggery was right behind her.

Then a stream of energy seared through his chest, lifting him off his feet and he fell. Collapsed on the floor.

“No!” She screamed, running back to him, grabbing his arm, pulling him after her. “Get up! Get up!”

“I think I killed him,” the blonde girl said, walking in. “Oops.”

Valkyrie narrowed her eyes and stood to her full height. She towered over the five-foot, four inch girl by a full foot, and she was easily six and four inches taller than the boys individually. And significantly broader. The boys still had their male teenage testosterone muscle, giving them some strength but she was still much more muscular than them. They were normal teenage boys. The boy that wasn’t Doran had a little bit of weight to him that would make him more difficult if only for him being physically heavier for her to overpower. But other than that… they were normal non-magic kids. With superpowers.

She didn’t have the right to kill them or potentially give them brain damage, but she did throw a beam of her own energy at them, hitting Doran in the stomach. He yelled out painfully and jigged like he’d been electrocuted before falling on his backside. The other boy gaped for a moment before sending a beam of energy at her which she stepped out the way off before sending a much lower powerful shot at him, sending him flying back from the sting. She girl barked a laugh of excitement and threw herself at Valkyrie.

Growling, Valkyrie easily flipped the short girl to the floor and started sending hammer shots at her. Her powers may have been too much to send at non-mortals and minors, but she was more than allowed to beat them.

The chubbier boy, who in actuality wasn’t that chubby, just heavier, jumped on her back and they stumbled into a table. She kicked at his leg, stomped on his knee, cracked an elbow into his jaw. He went down and Doran stood in his place, his face blotchy with fury. She hadn’t seen someone as angry as him in a long time, perhaps ever, and even she had to admit it was intimidating.

He hit her, a punch swinging from her blind side. Doran forced his way towards her and she relented some steps before her back suddenly felt the wall. He threw his body forward and held her back with one hand and punched her with the other. She didn’t want to kill him, or kill anyone, but she could see Skulduggery on the floor beyond Doran unmoving so she hit him in the throat with all her strength. He gagged and dropped. She turned and kicked the girl in the face with all her anger as she tried to stand up.

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Valkyrie surged to Skulduggery. She turned him on his back. His facade had melted away, he wasn’t moving and when she went to move him, she heard a chuckle from behind her.

“Did you really,” the girl said, “think it would be that easy?”

She whipped around but Doran moved faster than she could see, his fist slamming into her side like a truck. She was lifted off her feet, the breath rushing from her lungs, and went stumbling into the larger boys’ arms. He picked her up with ease, held her over his head and threw her into the bookcase. She hit a shelf and then the ground, books raining down on top of her, and something grabbed her ankle. The boy was dragging her across the floor. She tried to throw her magic at him but he had a force field now. And it deflected her magic.

Growling, she kicked at his hand with her free leg and escaped his grasp. He turned his head into her right hook, and she caught him on the hinge of his jaw. It should have sent him to the ground. He barely stumbled.

Her eyes wide at the comprehension of how strong these teenagers were, and Doran grabbed her in a bear hug from behind, lifting her in the air. She kicked him with her steel sole shoes in the knees and he grunted and let her go. She elbowed him exactly at the hump of his nose. He cried out in pain again but didn’t go down. She’d taken out men three times his size and a hundred times his strength and skill with that move. He only cried out.

The other boy was back again and he punched her. He didn’t know how to punch but he put so much strength behind it, it didn’t matter. The room whirled and Valkyrie felt the back of her thighs against a desk.

“I like your jacket,” the girl said. “Doran, Seán, get it for me.”

Doran thundered towards her and Valkyrie jumped over the table to stay away from him. He pushed it into her and she grunted at the pain. He climbed onto it to jump on her and she sent in flying with a shove from her magic.

Something blurred and the other boy, Seán, hit her again. She fell to her knees and he kicked her with more strength than he had any right to, sending her flipping. He kicked her again and it felt like her whole body was breaking. She tried to take in a raking breath as Seán crouched down, unzipped her jacket and yanked it off of her.

Thinking it wasn’t worth continuing the fight, she groaned and tried to lie on her side, but Doran’s foot found her side and smashed her ribs. Valkyrie found a breath and screamed.

Seán threw the jacket to the girl and she put it on. “Oh,” she said, “I like this. Oh, I like it a lot.”

Valkyrie tried to curl up into a ball, but every movement made her scream louder. Smashed bits of bone were sticking into her lungs, threatening to pierce through. She wrapped her arms around herself protectively, feeling the little jagged bits of rib poking through her skin.

“What’ll we do with her?” Doran asked with a grin.

“I don’t care,” said the girl. “Just kick her to death and be done with it.”


	221. The gangs all here

**Chapter 221**

Valkyrie was angry and in a lot of pain. Kenspeckle had been too busy to heal her, so she’d been treated by Doctor Synecdoche very rapidly. The moment she woke up she asked about Skulduggery, who was also sore but standing and well. He’d been okay enough to drive them to Corrival’s once a new rental was dropped off outside.

“Here they are!” A woman’s voice called excitedly.

Valkyrie raised her eyebrows at Skulduggery, who painfully shrugged back, and they walked pitifully slowly into the front parlour of the mansion. On the high backed, dark and faded sofas were Dexter, Erskine and Saracen, Tanith, Nadia and Militsa, and four people Valkyrie had never met before. Laila was in the arms of Tanith and the woman, a petite blonde girl, was kneeling at Tanith’s feet and seemed to have just stopped entertaining Laila.

“Hi,” she said roughly, limping into the room. Her hip had been smashed in four places and would take a while to fully heal. “Nadia.”

Nadia stood and very gently wrapped her arms around Valkyrie’s waist. “What happened?”

“I got fucked up.”

“Again?”

“Uh hu.”

“Sit down,” Nadia said softly, getting her to slowly lower into the over padded armchair. “What happened?”

“There’s three teenager mortals that got superpowers, but they’re all sociopaths. They messed me up and Kenspeckle’s too busy to help so Doctor Synecdoche operated on me but I literally woke up an hour ago so I’m in pain still.”

“Yeah, I’d imagine so,” Nadia frowned. “Do you want a cup of tea?”

“I’d love that,” she said sincerely, giving her a small smile. Nadia asked around the room and everyone agreed to tea. She left to get it.

“Skulduggery,” the dark-skinned man grinned, standing and shaking Skulduggery’s hand. She doubted anyone other than her saw the slightly pained turn of his head. “It’s good to see you again.”

“And yourself Vernon,” Skulduggery nodded. “How have you been? Not to be rude, but I thought you were dead.”

“Ah, yes, that was intentional. You’ve missed out on some important things,” he said, offering Skulduggery his seat. To his credit, Skulduggery took it, a testament to his pain and his willingness to take the help.

“You’ll have to catch us up.”

That began the saga of learning that Dexter, Tanith and Erskine had tried to reach herself and Skulduggery but, as they hadn’t been able to, had gone to the Alps to locate Argeddion, who was a superpowered human through finding out his True Name, and was supposedly the one responsible for giving mortal’s in Ireland magical abilities. At the base Tyron Lament had set up, with Vernon Plight, Lenka Bazaar and Kalvin Accord, they had found Argeddion, who was unconscious. None of the four were able to leave the base as they had to keep Argeddion safely secured. Lament had told them about the Accelerator, which they believed could be used to create a larger facility that could hold multiple people that knew their True Name or were too superpowered to allow to remain in society, which had been the reason Valkyrie had been called by Corrival about an incident at the Sanctuary. At this same time, Dexter had been allowed to observe Argeddion up close, at which point he had betrayed their trust and killed him by stabbing him in the brain and swirling the knife around so no god-like powers could fix the damage.

“And you didn’t get mad?” Valkyrie asked incredulously.

“Oh yes, I was furious,” Lament nodded. “However, once I removed myself from the situation and calmed down, I realised I felt different. As if something had been overshadowing my thoughts for a long time. My thinking and thought patterns shifted and I was able to deduce Dexter, Erskine and Tanith were correct when they suggested that Argeddion was doing something to the mortal’s here in Ireland. I think he was doing something to myself as well. And my co-workers. He was influencing our thinking and our actions and when he died, it stopped.”

“Oh, wow,” Valkyrie said.

“Indeed. I was hoping this meant the powers of the mortals would have disappeared, but Dexter spoke with an Elder some hours ago when Mr Renn was helping us relocate to Ireland discreetly, and it doesn’t seem to have helped.”

“The mortals,” Skulduggery interjected, “weren’t necessarily given powers, but rather access to powers they already had. I expect that now it is awakened, it cannot be hidden.”

“What do you suggest doing with them?” Vernon asked.

Skulduggery shrugged. “There is nothing we _can_ do. It's the Sanctuary’s problem. With hope, they’ll ask the other Sanctuary’s to help them in making a decision to appear more cooperative.”

Lament nodded and Laila made a sudden shriek as Tanith removed Lenka’s hair from her tight fist. “You can’t pull hair,” Tanith whispered to her. “That’s not very kind.”

“I don’t mind,” Lenka grinned.

“No, it’s not okay,” Tanith reiterated. “Let go.”

Laila squealed again, but in anger this time.

“Let go,” Tanith said patiently, trying to pry Laila’s tiny fingers open. Every time she let go of one to work on the next, it went straight back down. She looked across Lenka’s head and at Valkyrie before huffing a breath out like a growl.

Valkyrie chuckled painfully, and everyone began laughing as Tanith struggled with Laila until the baby finally dropped the hair by herself. Tanith thanked her and there was a moment of silence before Laila threw herself at Lenka’s head.

“Oh my god!” Lenka cried, falling back.

Tanith held Laila up, out of reach of Lenka’s hair. “Baby! That was so naughty!”

“She’s a ninja.”

“She would be a good ninja,” Valkyrie nodded, accepting the tea Nadia handed her. She gave her a sweet smile that was returned before Nadia began handing out drinks to everyone else. “I’m going to go upstairs if you don’t mind. I’m too tired for any political talk, and I can feel it coming.”

Nadia nodded with her and Tanith decided to follow with Laila, and that meant all the women in the room ended up leaving the men to be boring. She felt like one of them should remain for the principle of being involved, but didn’t both to say anything. It wasn’t like they were forced to leave, they _choose_ it, so it wasn’t bad. She wondered, as she very achily pulled herself up the steps, how many drugs were still in her brain.

“So Valkyrie,” Lenka began when they were in one of the upstairs informal living rooms. A dozen lounge chairs were in there and Valkyrie lay down immediately to rest her body. Nadia put a big pillow on the floor next to her head and held onto her tea for her. She smiled at Nadia and they gently kissed. “What’s it like working with the Dead Men?”

“Tiring,” she said. “Difficult. Rewarding, most of the time. It can be hard but I love working with my brothers.”

“It’s so sweet you and the Dead Men are so close,” she gushed. “I always wanted older siblings, it’s like a dream of mine.”

She grinned. “They’re alright. Saracen once gave me a headlock takedown and almost killed me, so brothers aren’t always great. I’ve loved having a big sister though, Tanith’s the best.”

Tanith grinned at her. “Ah, you’re cute.”

“She did once break both my arms at once though.”

“Which was an accident!”

“It was on purpose because I called her fat when she sat on me. So she broke my arms. I was thirteen.”

Nadia smirked. “I remember this.”

“You weren’t there, she’s fed you lies!” Tanith laughed. “It was an _accident_!”

Valkyrie shook her head. “She’s in denial because she doesn’t want to admit she’s fat.”

“I swear to god, Val,” Tanith smiled. “You’re the worse. Little sisters are the worst.”

“Nah, big brothers are the worst.”

She nodded. “Agreed. Do you need any pain medication? You don’t look so hot.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, carefully rolling on her side to have some tea. It was awful, but the tea soothed her a lot. “Were you guys okay the last few days? Hey, did you settle in fine Militsa? I’m sorry for disappearing immediately.”

“It’s okay,” Militsa said politely. “Me and Nadia have been talking and I helped with the baby. It’s been fun.”

“I’m glad,” she nodded.

“Your baby’s so cute,” Lenka grinned, holding out a finger for Laila which she batted away. “I wish I could just snuggle you forever!”

“She’s a sweetheart,” Tanith said proudly. “You can hold her if you want.”

Lenka grinned and held her arms out and Valkyrie watched as Tanith sat back and watched the cute woman hold Laila carefully and hold her like she was standing up. Laila looked around, kicked both her feet and demanded to be set on the floor. Lenka looked like she might refuse so she could cuddle for a moment – Valkyrie didn’t blame her, everyone in Valkyrie’s family wanted to cuddle her and not let go – but then released her. Laila laughed and began crawling at incredible speeds, and Lenka crawled after her. They crawled out of the room.

“She seems nice,” Valkyrie said mildly.

“She is,” Tanith said.

Valkyrie narrowed her eyes at her. “You have feelings for her.”

“No, not like that,” she dismissed quickly.

“Yes like that. You like her.”

“I like her as a person.”

“Did you sleep with her?”

“Well, yes.”

“Already? You’ve known each other for three days!”

“Well, about four days, but I suppose. There’re no feelings between us. Lenka already said when she found out she was getting to leave the facility that she doesn’t want a relationship,” Tanith explained. “I don’t want to make too many plans for after the war, but if we all get out alive… I suppose it’s something I could consider. Asking her out, I mean. I have a date with someone else anyway.”

“Oh my god, Tan, I swear it was yesterday you were saying you’d never date again!”

“Hey, the date’s only casual and sex isn’t a commitment so it’s hardly a thing,” Tanith grinned. Militsa covered her mouth to keep from laughing. “I’m just having fun outside of work and being a mum. Is that acceptable?”

“Yeah, of course, I just wasn’t expecting to come back to you being all mushy with some girl you just met,” Valkyrie smirked. “I’m going to tell her you fancy her.”

Tanith rolled her eyes. “Sure. Go for it.”

She hummed. “You’re shameless, you know that?”

“Of course,” she said simply. “Why would I be ashamed for liking sex? Isn’t that the point of it?”

Valkyrie snorted a laugh only to tense painfully and let out a pathetic “ow” that cracked everyone up.

When she was done having everyone mock her, she spoke again. “How did Fletcher react to Lenka?”

“In his usual way,” Tanith said with a one shoulder shrug and an evil glint in her eyes. “He flirted with her and got rejected. He tried to ask me out again but then said ‘Oh wait, you have a baby. Sorry I forgot,’ and Lenka slapped him across the face. It was great.”

“Ha! He deserved that,” Nadia grinned. “He tried flirting with Militsa too.”

“He did,” she nodded. “I told him I wasn’t interested and he didn’t believe me.”

Valkyrie frowned. “Was he pushy? He’s been a dick before. Feel free to break his nose.”

“Don’t worry, I can tell him to leave me alone,” she reassured her. “I already spoke about it with Nadia and she explained what happened with you.” Laila and Lenka came crawling back into the room excitedly. “I still can’t believe he said that to Tanith though.”

“I think it was the way he genuinely thought I’d be offended over him asking me out rather than the baby comment. He really didn’t think it was wrong to not want to ask me out over my baby, but didn’t care about asking me out in general,” she mused. “He can be quite immature when it comes to women.”

“You can say that again,” Valkyrie rolled her eyes. “At least he’s getting over Myra.”

“Yeah,” Nadia agreed.

“What’s the next step on your mission, Val?” Tanith asked.

She took a deep breath and watched Laila hand Lenka a delicate glass jar from the fireplace. “We just need to find them before they can… end anyone else. They really are sociopaths though. They’re scary, more scary than anyone I’ve ever met. They have no sense of consequences, no care of ending people. They’re seriously powerful and they can think up new powers at a second’s notice. They created a force field to stop bullets and my magic instantly, they can heal from anything, they are physically stronger than they should be, they can fuel their attacks with magic to have more force behind them. They completely overpowered me instantly. We need to get them alone and away from everyone, and then take them out.”

Nadia gently ran a hand over her hair. “You should have called me in the hospital.”

“I was unconscious,” she admitted quietly. “They left when they knocked me out and I didn’t wake up until right before I left for here. I’m sorry for getting hurt.”

“It’s okay,” she sighed, running a hand over her cheek. “You need to be more careful though.”

“I always try my best.”

“I know.”

Tanith made a gagging motion behind Nadia’s back and Valkyrie glared at her. “Fuck off Tanith.”


	222. Her mental state

**Chapter 222**

**_Nadia’s POV_ **

Stretching and yawning widely, Nadia strained her arms out towards the other side of the bed to try to find Laila. She slapped her arms around a few times before cracking open a groggy eye and seeing from the light coming through the curtains of her room that she was alone in bed.

She hadn’t woken up alone in a week. Laila was always with her, and when she wasn’t, Nadia generally fell asleep downstairs, dropping off the moment Laila was taken by one of her parents.

Yawning again, she forced herself to throw the covers back. It was warm in the room, and it felt like it must have come from the sun outside. She was almost naked from last night. Valkyrie had been tired and in a lot of pain but she enjoyed sleeping without clothes and Nadia rather enjoyed it too. They had at least worn underwear to respect Elder Deuce. Although she very much doubted he’d be impressed by their bending of his rules.

She grabbed her towel and went to the bathroom, taking the unexpected free time to wash, shave for the first time in weeks and pluck her eyebrows before finally sighing and deciding she’d wasted enough time went back to her room to dress. She’d missed her last few therapy sessions and she could feel a lot of her progress undoing. Looking after Laila constantly was difficult, and she felt the constant stress Valkyrie was under. It was difficult – trying to help Laila grow and holding her whole life in her hands, fearing someone would come and kidnap them again, or kill them outright. The pit in her stomach that came back at the same moment she felt relief and joy that Valkyrie had gotten home. She knew enough, was smart enough, to know that she associated Valkyrie with difficult conversations. With terror and pain and anxiety. Her job was difficult and Nadia wanted to keep her head above water but it was grating on her mental health faster than anything had before. The pressure of being a full time caretaker not only made it worse, but made her resent her position at times. Resent her choices.

She wore a bra and a crop top, skirt and sandals. It was perhaps a little showy, but Nadia didn’t mind. It was cute, it was hot outside, and it made her feel a bit better about herself. And since Laila wasn’t with her at least for the next few minutes, that meant one of her parents had her and Nadia could do what she wanted for the first time in a long time. Even if she didn’t have Valkyrie with her.

She took her engagement ring and put it on her finger before opening the large curtains and shamelessly admired it in the sun. Valkyrie had truly found her a gorgeous ring. Her mother had switched hers twice in the years since she married her father. Simply updating it with the styles of the time, and with her new financial situation. But Nadia couldn’t imagine changing the diamond flower on her finger. It was incredible, sparkled wonderfully, and was unique.

Sighing a final time, she fixed a smile on her face and left her room to find Laila.

She ended up being in the kitchen, sitting on the table and attempting to eat porridge with her hands. She was covered in it.

“Hey Tanith,” Nadia smiled kindly. “How are you this morning?”

“I’m alright, thanks,” she said, sipping her tea. “Did you sleep well?”

“Yeah, it was good. Where’s Valkyrie?”

“She already left with Dexter and Skulduggery. They’re going after those teenagers with the powers from Argeddion.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Are you okay, Nadia? I can’t imagine how hard this is on you,” Tanith frowned.

She threw a grin at her. “What? No, I’m fine. Are you going to be here all day? I was thinking of visiting the renovation and I need to go over the library with the carpenter and Gordon,” she said, grabbing a glass of orange juice. When it was hot, she struggled to eat breakfast. She’d make up for it with a large lunch and some snacks though. She was proud of her weight gain and felt ten times better where she was now. For a few weeks she’d felt gross, as if she was too large for her skin, but then she got settled into her patterns and bought clothes – with Valkyrie’s hard earned money – that weren’t two sizes too small, and now she was happy with herself. She ate as and when she wanted, at a healthy weight. None of her bones showed and her collar bone was no longer pronounced. “Gordon’s worried the new house won’t have enough room for all the artwork he has.”

“How much does he have?”

“Over a hundred pieces. More than he had hanging up before the renovation started,” said Nadia, leaning against the counter. She didn’t sit down even when Laila moaned at her to sit. Her clothes were too nice for Laila’s messy hands! “To be honest, I’m not sure how much we’re going to keep and he’s getting sort of upset with me over it.”

“He’s generally quite laidback,” Tanith commented slowly. “Maybe he’s just struggling with losing control?”

“Mm,” Nadia nodded. “I suppose it’s the first time he’s had to give up so much control since he died. It’s, like, a visual thing, isn’t it? He can’t escape the change or control any part, and he’s upset.”

“That doesn’t mean he should take it out on you though,” she said softly. Nadia nodded at her orange juice, the hypocrisy keenly obvious to them both. “Did you decide what to do with the garden?”

“Oh, yeah, that was a few weeks ago. They’ve started it already. It’s so close to being finished, except for the glass actually growing obviously. We decided to keep it natural and just seed it. It saves thousands of euro’s and it’ll only take a few weeks for all the grass to grow in. It’ll hardly stop weeds from growing anyway so it doesn’t matter.”

“We’ll have to get into gardening,” Tanith joked.

“I really want to,” Nadia smiled. “It’ll be like a hobby. I want to get some broccoli seeds. Have you ever seen a broccoli flower? It’s so pretty! And bee’s love it. I want to have some beehives and ladybug hides too. I’m not organising any of that until the inside stuff is done though.”

“Yeah.”

“I need to order the new mattresses too. I think I have the company decided, I just haven’t done it.”

“That’ll be good. Make sure you’re taking breaks too. I know looking after Laila can be tiring. Thank you for caring for her so much, by the way. I do really appreciate it. And so does Ghastly.”

“I know,” she nodded. “It’s okay, I don’t mind.”

She smiled. “Well, I still appreciate it. After all of… I’d like to make it up to you. And to Valkyrie. Neither of you had to help me so much with Laila, but you’ve done so much. It means a lot to me.”

She put her drink down and hugged Tanith from behind, not letting Laila get her hands on her. “It’s okay. I really don’t mind. You’re Valkyrie’s sister, and I love Laila. Just tell me all your gossip and stay alive and I’ll keep doing it.”

Tanith laughed. “Sure, I can do that.”

Lenka’s and Militsa’s voices filtered through the house and they separated. Nadia put on the kettle just as they came in. Lenka immediately gushed over Laila, who was glad to finally have some more attention on her considering how utterly deprived she’d been when Tanith and Nadia had been talking, while Militsa helped her with the tea. At some point, Aine called her to talk and before she knew what was happening, she’d agreed to visit the renovation with them all and they were getting in the car together to meet Aine at the house.

The heat of the sun was wonderful on her skin; it made her miss India. She wished she’d had more time to truly appreciate that. She knew Valkyrie would love it in India. And when she had made up with her family and they liked Valkyrie again, she knew they’d visit almost every year and soak up the sun. It was a nice, comfortable fantasy she liked to enjoy sometimes.

“It looks amazing,” Militsa gasped.

“The front is just about done,” Nadia commented, looking around Laila and out of the window at the treeline. They’d added some new trees along the edge of the woods in a straight line to make a significantly more pruned look, and the front garden between the house and front wall was now entirely flat up until the house itself, which had a single raised, tiered flower bed against the house, and one below that where it became flat, giving them two flower beds. Trees lined the front wall at a safe distance for growing in safely, primarily trees that wouldn’t lose their leaves in winter for privacy, alongside rocks, taller oaks and other trees, bushes and shrubs. There was another flowerbed along the whole wall, lined with rocks like all the others, although smaller since there as it wasn’t a tier, and it would grow in to have a much more wild look over the years to come. She was going to add a beehive and bird boxes. Massive patches of dirt remained, where dirt had been added and removed to make it flat. Luckily for the price, it hadn’t been too bad at the front, just a few little bumps and holes they shuffled around. “They haven’t put in the flower boxes on the windows.”

“Aw, that’ll look so sweet,” Militsa complimented.

“Thank you,” she smiled. “I want to see if they’re done with the extension at the back.”

They piled out and there was a lot of explaining Nadia told them about, pointing things out, and Aine joined them from her taxi, silently smiling and waving her greetings.

Around the left of the house, they could immediately see the side had been tiered with dirt they’d finally been able to bring onto the property and spread. Large rocks had been artfully placed. Flowers and shrubs would be added to the thin areas soon, and the larger areas would be lawn. A few trees had already been placed, and the handful that were already there were either protected with tape or now completely cut down and removed so they’d have more light into the windows, which was of course a must. They had at least planted twice as many as they’d removed which made Nadia happier.

The extension was obviously finished from the outside, and it made Nadia grin. They walked around it and enjoyed it, before walking around to the very back of the house. There was a small extension, just large, protruding glass windows that let in lots of light in the morning when the sun rose. It would be a beautiful sunroom with plants, and a gorgeous junction room between the library, ballroom and outside entertainment area in the future.

They’d already had new windows over the whole house and had it repointed the last time it was renovated a year ago, but there had been even more updates since then. The back roof was lined with solar panels, for instance, and the outside now had a massive entertainment patio laid out with a gazebo, outside furniture and firepit. Further away, next to the natural spring pond four wide tiers up near the treeline – which had been chopped back into a relatively neat curve so it fit more beautifully – there was a pool house so they could change there. There was a bar building for entertaining outside that they could stock with some drinks for the outside, or stock more fully for parties. Around the corner near to the trees, there was a smokehouse Anton had asked for.

They had considered an outdoor pool, but decided it was far too cold most of the year to make it worth it and they’d just get one they could put out on the concrete tiles when it was warm and put away the rest of the year. A children’s pool, essentially. Nadia had never been allowed one as a child, because her parents hadn’t been keen on ruining their grass with it, so she was excited to get one now.

“We’re still waiting on the swing set for over there,” Nadia said, pointing to one area by a standalone tree in the garden. “But they have put in the log swing on the big oak.”

“I like the little bench under that tree, that’ll be nice to sit at,” Lenka smiled.

“Yeah, I think we’ll get some good pictures over there. It’s coming together really fast now,” she agreed. “Let’s have a look inside.”

She got her large set of keys and went through the new kitchen door. The new kitchen had been a point of minor controversy. At first, they weren’t going to change it at all as Valkyrie had had a nice new kitchen installed right before they had reunited, and none of them wanted to be wasteful by destroying it. But then with the remodelling ideas from the professional designers, they agreed to widen the room – not to make it any longer, but to deepen it into the house so it had less of the oversized galley kitchen feel to it and make it more open. They were going to just push the back cabinets backwards with the wall, without ruining anything.

Big windows had been installed and the left wall had been removed to open the room into an informal dining area that had more big windows and would one day have a long table in the centre for them all to eat at together. But even that plan had changed slightly. Nadia and Erskine had been worn down to the point they agreed they didn’t like how the kitchen felt when it was larger with their original – or before the second reno, anyway – kitchen cabinets, and before they knew it, they’d convinced Anton to let them sell the kitchen cabinets and counter to someone online who took it the next day, and they’d had a whole new kitchen installed.

Now, it was white marble counters – or something that looked like marble but was far hardier, as the maintenance needed for marble was more than any of them were prepared to deal with – with dark sage green bottom cabinets and lighter sage top cabinets. The backsplash was hexagon marble-style tiles that went from the counter to the bottom of the top cabinets, there was a massive oven in the centre of the back wall with a large six ring, electric hob on top, plus extractor above and spaghetti tap. The very tops of the cabinets had a secondary cabinet above them that had glass panelled doors so they could display things, and they had a long new island. There were two kitchen sinks, and a five foot wide fridge next to a five foot wide freezer. And over to the right of the room, not far from one of the entrances in, which came from a hall leading from the orangery for the staff should they ever have a party, was a door going into the new pantry. They were a family of currently nine, with Elder Deuce to likely join them when he wasn’t working so hard in the future, and all their friends constantly visiting, and potentially Fletcher if he chose to stay in the future. They needed a lot of food space. And Nadia was already in contact with a professional organiser to make sure the whole kitchen and pantry were perfectly prepped for their move in.

“It’s so bright!” Tanith exclaimed.

“Yeah, we have a lot more window space now,” Nadia nodded. “And more white. And I think there’s twenty-two can lights in here alone.”

“That’s a lot of lights,” Lenka said softly, looking around appreciatively. “You’re going to be able to fit so much _food_ in here!”

Nadia couldn’t help but laugh a little. “Yeah, it’ll be good! The carpenters working on the library are going to be making some custom bits for us like the table later. They already finished the kitchen, as you see. I want to see if they’re done with the staircases.”

Together, they went through the house and found the almost finished rooms to admire. Some of it was still very much not done, but they could look at a lot of little bits that were finished. Most of the electricals were finished entirely, though not all of the bulbs were in, nor all of the switches and sockets installed. The main staircase was not finished at all, but one of the back staircases was finished so Nadia took them upstairs and they looked around their rooms. It was still hard for her to envision fully. Some rooms looked gigantic for what they were going to be, but others felt too small without furniture and she didn’t know how they’d fit it all.

“You’ve done a really good job planning,” Tanith complimented as they looked around her mostly finished apartment. All the upstairs doors were missing and only half the plumbing was done. They were waiting on a lot of appliances. She’d been told there was a working toilet downstairs all the workers were using though, so at least there was that. “The baby’s room is massive!”

“It’ll be something she can grow into,” Nadia agreed. “And I figured once she’s not sleeping in your apartment or Ghastly’s, you can turn it into whatever space you want.”

“You could hang all your Yeti furs,” Lenka grinned.

Tanith grinned wickedly. “Fuck yes.”

“What happened to no swearing around the kid?” Nadia teased.

Tanith put her hands over Laila’s ears. “She’ll never know.”

While the house was exciting in many ways, it wasn’t home yet and there was only so much looking they could do, so they left to get some early lunch together. They found a nice little café not far from the house on Tanith’s phone, which Lenka was loving using and seemed to be in a constant state of about-to-pull-it-apart-for-science, and they drove over. It was on a small farm, with their own ice creams, most of the food grown by them, and a small play park next to the parking. They were seated and Nadia instantly looked over the menu.

“I’ve been craving an egg mayo sandwich,” Nadia muttered, looking at the lunch items. “But there’s a soup.”

“I think it’s broccoli,” Aine told her.

“I love broccoli.”

“That’s a strange thing to love. I’ve never known anyone to not just tolerate it.”

“Well. As long as it isn’t over-boiled,” she shrugged. “Over-boiled broccoli is what they serve in hell. What are you thinking of having?”

“Probably a panini.”

“Mm, that’ll leave room for ice cream after,” she smiled, turning to look at the front of the shop. Only gossiping older mortals were currently there. “Oh, wow, the cakes are massive!”

“I’m not sure they’re quite diet friendly,” Aine said as drily as she could. There was a deep regret in her voice that spoke volumes of how much she’d love to break her diet. “Maybe next time.”

“I’ll let you have some of mine,” Nadia said kindly. “If it’s not your cake, it’s not your calories, right?”

Aine cracked a smile. “Maybe I’ll try it.”

Laila squealed loudly from Tanith’s arms, gaining them some looks of annoyance and joy from the elderly people sitting around them. They all ordered and enjoyed light conversation, staying clear of any difficult conversation. As they ordered and waited for their food, it was easy for Nadia to keep up conversation and smile, but as their food was placed and they began to eat, she could feel herself flagging. Militsa and Aine were in conversation about mortal and sorcerer universities while Lenka and Tanith were chatting as if they are on some private date while Laila happily tried to eat every bit of food she could get her hands on. It left her with her thoughts.

She almost got through the entirety of lunch pretending to be incredibly interested in her food to stay out of conversation and got herself a homemade ice cream waffle cone with one cream and one cherry scoop. The ice cream did lift her spirits before Militsa spoke up.

“Nadia, I was hoping to go and see Erembour this afternoon. Would you mind coming with me? I’m not confident I could get to the hospital myself.”

“Oh sure, I’d be happy to go with you! We can get some flowers for her on the way if you like,” she replied instantly, plastering a smile on.

“That would be nice,” Militsa agreed.

They split from Aine, who was going to a lesson with her tutor, and Lenka, Tanith and Laila who were going back to Corrival’s together, and took a taxi over to Doctor Synecdoche’s practice. Nadia was saved from talking again by the driver who talked both their ears off, and then Doctor Synecdoche’s nurse only allowed one person into the room to see Erembour, who was now awake but in pain. Nadia waited in the front entrance for her, texting her friends.

When Militsa was back, she was smiling sadly.

“Is she alright?” Nadia asked.

“I think so,” Militsa nodded. “Do you mind if we go straight back to Elder Corrival’s house?”

“Sure. I’ll call a taxi.”

Nadia did that while Militsa went to the bathroom for a moment to calm down her nerves. She was gone right up until their new taxi pulled up, and they got in. This driver was perfectly silent from the moment they got in, using the offered address Nadia had put into the app so they didn’t have to interact at all.

Nadia was suddenly overwhelmed with how incredibly awkward it was. She and Militsa hadn’t had to be alone. Or, at least, they have been alone but they had had immediate topics of discussion then. Such as Militsa having just been kidnapped and liberated, and then they were talking about rooms and renovations. But now they had exhausted most of their conversations. And were sitting in a car together.

“Militsa,” Nadia started suddenly. “I never asked, do you need any help contacting your family?”

“Oh no, er, my family died a while ago,” she nodded.

Nadia took a small breath and nodded back. “Right. Um, is there any friends I could help you talk to?”

“Um, not really. I don’t have any.”

“Oh,” Nadia said, looking down at her lap. She wasn’t sure if her face was getting flushed or pale from the embarrassment. “Well, you always have me and Valkyrie now.”

Militsa smiled. “You’re sweet. Me and Valkyrie spoke some in Australia and that was nice. It would be fun to go out and get tea every once and a while. Though with the state of the world right now…”

“Yeah,” Nadia finished. “When it’s better.”

“Sure! Although, hopefully I’ll be in teacher training by then. I’d like to do that.”

“That’ll be good. And you’ll meet lots of people that way and make a lot more friends.”

“Yeah. I’m looking forward to that aspect of it. University should be a good thing for me. I’m not sure where I’m going yet though.”

“Oh, I’ll help you have a look when we get back. I don’t have all of my perspective guides anymore, but I can get my friends to send pictures of the course information you’re interested in.”

“That would be really nice,” Militsa smiled happily. “Have you thought about going?”

“Hmm, I used to. But I’ve changed what my, er, hobby is now,” she said, once again refraining from mentioning magic. Militsa seemed to understand and nodded. “So I think I’d do a different course from what I used to want to do. I’m still interested in business and my whole family is full of different entrepreneurs and company owners, so I’ve always sort of thought I’d go that way, but maybe not. Then again, Valkyrie wants me to think about looking at running her family businesses later in life.”

“That would be a good job,” Militsa commented.

“It would. And it would be nice to help out. But it feels a bit like nepotism.”

“Yeah, but as long as you work hard and have someone to answer to so you have goals and stuff, it’s not so bad, right? For you at least.”

“I mean, I understand what you’re saying, but I still feel weird about it.”

“I suppose that’s fair,” Militsa agreed. They pulled onto a main road and sped up. “Have you found a dress for your wedding? I asked Valkyrie about the wedding stuff, but it feels like you probably have more of a hand in it.”

“Oh yeah, Valkyrie’s fairly romantic and sweet, but she’s not into the organising them part. I’ve looked at some dresses online and some venues, but nothing too serious. It’s sort of hard when I don’t really know how long it’ll be until it can happen.”

“I get that.”

“I think I have a few ideas of what I _don’t_ want though. I don’t want to wear a suit, I don’t want a vail over my face, I don’t want to do it until my parents accept my relationship with Valkyrie. That type of stuff.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t realise your parents weren’t accepting,” Militsa said, suddenly sad for her.

Nadia took a moment to catch up mentally before her eyes widened. “Oh no, that’s not what I meant! They’re accepting of us being you know,” an eye flick to the driver, “but they don’t like Valkyrie as a person so they don’t accept our relationship.”

“Valkyrie mentioned something like that when I met her.”

She sighed softly. “Yeah. I imagine she did. The whole thing was such a mistake. I’m… well, I’m glad she had you at that point. I mean, not like, romantically. Not to say I’m blaming her or anything! I saw someone too! But I’m glad she had someone to talk to. About… things.”

“Hey, it’s okay. She was a sweetheart, and if I’m honest, we mostly talked about our schooling and you.”

“You did?”

“Oh yes. She said from the start she was still, at the time, trying to get over you and had feelings for you, but I still held out hope I suppose. Not intentionally, she’s just a great person so it happened naturally. I won’t lie, it hurt a little at the time since I had a few self-esteem issues, but I’ve gotten over my feelings now. I just want to have some friends and enjoy the time we have together. I’m happy to help look over wedding plans with you for fun too.”

Nadia smiled warmly. “I’d really like that.”


	223. Splitting up the Players

**Chapter 223**

**_Valkyrie’s POV_ **

“’Sup,” Valkyrie said in monotone, leaning against a cabinet. “You found something?”

“We have information about the three teenagers you and Pleasant fought in the bookshop,” the lady said. She’d learnt her name years ago, forgotten it, and been told half a dozen times since and yet still continued to forget it. She was always nice, so Valkyrie liked her even if she was, for some reason, unable to remember who she was. “Their names. Kitana Kellaway is the girl, seventeen years old. You’ve been introduced to Doran Purcell, and the other boy is Seán Mackin. All three are seventeen with six months in age difference between the oldest and youngest. We’ve traced the murder with a lot of blood you saw directly before Thomas Purcell to be a young man that once dated Miss Kitana Kellaway, and we’re under the impression the young man broke up with Kitana some weeks ago and she’s held a grudge since. They apparently had a loud shouting match outside school teachers broke up.”

“Matches her personality,” Valkyrie muttered. Skulduggery nodded out the corner of her eye.

The woman whose name she still forgot continued. _Per_ -something. Or maybe it started _Par_? She didn’t know. “We know the school they go to now and they haven’t attended in the last week and a half so it’s assumable they’ve had access to these new powers since then.”

“That would make some sense. We’ll need to have some undercover people watching the school,” Skulduggery said.

“Miss Ó Hallmhuráin already had us ask the receptionist to call us if any of the three turn up, and there’s cars in the area for immediate action,” she informed them. Miss Ó Hallmhuráin being Amanda, Head of the detectives and other law enforcement officers. “There’s another thing. There’s usually a fourth member of their group.”

Skulduggery and Valkyrie stood straighter. “There was a fourth light,” Valkyrie said quickly.

“That was my thinking from the reports we have also. We found out that the fourth person, a girl named Elsie O'Brien also their age, hasn’t been seen in just as long. We don’t know where she is. She’s usually with the other three teens.”

“She could still be hanging around them but not in public,” Valkyrie said softly, thinking.

“Or she could have split and ran,” Skulduggery continued for her.

“Or they killed her. Or she killed herself by accident with her powers.”

“All ideas. Unfortunately, I can’t help you much more than that. We did find the home address for Elsie O'Brien, but she apparently isn’t home much and her parents don’t seem the most attentive. They’re going through a divorce at present and from the notes we got, it’s a rather messy one. Both parents seemed to be under the impression she was with the other and had no idea she was missing for the last fortnight.”

Valkyrie wrinkled her nose and Skulduggery thanked the lady for her help. Valkyrie copied as they left her office.

“So, we track down Elsie O’Brien?” She said.

“Yes, but first I wanted to go to see the newly rediscovered Accelerator before we leave the Sanctuary,” Skulduggery said.

“Oh yeah. Didn’t Erskine say something about that causing damage?”

“I remember something about an incident when it was found but I was admittedly distracted.”

Valkyrie nodded and ran a hand through her hair only to notice it was coming loose from its tie and pulled it out to redo it. “Is Kenspeckle working on it?”

“I believe so, as well as everything else the Sanctuary has him on.”

Valkyrie fixed her hair as they walked, using passing glass to check her reflection as they went until they got down to where the Accelerator was. When they got to the open door, Skulduggery raised his fist to knock politely but hesitated when he noticed Lament and Lenka in hushed argument.

He glanced at her and she awkwardly cringed, looking between the arguing pair, Skulduggery and behind her into the empty hallway they could disappear into.

“Oh, Pleasant,” Lament suddenly said, ruining her getaway. She pretended she was shuffling instead of taking a quiet step out of view as she had been. “Valkyrie. I didn’t see you there. Did you need something?”

Lenka flicked her hair and took a deep breath as she looked over a large, open topped box full of wires that might have been connected to buttons when it was fully assembled. Though Valkyrie really couldn’t be sure when it was all apart as it was. She looked angry. “We were just coming to see the Accelerator,” Skulduggery provided.

“Ah, I see. Well, it’s here.” Lament turned and went around the back of a big box-like podium and it sounded like he kicked something across the floor.

There was a pause before Skulduggery filled it. “Right.”

“You can come in,” Lenka said, throwing them a smile. “Don’t worry about him, he’s just stressy. Is there anything you want to know about it?”

“Everything that’s happened so far, really,” Skulduggery said, taking some steps in but staying back from the wires, tools and sheets of metal around.

“Well, you know it was made back when this Sanctuary was built. And it was rediscovered when Tyren, Vernon and Kalvin told Dexter and Erskine about it, and they told your Elders. Elder Deuce and Meritorious came to look at it and triggered some activation codes when they did, and it set off some sort of trap at the same time. I’ve looked and it wasn’t anything to do with the machine though, it was something added by someone else. It was created by Doctor Rote, did you know? He was really talented. I don’t know if I know enough to inactivate his machine. But Tyren’s been doing some digging, and he thinks that Doctor Rote made a separate machine to control the Accelerator.”

“Oh? That sounds important.”

“I think it is. It’s called The Engineer, with a capital on ‘The’. I assume it can tell us how to work this thing.”

“Okay, and I presume that is something exceptionally easy or something exceptionally hard to find.”

“I’m betting on hard,” Skulduggery said, putting his hands in his pockets.

“We don’t know where it is right now,” Lenka said seriously.

“So really hard,” Valkyrie nodded. “What does this thing even do?”

“It blows up the entire solar system, or maybe more,” Lenka said casually, looking back at the box of wires. “It works by taking magical energy from the ‘Source of All Magic’,” and she said that phrase in a mocking voice, “to power itself. It’s been dormant until recently so I don’t think it’s been used but seems to be in working order. In theory, Doctor Rote’s notes indicate it can take that energy and put it in other people to give them a boost.”

Valkyrie and Skulduggery both paused. “Oh shit,” Valkyrie said, looking at the podium thing with a small amount of nervousness.

“That’s not unlike the Magicae Furem Device,” Skulduggery said quietly.

“I’ve heard of that from Doctor Kenspeckle. It seems to have some similarities, but it’s not exactly the same. The Magicae Furem Device, if it works the way we assume it does, takes people’s magic and transfers it either exactly as it is taken with that type of magic limiting it and puts it in another person, or else it just takes the power itself and gives the receiver that. If it’s just the power, it’s similar, yes. But the Accelerator would be way more powerful. It would give people god-like powers every time.”

“Why would Doctor Rote make something like that?”

Lenka shrugged. “I don’t know. I just have to figure out how it works and stop it. Tyren might know, but he’s being a baby right now.”

“I am not,” Lament’s sulking voice came from behind some things not far away.

“You are.”

“I just don’t think you’re making smart decisions right now.”

“You’re judging me on something that has nothing to do with you. So stop being a baby about it.”

“I’m trying to look out for you.”

“You don’t need to do that. I have my own eyes. And they work really good. I’d know, because Doctor Kenspeckle looked in them with a really bright light and he said they were good.”

He sighed and Lenka looked over her shoulder in Lament’s general direction with a frown before slowly going back to what she was doing.

There was a sound behind them and Valkyrie turned a few moments before a Cleaver came in, followed a few moments later by a haggard Meritorious, with more Cleavers at his back. Him not being allowed to wander without escort indicated how on edge he was. He wasn’t someone she’d ever viewed as _weak_ or _worried_. He was strength and power and that was all. “Pleasant, Cain. You’ve broken in again. What do you think?”

“Is it breaking in yet?” Skulduggery asked.

“Technically, I think. But I really don’t have the energy to care what the Supreme Council think of the Dead Men. I would like both of you on finding The Engineer, but we still need to put focus on finding our three newly gifted teenagers.”

“I agree,” Skulduggery said, crossing his arms.

“I want to put yourself, Skulduggery, and Tyren on finding where The Engineer ended up. Valkyrie, I need you to continue focusing on the teenagers with your brothers.”

“We should work together on the teenagers,” Skulduggery argued immediately.

“That would be ideal, but the Accelerator has solar system ending properties, so I think it might just be a little important,” Meritorious said somewhat rudely. “We don’t have enough people power to keep our best people together right now. This is how it needs to be.”

Valkyrie frowned but nodded. “It makes sense but these teenagers are literally supercharged crazy people. We’re going to need a lot of people to keep it out of the way of mortal populations. Especially since they probably think this is a great game.”

Meritorious nodded but shrugged. “We’ll do what we can as we can. You always have the Sanctuary’s support, and things are getting easier now we aren’t getting new reports of magic from more mortals, but we’re still stretched too thin. With any hope you’ll corner them and the stars will align and everyone will be free at the exact moment to help. But you know how that goes.”

“It doesn’t tend to happen.”

“Precisely. I want to leave Bazaar on figuring out what she can on the Accelerator until then, and keep Kenspeckle on the mortals and his other tasks he’s graciously helping us with, and I know Valkyrie, you are capable of dealing with these children. I have confidence in you.”

“I’ll try my best,” she nodded.

“I know. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get back to work. If we can’t secure more Cleavers or Reapers soon, we’ll have to resort to Hollow Men. Which is not a good look.”


End file.
